{"id":1537,"date":"2014-12-20T11:44:48","date_gmt":"2014-12-20T11:44:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.stmarys-tallaght.ie\/site\/?p=1537"},"modified":"2014-12-24T00:39:10","modified_gmt":"2014-12-24T00:39:10","slug":"commentary-4th-sunday-advent-b-21st-dec-2014","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.stmarys-tallaght.ie\/site\/commentary-4th-sunday-advent-b-21st-dec-2014\/","title":{"rendered":"Commentary on 4th Sunday of Advent (B) 21st Dec 2014"},"content":{"rendered":"

Today\u2019s commentary is given by Fr Donagh O\u2019Shea OP (http:\/\/goodnews.ie<\/a>).<\/p>\n

When the prophets of Israel spoke of God’s intervention in human history, they imagined it as another thunderous event like Exodus or Mount Sinai.\u00a0 No one imagined that it would be an event so hidden in ordinariness as the conception of a child.\u00a0<\/p>\n

There are many stories in world literature about the disappointment of expectation when the reality appears.\u00a0 The first play I ever saw in a theatre was called Professor Tim<\/i>, an elderly and wealthy American whose return to the old country was eagerly awaited by his family.\u00a0 Their disappointment was extreme when he arrived.\u00a0 He staggered around day after day with a whiskey bottle, making caustic remarks about everybody.\u00a0 He was quickly ostracised by everyone (but perhaps there was one exception, probably a local down-and-out; I can’t remember).\u00a0 At the end of the play he suddenly revealed that it was all an elaborate game to find out what they were really like.\u00a0 He disinherited the lot of them, and left all his wealth, I suppose, to the one person who didn\u2019t reject him.\u00a0<\/p>\n

All such stories have some resonance of the Incarnation.\u00a0 Mount Sinai or such would compel your attention; it would affect you powerfully but would not sift your spirit or test your depth.\u00a0 It would match your expectation, and would therefore not bring you to a new awareness.\u00a0 It would be all ‘out there’, and to that extent only a spectacle.\u00a0 We have a great hankering for religious visions and transparent messages.\u00a0 Our religious sensibility is deeply affected by television and the cinema.\u00a0 But the Incarnation comes closer to us than any spectacle; it comes behind the eye, so to speak.\u00a0<\/p>\n

I spent some time once in a Cistercian monastery.\u00a0 Monks have many choral Offices throughout the day, three of them being at 6 am, noon and 6 pm.\u00a0 As they stood in choir, waiting, facing the altar, the Angelus bell was rung.\u00a0 I expected that they would recite the Angelus, but instead they stood there in silence for a couple of minutes.\u00a0 It was deeply affecting. The Word became flesh\u00a0 –\u00a0 this<\/i> flesh.\u00a0 The Word entered our world silently, unobserved.\u00a0 “When peaceful silence lay over all, and night had run the half of her swift course, down from the heavens, from the royal throne, leapt your all-powerful Word” (Wisdom 18:14-15).\u00a0<\/p>\n

In Nazareth the Catholics indicate Mary\u2019s house as the place of the Annunciation, while the Greek Orthodox indicate the site of the village well.\u00a0 Nobody knows where it took place, but the symbolism of both places is very affecting.\u00a0 The kitchen and the village well are the most ordinary places in a most obscure village.\u00a0 \u201cCan anything good come out of Nazareth?\u201d Philip asked.\u00a0 Yes, the greatest of all.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Today\u2019s commentary is given by Fr Donagh O\u2019Shea OP (http:\/\/goodnews.ie). When the prophets of Israel spoke of God’s intervention in human history, they imagined it as another thunderous event like Exodus or Mount Sinai.\u00a0 No one imagined that it would be an event so hidden in ordinariness as the conception of a child.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1539,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[45],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1537","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-commentary"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.stmarys-tallaght.ie\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1537","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.stmarys-tallaght.ie\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.stmarys-tallaght.ie\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.stmarys-tallaght.ie\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.stmarys-tallaght.ie\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1537"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.stmarys-tallaght.ie\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1537\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1593,"href":"https:\/\/www.stmarys-tallaght.ie\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1537\/revisions\/1593"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.stmarys-tallaght.ie\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1539"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.stmarys-tallaght.ie\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1537"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.stmarys-tallaght.ie\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1537"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.stmarys-tallaght.ie\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1537"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}