Parrhesia
HOMILY for 3rd Thu (I) per annum
Heb 10:19-25; Ps 24; Mark 4:21-25
Every morning we gather for Holy Mass, and whenever we receive Holy Communion, we “enter the holy places by the blood of Jesus”, through his flesh, we come before God, the Triune God. It may seem like we receive the Eucharist into our own bodies, and so God comes to us, or that we unite him to ourselves. But recall these words of the Lord recounted by St Augustine, “You will not change me into yourself like bodily food; but you will be changed into me”. The Eucharist, therefore, makes us like Christ, it unites us to him and so he is the Agent, it is Christ who changes us, elevating our relationship with God, so that together with him, “through his flesh”, through this “new and living way” that is the Sacrament of the Eucharist, we can enter into communion with the living God. And we do so with confidence. This word, parrhesia in Greek means, in the words of the Catechism, “straightforward simplicity, filial trust, joyous assurance, humble boldness, the certainty of being loved.” (CCC 2778)
How marvellous it is to ponder again this wonderful and beautiful truth: Because of Christ’s incarnation, and his coming to us in the flesh, in this Sacrament of the Eucharist; because Jesus unites us to himself in this Sacrament, so he has opened for us the way to God, and now we have access to God through him. Baptism into Christ has washed us and purified us of sin so that we can now come before God “in full assurance of faith”, and we come before God as his own beloved sons and daughters, with confidence, with parrhesia. Again, because I think we all need to hear this repeatedly, through Christ and with Christ and in Christ we can come to God with “straightforward simplicity, filial trust, joyous assurance, humble boldness, the certainty of being loved.”
This certainty, this faith, this assurance of God’s loving mercy and the gifts of his grace to sanctify us and save us from sin is not the same as presumption. But rather, it is the lifting of our eyes and our hearts to God our Father, turning to him with “filial trust” so that we desire more and more to conform our lives to Christ’s, and show by our way of living and acting that we are God’s. As St Ambrose says, “Suddenly you have received the grace of Christ: all your sins have been forgiven. From being a wicked servant you have become a good son… Then raise your eyes to the Father who has begotten you through Baptism, to the Father who has redeemed you through his Son”. For we have been restored to his likeness by grace, and so we must respond to this grace. We respond by drawing near with confidence, with parrhesia, and asking the Father for his gifts, confessing our weaknesses and failings but so remembering our utter need of the Saviour. And “he who promised is faithful”, and so he acts through the Eucharist and the other Sacraments, and through the gift of his Spirit to save us, to change us into himself. We can hope in the promises of Christ. So, in this passage there is reference to the virtues of faith and of hope.
And finally, in the final sentence there is reference to the virtue charity, to the works of love that we should find among us, within the communion of the Church: “Let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works [and] encouraging one another”. May this reminder from God’s holy Word of what God does for us daily, and may this daily Liturgy and our prayers together, and our fellowship in the refectory and elsewhere increase true charity among us.
