'God gave me the best part - and he never took it away.' Sunday Reflections, 1st Sunday of Lent, Year A

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Landscape with the Temptation of Christ
Joos de Momper [Web Gallery of Art]

Readings (Jerusalem Bible: Australia, England & Wales, Ireland, New Zealand, Pakistan, Scotland, South Africa)

Readings (New American Bible: Philippines, USA) 

Gospel Matthew 4:1-11 (English Standard Version Anglicised: India)  

Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. And after fasting forty days and forty nights, he was hungry. And the tempter came and said to him, “If you are the Son of God, command these stones to become loaves of bread.” But he answered, “It is written,

“‘Man shall not live by bread alone,
    but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.’”

Then the devil took him to the holy city and set him on the pinnacle of the temple and said to him, “If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down, for it is written,

“‘He will command his angels concerning you’,

and

“‘On their hands they will bear you up,
    lest you strike your foot against a stone.’”

Jesus said to him, “Again it is written, ‘You shall not put the Lord your God to the test.’” Again, the devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory. And he said to him, “All these I will give you, if you will fall down and worship me.” Then Jesus said to him, “Be gone, Satan! For it is written,

“‘You shall worship the Lord your God
    and him only shall you serve.’”

Then the devil left him, and behold, angels came and were ministering to him.

 

Léachtaí i nGaeilge 


The Venerable Matt Talbot, Dublin
[Wikipedia; photo]

I remember vividly a homily on this gospel when I was in the seminary, around 1965. The preacher was a saintly Columban, Fr Edward McCormack, known to us as ‘Father Ted’, though he was a far cry from the Father Ted in the British comedy TV series about a group of priests in a remote part of Ireland. It wasn’t so much the preacher’s words as the sense of the horror he conveyed of the very idea of Satan trying to tempt Jesus Christ, God who became Man that struck me and that still remains. Father Ted conveyed to me a sense of the horror of what sin is.

Please continue at Bangor to Bobbio.

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