Letters

The Second Coming

Andrew Sholl

Contents - Apr 2013 - Buy a copy now AD2000: the changing of the guard - Michael Gilchrist POPE FRANCIS: 'REBUILD MY CHURCH' - Michael Gilchrist News: The Church Around the World Obituary: Vale Dr Lyn Billings AM, DCSG, MBBS (Melb), DCH (Lond) - Joan Clements Vocations: Australia's vocations springtime continues into 2013 - Br Barry Coldrey 'Jesus Abandoned' in Nigeria: Chiemera's new freedom - Madonna Brosnan Pilgrimage: A Holy Land pilgrimage with Scott and Kimberly Hahn - Wanda Skowronska Returning beauty and sacredness to churches - Art Lohsen Child sexual abuse: looking beyond the institutions - Anne Lastman Venerable Fulton J. Sheen's insights on the priesthood - Martin Tobin Letters: Anglican Ordinariate - Phillip Turnbull Letters: The Second Coming - Andrew Sholl Letters: Holy priest - M.A. Ross Letters: Child abuse - Arnold Jago Correction Solemn Abbatial Requiem Mass for deceased servicemen on Anzac Day Books: REDEEMING GRIEF: Abortion and Its Pain (2nd and Revised ed.), by Anne R. Lastman - Fr Paul Crotty (reviewer) Books: PERPETUA'S PASSIONS, ed. Jan N. Bremmer and Marco Formisano - Peter Westmore (reviewer) Books: FESTA PASCHALIA: A History of Holy Week Liturgy in the Roman Rite, Goddard - Michael Daniel (reviewer) Books: THE SEVEN BIG MYTHS ABOUT THE CATHOLIC CHURCH, by Christopher Kaczor - Father John Flynn LC Books: Order books from www.freedompublishing.com.au Reflection: Easter: the centrality of faith in the risen Christ - Fr Dennis Byrnes

Whenever I read in the Scriptures that God said or did something of great significance, I inevitably exclaim "How great You are!", or "Halleluia!", Hebrew for "Praise ye the Lord!"

So it is with the narrative of the Resurrection in St John's Gospel. However, regarding chapter 20, verse 7 of this Gospel, as a Hebrew-Catholic it astounds me that in my 73 years I have yet to hear a bishop or priest preach on the significance of this, to me, a most significant verse.

It is rightly said that anything that Jesus says or does is of significance. Thus, when just after the Resurrection, Mary of Magdala rushes into the tomb of Jesus, she not only finds it empty, but finds the grave "clothes" scattered on the ground, and the cloth that covered Jesus' face, folded or rolled up in a separate place.

What is the significance of the latter? Let me elaborate: it has everything to do with Jewish table manners at the time. Whereas we in our Western culture in Australia follow the table setting and manners of Louis XIV, the 17th century "Sun-King" of France, whose setting and use of knife, fork and spoon, together with serviette, were slavishly copied by European society, at the time of Jesus, Jewish table manners required eating with the right hand, as is still the case in most of the Arab World, the Indian sub-continent, and parts of south-east Asia where no chopsticks are used.

In our Western culture, to show that we have finished our meal, it is customary, especially in a restaurant, to put knife and fork together on the plate. In ancient Jewish custom, however, to show that one is finished, one would scrunch up the serviette and casually throw it on the table: this would then be a sign to the servant that the master had finished, and the table could be cleared.

However, should the master fold or roll up the serviette, this would be a sign to the servant not to clear the table as yet, because the master has, e.g., taken a phone call, with the unspoken message, "I shall return!"

That is precisely the vital message that Jesus wants to convey to us by means of verse 7: "I shall return!" Namely, his Second Coming.

ANDREW SHOLL
Townsville, Queensland

Reprinted from AD2000 Vol 26 No 3 (April 2013), p. 14