READINGS

Luke 2:22-40
Malachi 3:1-4
Hebrews 2:14-18
Exodus 13:1-16
Leviticus 12:1-8
Isaiah 40:1

HOMILY

In Old English it used to be called candle Mass, because of all the lights that would be lit for the occasion.

In Spanish, it's so referred to as La Candelaria.

This is the feast by which we celebrate the purification of the Virgin and Jesus's first entry into the temple with the astounding things that happened around it.

Background: in St Luke's gospel, the temple is the constant background to everything that happens.

The whole story is about the movement from the temple, which starts with Zechariah, passes through Jesus as he comes into the temple as an infant, and then he achieves what the whole purpose of the temple was: rendering it otiose (serving no propose) at the moment of his death.

Finally, the new Temple starts to come into being at Pentecost with the tongues of fire on the heads of the people.

Absolutely Central to the picture of the temple was avoiding anything to do with death coming close to God: the notion that God has nothing to do with death.

This was part of what was distant between the temple and the rest of creation.

As St Luke explains the gospel, Jesus coming into the world is the person who is going to be baptized with the spirit.

The spirit that was hovering before the Earth, and even before the creation over the void, comes in and baptizes himself so that he can baptize us.

In this way, Jesus' baptism is in going up to death, assuming death, detoxifying death.

Thereafter the temple ceases to be a useful symbol, because humans are no longer run by death, which is exactly what the epistle to the Hebrews tells us about today: we are able to live as daughters and sons of God not run by death and its fear.

The utter liveliness and aliveness of God comes and shows us what is going on.

So 8 days after Jesus's birth, he was circumcised under the law, given the name Jesus.

Note that the name had been given before he was conceived. This is to stress that the word was spoken before the conception, just as the word was spoken before creation.

Then 31 days after the circumcision, it is the appropriate time for the mother to be purified.

Note that some people have said that it's only Mary who needs to be purified, and this is true strictly according to the law; however, apparently at the second temple period, it was assumed that the child having been in contact with the mother's blood also needed purification.

So, given that the child had to be brought to the temple anyhow (whether boy or girl), the notion that they were both purified was just understood and taken for granted.

So when the time came for their purification, according to the law of Moses, they brought him up to Jerusalem to present him to the Lord.

That's the technical term, but it was more than simply the presentation of any child because, as it is written in the law of the Lord, every firstborn male shall be designated as holy to the Lord.

This is from Exodus 13 and it's very important, because it's also the basis of the whole of the sacrificial system in the temple.

In the first Passover, Lambs were sacrificed and their blood painted over the the lentils of the the doors of the Hebrews so they could Escape out of Egypt, and that was considered as saving the firstborn from destruction, whereas the firstborn of the Egyptians were destroyed.

The result was that every firstborn male needed to be redeemed.

It's not only designated as holy, but later in a different chapter and verse of the book of Exodus, redeemed.

So the notion was that for the firstborn a lamb should be offered.

Here St Luke is as eloquent in what he doesn't say as in what he does.

The suggestion is that there was no lamb offered for Jesus: all that they offered was the sacrifice according to what is stated in the law of the Lord - a pair of turtle doves or two young pigeons - which was the purification sacrifice for the mother.

So the suggestion is that no lamb was needed to redeem Jesus, because he was the promised son who is going to redeem all.

St Luke very carefully just hinting at something by leaving something that might be expected out.

So they come to do what was expected even though it wasn't entirely as expected as you might think.

And there was a man in Jerusalem whose name was Simeon, who was righteous and devout looking forward to the consolation of Israel (ye Comfort ye my people from Isaiah).

The Holy Spirit that comes upon you is the comforter, the defense counselor, it's the same term here.

The Holy Spirit rested on him it had been revealed to him that he would not see death before he had seen the Lord's Messiah.

Guided by the spirit, Simeon came into the temple and when the parents brought in the Child Jesus to do to him (what was customary under the law), Simeon took him in his arms and praised God.

So Mary and Joseph were taking Jesus to be presented to a priest and instead someone who must have seemed like a bit of a weird old man comes rushing up to them and grabs their baby and starts praising God.

What has he noticed? What's he picked up?

He's picked up the prophecy which is in our first reading, the prophecy from Malachi.

See, I am going to send my messenger, and he will clear the way before me.

So this messenger is John the Baptist.

Then the Lord you seek will suddenly come to his temple, the Messenger of the covenant you delight in.

So Simeon realizes that this is what's happening: Malachi at last being fulfilled.

Master now you are dismissing your servant in peace according to your word for my eyes have seen your salvation, which you have prepared in the presence of All Peoples.

So interestingly that, for this old man and devout prophet figure, there's nothing sectarian or narrow minded about in the presence of All Peoples: alike for Revelation to the Gentiles and for Glory to a People Israel.

This is not simply something about some sorting out something for a small group of people.

This is God showing God's love for the world and it's going to open up for All Peoples.

Here the catholicity of the church comes from this notion of something that is being shown to all people.

And the child's mother and father were amazed at what was being said about him well.

They'd been no doubt growing in understanding little by little.

Then Simeon blessed them and said to his mother Mary this child is destined for the falling and the rising of many in Israel.

Those are gentle words: the falling is like the overthrowing and the rising up, the Insurrection, and it could be as strong as that.

It is a sign that will scandalize, because it's going to change the meaning of everything.

What Jesus is going to do is going to change the whole of symbolicity: the people who are looking for something will not recognize the one who has come; the people who are not looking for it will suddenly find that they have in fact being taken into the inside of this new form of life.

This is extraordinary prophecy about how it is that the Holy Spirit is going to recreate us all.

It will recreate the sense of our meanings and our desires around what's going to happen to this person.

Mow the translation which we have here is slightly odd, because they all put this thing about a sword will pierce your own soul too in an odd place, whereas in fact it says he will be a sign that will be spoken against, and a sword shall pierce your own soul too so that the thoughts of many hearts may be revealed.

The translations always assume that the sword piercing your own soul too is secondary somehow to the the sign that will be opposed, and the inner thoughts of many being revealed, but in fact what the Greek says pretty clearly is and a sword will pierce your heart also, so that the hidden thoughts of many will be revealed.

This links Mary and her role as having been considering all these things, pondering in her heart the undergoing of this huge change.

So this is going to be something that works through the human level, at the level of flesh, all the way through families and close people. This is not some mysterious outside thing. Our hearts are going to be turned around all of them.

There was also a prophet Anna the daughter of the tribe of Asher.

Well given that the tribe of Asher had effectively ceased to exist in any recognizable sense for quite a long time, she must have been of a very great age.

Probably there were descendants of the tribe who lived as kind of people who remembered the old days not far from uh Jerusalem and were horrified at the second temple regime and longing for the the second's temple and Jerusalem to be redeemed.

So she's a person of critical interest.

She's of great age, her husband died seven years after her marriage, then as a widow to the age of 84 she never left the temple, but worshiped there with fasting and prayer night and day.

At that moment she came and began to praise God and to speak about the child to all who were looking for the Redemption of Jerusalem, for all who were aware that this second temple thing was not quite the real thing.

The real thing is going to come: that was what the hope of the return of the first temple and was very much alive.

This is the notion that the temple was going to come to an end and the real Temple was going to come

So we have these two marginal figures that are not priests and they both point to this extraordinary thing that's coming in the consolation of Israel, the Redemption of Jerusalem, the one who is in fact the life who will eventually themselves overcome death and therefore help make the temple moot.

They are waiting for the one who is actually going to resignify the whole of human life and make it possible for the Gentiles and the people of Israel to share this extraordinary joy.

When they had finished everything required by the law of the Lord, they returned to Galilee to their own town of Nazareth, the child grew and became stronger filled with wisdom and the favor of God was upon him.

So again not a magical picture of Jesus; there is a whole process of him growing up, learning and eventually, as exactly as our Hebrews passage says, becoming someone who was able to be tempted like others and to become a brother to all of us.

Moreover, in occupying the place of death was able to set us free from all of those who by fear are bound down.

So all of this extraordinary excitement is brought about as a an early glimpse of what's going on in today's Feast of the presentation.