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Our Lady of Mt. Carmel Community Volume 18, No. 1 November 2001 Meet the FacilitatorsWe asked our facilitators to tell us what their greatest rewards and challenges have been, and to share some unique qualities of their group. Linda Lozano has been a facilitator for eight years. Her reward is witnessing the faith shown by all the members who try to come to the meeting even from as far as Riverside County, through rain or shine. The great bond of the group's friendship was formed in accordance with the teachings in the Bible. Her challenges are waking up early for the 7:30 A.M. facilitators' meetings, and being confronted by questions beyond her knowledge of Scripture. Her group consists of six couples. They like to socialize, going to places like San Luis Obispo, Las Vegas, and various San Diego locations. Because most of the couples belong to the same generation they can relate to common problems, their own or their children's. Puring Arcega has been a facilitator for five years. Her greatest reward has been seeing the smiles and sparkle in the eyes of participants when they find something in the Bible they had not realized before their questions were answered. The camaraderie and bonding develop within years of togetherness. Her greatest challenge has been getting everyone to read the lessons and feeling she has motivated them enough to study. Her group enjoys bringing food to share since they meet after daily Mass and most haven't eaten breakfast. "We are mostly senior citizens, and wisdom comes from age and experience from which spirituality flows. We care for each other and discover in our sharing a new power in our lives through the Holy Spirit." Sue Bettenga has been a facilitator for about five years. She took over her group when Diane Larroque moved. "Being a facilitator for my group has been very easy. Many in our group have been together for many years, so everyone is very comfortable. We love having new people in our group because it adds another dimension, and their faith adds to ours because we are all continually growing. As for challenges, everyone has so much to add and to share, it is sometimes difficult to move on to the next question. Sometimes topics come up that everyone wants to talk about so keeping on track is a goal to strive for." Her group's qualities includes their comfortableness in sharing our faith stories. They are varied in age from young mothers to retirees. As a project the group provides a meal every Monday for a parishioner who is battling cancer and her family. The Pastor's Corner ....Father Frank Fawcett answered these questions in 1990, the last time we studied the Gospel According to St. John. Who wrote the Gospel of John? John's Gospel was not written by St. John but by the Johannine School which is identified with the Church of Ephesus. It is believed that John did have a hand in this Gospel but that the editor who put it together belonged to the Church of Ephesus. The Greek at the end is evidence that someone else put it together. The prologue was most likely a hymn which was sung in the Church of Ephesus. What do we know about the John, identified with the Gospel? We know his brother was James and his father was Zebedee. It appears he was from a noble, priestly family. He probably had connections that allowed him to take Mary to Golgotha and protect her. Tradition says he lived to 100 years old. He was not martyred but died of old age. There is evidence that he was the founding Bishop of the Church of Ephesus. And he took care of Mary until she ascended into heaven. When did Jesus know He was the perfect manifestation of God? We don't know that He didn't always know. Is John the Baptist Elijah? The synoptic Gospels do identify John the Baptist with Elijah to emphasize John as the forerunner of the Messiah. John was to act in the manner of Elijah. The Old Testament points to Elijah as the forerunner of the day of judgment. The object of John's Gospel, however, is to emphasize the Word made flesh. The focus is on Jesus as the greatest one. Therefore John the Baptist must not be identified with any great one, namely Elijah. The Gospel of John and the Synoptics have different points to make. Notice how John refuses to identify with any of the titles offered, perhaps because he knows the One they belong to. Why didn't Jesus Baptize? Explain John's baptism. Some say that Jesus never Himself baptized so that His mission would not be confused with John and his mission. Jesus' baptism is substantially different from John's. The latter's was a baptism signifying repentance. Jesus' Baptism signifies and accomplishes the forgiveness of all sin and a new birth whereby the person becomes a living member of Christ's Body, the Church. The Deacon's Corner....Deacon Bernard Yeatts answered these recently submitted questions. Please provide some background on Jacob's Well (John 4:5 - 4:42). The well where Jesus met the Samaritan woman is associated with present day Bir Ya'aqub at the base of Mount Gerizim which is traditionally viewed as the Samaritans' holy place and center of worship (just as Jerusalem was for the Jews). It is about 100 ft. deep and appears to be fed by an underground stream. It is located near the town of Shechem. About 600 Samaritans were living there in 1983. In Genesis 33:18-20 we read of Jacob acquiring Shechem and the surrounding area: "Having thus come from Paddan-aram, Jacob arrived safely at the city of Shechem, which is in the land of Canaan, and he encamped in sight of the city. The plot of ground on which he had pitched his tent he bought for a hundred pieces of bullion from the descendants of Hamor, the founder of Shechem. He set up a memorial stone there and invoked 'El, the God of Israel.'" Later, in Genesis 48:21-22, Jacob gives that portion of land to Joseph: "Then Israel said to Joseph: 'I am about to die. But God will be with you and will restore you to the land of your fathers. As for me, I give to you, as to the one above his brothers, Shechem, which I captured from the Amorites with my sword and bow.'" As a sidelight, it is interesting how the story changed in these few verses. In Genesis 33:19, Jacob is said to have bought the land. But in Genesis 48:22, Jacob tells Joseph he captured it. In Joshua 24:32 we read: "The bones of Joseph, which the Israelites had brought up from Egypt, were buried in Shechem in the plot of ground Jacob had bought from the sons of Hamor, father of Shechem, for a hundred pieces of money. This was a heritage of the descendants of Joseph." A Targum is a translation of the Torah into Aramaic with notes added by rabbis. The Targums speak of Jacob's well, even though no Old Testament reference is found that specifically mentions it. The Targums reflect rabbinic traditions concerning Jacob's miraculous power to provide water for the people and flocks wherever he went. In these traditions, Jacob is said to have a "traveling well." Specific to the well near Shechem, a rabbinic tradition said that the water continuously bubbled or "welled up" to the top of the well so that no cup was necessary to get a drink. It was, in a manner speaking, "living water." It is an interesting background to the story of Jesus' encounter with the Samaritan woman. He knew the tradition more extensively than she. It gives a further basis for reflecting on John 4:11-15: "(The woman) said to him, 'Sir, you do not even have a bucket and the cistern is deep; where then can you get this living water? Are you greater than our father Jacob, who gave us this cistern and drank from it himself with his children and his flocks?' Jesus answered and said to her, 'Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again; but whoever drinks the water I shall give will never thirst; the water I shall give will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.' The woman said to him, 'Sir, give me this water, so that I may not be thirsty or have to keep coming here to draw water.'" Were John and Jesus related? The relationship question depends on the elusive meaning of "brother" and "cousin" and "relative" among the Semitic peoples (Jews and Arabs). These terms can mean very loose affiliation as having a common goal or common background, ethnicity, race or hometown. Or they can mean having common ancestors such as the terms mean in Western societies. So, immediately, we're on a very imprecise ground. However, the infancy narrative in Luke's Gospel clearly identifies John's mother Elizabeth as a "relative" to Mary, Jesus' mother. And all references indicate that the John who was the son of Zechariah and Elizabeth is the same John who became known as the "Baptizer." So, even though the infancy narrative of Luke is not intended as a precise background explaining who Jesus was as regards his human nature, it seems we're on fairly solid ground in saying that they were somehow related. Did Jesus know John? It seems that John was well known. The historian Flavius Josephus mentions him several times in the works he was commissioned to write to give the authorities in Rome some background on the Jews - Jewish Antiquities and The Jewish War. He was certainly known to Herod Antipas who had him arrested and, through the influence of his wife, had him executed. John was a charismatic preacher and stirred up the people, much to the chagrin of the Jewish and Roman authorities. It seems likely that everyone knew John or, at least, knew about him, and Jesus would have been no exception. Jesus seems to have been attracted to him and even submitted to John's baptism of repentance. In the Gospel of John, John the Baptizer has a key role in identifying who Jesus of Nazareth is. Two excellent books about the Baptist are: "John the Baptist" by C. H. Kraeling; and "John the Baptist" by C. H. H. Scobie. Why do the Roman Churches follow a different calendar than the Eastern Orthodox Churches? Claus Tondering, a man from Denmark, has put together a fascinating web site with more information on calendars - Gregorian, Julian, Jewish and Islamic - than you could possibly ever need or want to know. In fact, it even discusses the French Revolution Calendar and the Mayan and Chinese calendars. It can be found at this web site address: http://www.tondering.dk/claus/calendar.html. But, very briefly, most Christians followed the Julian Calendar (introduced by Julius Caesar in 45 B.C.) until Pope Gregory XIII promulgated a revised calendar (proposed by Aloysius Lilius, a physician from Naples) in 1582. The problem with the Julian Calendar was that there were no exceptions to the rule that every four years is a leap year. So, by the 16th century, the calendar was ten days ahead of the actual sun time. Pope Gregory XIII declared that October 4, 1582 would be followed by October 15, 1582. Thereafter, every year divisible by 100 would not be a leap year. But, since that would mean too much was being compensated for, the Gregorian calendar also states that every year divisible by 400 would be a leap year. So 1700, 1800 and 1900 were not leap years. But 2000 was. By the time of Pope Gregory XIII, the Reformation had occurred and Protestant countries were reluctant to follow a directive of the Pope. So England and Germany and other northern European countries did not change from the Julian calendar until the 18th century. The American Colonies of England did not change to the Gregorian calendar until 1752. The Orthodox Churches still follow the Julian calendar. That is the reason they celebrate Christmas on January 7. The Christian calendar, as regards feast days, is indebted to a monk named Dionysius Exiguus. (In English his name can be translated as Little Dennis.) Dionysius relied on the New Testament as though it were an accurate calendar of events surrounding the birth and death of Jesus. He was off by six or seven years, based on what we know from secular and Jewish history when events mentioned in the New Testament are compared to those sources. Jesus was born in 6 or 7 BC. He began his public ministry in 28 AD and died, most probably, in April of 30 AD. For an excellent treatment of the chronology of Jesus' life, see "A Marginal Jew: Rethinking the Historical Jesus" (Volume 1), by John P. Meier, published by Doubleday in 1991. In the next issue we will present information on the liturgical calendar. St. John ....From The Lives of the Saints for every day of the year. Saint Irenaeus says that John settled at Ephesus only after the martyrdom of Saints Peter and Paul, but how soon afterward nobody seems to know. A tradition states that he was taken to Rome during the reign of Domitian, where he was miraculously saved from martyrdom, and that he was then banished to the island of Patmos. It is certain that he composed the Apocalypse on Patmos, where he received the visions which that book describes. In the year 96, when Domitian was dead, he was able to return to Ephesus, and it is believed that he was there when he wrote his Gospel. The Fourth Gospel is strikingly different from the Gospels of the other evangelists. Saint John evidently intended to supplement rather than repeat the information contained in the other accounts, and he relates events in Jesus' life which appear nowhere else. In none of the other Gospels is the personality of our Lord so beautifully set forth. Yet John, with quiet humility, refrained therein from referring to himself by name; he is most often referred to simply as the "beloved disciple." It is Christian charity, propounded through all of his writings, that is John's central doctrine. His works, especially his Epistles, return to that theme continually. His close union with Jesus, his abiding love for Him, and his intimacy with Mary are all reflected there, burning incessantly, unquenchably, for the moment of love's final consummation in heaven. Download this Bible Study Digest as a .pdf file Last Updated on 3/24/02 |