Archbishop of Sydney

Third Sunday of Advent

Saint Mary’s Cathedral, Sydney
Is 35:1-6, 10; James 5:7-10; Mt 11:2-11

By + Cardinal George Pell
Archbishop of Sydney
12 December 2004

As always at Advent we are focused on the coming of God among us and the consequences this has for daily living.

As a child I remember being more than a bit frightened by the prospect of God’s return.  Not merely by the wars, earthquakes and conflagrations that were seen to precede the return of the Son of God, but I was also fearful that God might be too strict, too quick to condemn and punish.  This was certainly a childish and somewhat selfish reaction, but as God is so radically different from us, so powerful and mysterious, the force that guides and sustains the whole universe, it is not surprising that we can sometimes forget that God is a blazing mystery of love.

The instincts of the prophet Isaiah were radically different from my childish fears.  God was coming as a liberator, as a champion of his people, bringing all sorts of spectacular benefits for the people

“Look your God is coming,
vengeance is coming,
the retribution of God;
he is coming to save you.”

Because of this coming the eyes of the blind will be opened, the ears of the deaf unsealed, the lame shall leap like a deer and the tongues of the dumb sing for joy.

God and the Son of God’s message should make a difference to daily living.

Early last week, I was at a gathering where there was not only evidence of good will, but also of the good work done by many different traditions and especially the followers of Christ.

It was a meeting of 123 religious leaders from 13 countries and every major faith in Yogyakarta, the ancient cultural centre of Indonesia.

A joint initiative of the Foreign Ministers of Indonesia and Australia, it was opened by President Yudhoyono of Indonesia who explicitly recognised the contribution the great religions make to society.  He emphasised there was no attempt to deny the differences so manifest in the variety of costumes and colours at this gathering.

Many followed the President in acknowledging that there was no need for anyone to give up or defend his convictions.  People can agree to disagree without hostile stereotyping, without blaming many for the actions of a few.  A person can be moderate and deeply committed at the same time.

In an unusual speech for an Australian politician Foreign Minister Downer described the meeting as a most timely conversation, as he spelt out some of the differences faith should make.

As all people of faith, he said, see mankind as divinely ordered, they should have an enriched understanding of what it is to be human, and a developed sense of the sanctity of life.  They should be moved to act when human rights are violated, be peacemakers and sway others to mercy and compassion.

People of faith believe and honour bonds that bind the dead, the living and those yet to be born and have a spiritual understanding both of time’s passing and their own mortality.  In other words we value traditions and do not believe as individuals that we are the centre of attraction or here for ever!

Downer stressed that terrorism was the common enemy to all people of moderation.  He saw this meeting as one step in a long struggle in every society to deny terrorists oxygen, to show that sympathy for them is misplaced, to vanquish them in the battle of ideas and thwart their recruitment attempts.

In different countries there are often different small religious or ethnic minorities, fearful for sound or exaggerated reasons.  We should all work to defend their civic and religious rights, especially here in Australia.

As well as the plenary sessions delegates broke up into small mixed groups for case studies and general discussion.  These were valuable.

We heard of the serious efforts by the Philippine government to quell the military insurrection in Mindanao and to encourage different groups to work locally at the even more difficult task of reducing suspicion and hatred and healing wounds.

Civil war has continued off and on in the Southern Philippines for years.  The wounds are deep and the memories of hurt are strong.

One Protestant minister of religion founded a group called “Islam” i.e. I sincerely love all Moslems.

A few years ago they sent a team of workers and volunteers into a Moslem village destroyed by the army in a battle with the guerrillas.  They rebuilt houses, facilities and most importantly, the local mosque.  This was important to reassure the Moslems that these works were not a prelude to attempts to convert them.

The local leader of the rebels ordered the Moslems to stop cooperating with the reconstruction and threatened to destroy what they had built.  For some nights many Moslems, especially the old, spent the nights outside surrounding the mosque, saying that if he was to destroy anything or kill anyone, he would have to kill them first.

This demonstrates that the Catholic Cardinal from Jakarta was right to warn us against generalising.  Let me give another couple of examples.  Around Christmas 2000 many Christian churches were being bombed in Indonesia by elements the government has now crushed.

The Cardinal recounted how many Muslim youths joined the Catholic youth and the police to form a human chain around his Cathedral to protect it successfully.  The bomb could only be exploded in the street.

He also told of the Moslem youth in East Java who was attempting to deflect a bomb thrown at a Catholic church.  He was too late and blown to pieces.

We Westerners should remember these incidents.  While we must be Advent people making a difference for the better, we also must remember that God’s work is done by good people in every tradition and especially in the great religions.

In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.