{"id":27355,"date":"2021-03-31T07:00:12","date_gmt":"2021-03-31T06:00:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.glowscotland.org.uk\/er\/StNinians\/?p=27355"},"modified":"2021-03-31T00:49:33","modified_gmt":"2021-03-30T23:49:33","slug":"wednesday-reflection-36","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.glowscotland.org.uk\/er\/StNinians\/wednesday-reflection-36\/","title":{"rendered":"WEDNESDAY REFLECTION"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"text-align: center\"><strong>Mid-week Reflection<\/strong><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center\">31st\u00a0 March 2021<\/p>\n<p>Today is Wednesday in Holy Week. Many years ago, I don\u2019t know how many, an elderly man, a widower, asked me to call on him.\u00a0 He was troubled in spirit as he told me that his eldest son had been arrested and put in prison. This fellow, a grown man himself, had caused years and years of grief for his family and yet, here was this old man weeping for his son.\u00a0 In spite of all, he still loved him.<\/p>\n<p>This week, we encounter Jesus, also troubled in spirit, as he reflects on Judas, who in spite of his betrayal, is still loved by Jesus.\u00a0 Reading the Chapter 13 in St John\u2019s Gospel is like looking at a painting by Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio with his dramatic use of lighting contrasting with darkness. Rembrandt,Vermeer and Goya employed chiaroscuro but none so famously as Caravaggio.\u00a0 We probably all remember Anne Widdicombe grabbing the public\u2019s imagination and possibly destroying Michael Howard&#8217;s hopes of winning the\u00a0Tory\u00a0leadership when she said that,\u201d there was something of the night about him.\u201d\u00a0 Certainly, those words in St John\u2019s Gospel,\u201dNight had fallen\u201d send a shiver down your back.\u00a0 There is something ominous about to happen.\u00a0 Jesus, the Light of the World, is shunned by Judas, his heart darkened and overtaken by Satan.\u00a0 Treachery at its worst.\u00a0 And Jesus still loved him.\u00a0 In one swift moment of dipping bread into the cup, gone were love and loyalty.\u00a0 The one given an honoured place at table and a favoured morsel, hurries, scurries away from the One who, time and time again, had shown signs of special affection.\u00a0\u00a0 And Jesus still loved him.<\/p>\n<p>St John tells us it was night.\u00a0 It is always night when we separate ourselves from Jesus. It is always night when we turn away from the good and the pure and the holy.\u00a0 It is always night when the things of darkness seem more attractive than the things of the day.\u00a0 And yet, Jesus still loved him\u2026..and he still loves us.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Monsignor Monaghan<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Mid-week Reflection 31st\u00a0 March 2021 Today is Wednesday in Holy Week. Many years ago, I don\u2019t know how many, an elderly man, a widower, asked me to call on him.\u00a0 He was<\/p>\n<p><a class=\"more-link\" href=\"https:\/\/blogs.glowscotland.org.uk\/er\/StNinians\/wednesday-reflection-36\/\">Read More<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2931,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-27355","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-latest-news"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.glowscotland.org.uk\/er\/StNinians\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27355","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.glowscotland.org.uk\/er\/StNinians\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.glowscotland.org.uk\/er\/StNinians\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.glowscotland.org.uk\/er\/StNinians\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2931"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.glowscotland.org.uk\/er\/StNinians\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=27355"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.glowscotland.org.uk\/er\/StNinians\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27355\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":27356,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.glowscotland.org.uk\/er\/StNinians\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27355\/revisions\/27356"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.glowscotland.org.uk\/er\/StNinians\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=27355"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.glowscotland.org.uk\/er\/StNinians\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=27355"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.glowscotland.org.uk\/er\/StNinians\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=27355"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}