Helpful resources and gospel insights
First Reading: Isaiah 11: 1-10
Second Reading: Romans 15:4-9
Gospel: Matthew 3: 1-12
Commentary: to come
Image credit: Saint John the Baptist Preaching to the Masses in the Wilderness
Source: Wikimedia
Artist: Pieter Brueghel the Younger (1564–1638)
Acknowledgement: LiturgyTools.net
First Reading: Isaiah 2: 1-5
Second Reading: Romans 13: 11-14
Gospel: Matthew: 24: 37-44
Commentary: coming soon.
To speak of hope to those who are desperate, it is essential to share their desperation. To dry the tears from the faces of those who are suffering, it is necessary to join our tears with theirs.
Pope Francis, 4 January 2017
Image credit: Swords Are Beaten into Plowshares
Quatrefoil on the western exterior Cathédrale d’Amiens depicting Micah’s prophecy concerning the future reign of peace in which nations will beat swords into plowshares and wage war no more.
Source: http://diglib.library.vanderbilt.edu/act-imagelink.pl?RC=29252
Artist: Unknown (1220-1240)
Acknowledgement: LiturgyTools.net
The liturgical year for 2026 – Year A Matthew – began on the 1st Sunday of Advent 30 November 2025.
Three years ago, in the Year of Matthew 2022-23, Australians voted in October 2023 on a referendum proposal to amend the constitution to recognise Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples. In the lead-up to the new liturgical year, Professor Vicky Balabanski, in her inaugural professorial address, explicated the Gospel of Matthew’s concept of ἀναχωρέω anachōreō, i.e. withdraw, depart, return (home) or retire = disengage from a conflict situation (23.06).
23.30 “By using this verb ten times, Matthew makes this a theme, within the gospel, where timely and strategic withdrawal from conflict situations is characteristic of Jesus and of other people of God.” It gives “an important insight into the way wisdom is depicted in Matthew’s story.”
Balabanski juxtaposes Matthew’s picture of wisdom through withdrawing from conflict with a “similar value in Australian indigenous culture placed on timely and strategic withdrawing from conflict situations.”
She says there is a lesson here for those of us who see aggression as strength.
In response, Professor Aunty Anne Pattel-Gray reflected on how Professor Balabanski draws on ancient Aboriginal wisdom and practice.
Aunty Anne issued a call to action to stand in solidarity with our First Nations and the struggle for recognition of their rights and the injustices that have been perpetrated on them since white settlement.
One theme for this year might be to look at how that struggle is going in the context of this new liturgical year of Matthew.
