Twentieth Sunday of the Year

Twentieth Sunday of the year

‘I have come to bring fire to the earth, and how I wish it were blazing already’

Fire has many properties - positive ones like exuding warmth and light – giving us heat, drying clothes, cooking and so on. Fire is a powerful force for purification in a kiln or furnace by burning off impurities - for purifying metals and the hardening of clay pottery. Fire - even a tiny spark – is required for the combustion of gases, and setting off a chain reaction in any fireplace. A fire causes our faces to glow as it warms us. If we are near a fire we redden in appearance.

Fire also has destructive properties such as in the seasonal forest fires we are seeing in California and Portugal. In Scripture fire is seen as destructive in the case of the fire and brimstone (sulphur) that punished Sodom and Gomorrah for their awful sins.

Fire however is also a light in the darkness to the people of Israel – a ‘pillar of fire’ by night and a cloud by day guides the people of Israel to the Promised Land.

Love and zeal are the marks of a true disciple who does not rest until the Lord calls him or her home. There is no rear view mirror in their field of vision – onwards and upwards, and liked St Ignatius of Loyola, always seeking the ‘magis’, the better, the greater, striving ahead. If someone is in love we can see it in their face, their complexion exudes peace and certainty. It infectious – we want some of that! It is so attractive – it draws others to want to know the secret!

Jesus wants a blaze and John The Baptist predicted that Jesus would bring fire– but it is the Holy Spirit of God’s love with which He wants to set the fire to the world i.e.,  the love of God to enkindle and spread all over the earth. He is pointing to Pentecost and the tongues of fire that descends from heaven on Our Lady and the disciples at Pentecost. It gives the energy inspiration and drive and impetus to the mission of the Church – and continues to do so punctuated by much prayer. So it is through Spirit-filled disciples that the mission of the Church to preach the Gospel is accomplished in word and deed, fuelled by much prayer and docility to the promptings of the Spirit.

So the fire I question is not the destructive fire of Sodom or hellfire and brimstone sermonising but is a purifying fore that we experience ourselves and enlightening others in the truth and an inflaming fire of God’s intense passionate love which is transmitted in us and through us depending on our devotion and prayer. Let us ask Our Lady to fill us with the Holy Spirit – her spouse.