The Jubilee Year: resetting and rebooting my relationships

Homily for 3^rd Sunday of Ordinary Time Year C 2016

Nehemiah 8:2-6,8-10; 1 Corinthians 12:12-30; Luke 1:1-4; 4:14-21

Introduction

When a public leader such as a mayor, governor or president is taking office, he or she usually states their manifesto, saying what they hope to achieve.

Scripture and Theology

In today's gospel, as Jesus begins his ministry, he states his program of action: "to bring glad tidings to the poor, . . . to proclaim liberty to captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, and to proclaim a year acceptable to the Lord."  Jesus borrows these words of Isaiah to introduce himself and his mission.  Isaiah had said these words to give hope to the people of Israel, as they prepared to return from exile.  But Jesus says: “Today this Scripture passage is fulfilled in your hearing.”  He is fulfilling Isaiah's promise.

But what is "proclaiming a year acceptable to the Lord" or as other translations put it, "a year of the Lord's favour?" This is the year we know as a jubilee year, prescribed in the Book of Leviticus Chapter 25.  The Lord instructs the people of Israel to celebrate the jubilee year.  Just as the Lord had rested on the seventh day when he created the world, so he asked the people to rest on the seventh day, the Sabbath.  But he went further and asked them to rest also during seventh year, which they called the sabbatical year.  And further still, after seven times seven years, that is 49 years, the 50^th year would be a very sacred year of rest – a jubilee year, a year in which liberty would be given to all (Lev. 25:10).

While our silver jubilee today celebrates the 25^th anniversary and the golden jubilee the 50^th anniversary of something, the jubilee year of Leviticus served to return everything to its pristine condition, to restore all relationships.  The jubilee year was like reset feature on our smartphones or the rebooting feature on the computer, to give them a fresh start, especially when they have been corrupted.

·        And so, during the jubilee year, family relationships were to be restored; family members that had split or sent away were to return home.

·        Debts were to be cancelled, much like we do today with bankruptcy protection.  For example, if a relative owed you a large debt and the only way they could pay it back was by becoming your indentured servant, this debt was cancelled when the Jubilee year came around. Lev. 25:39-41).

·        Even the land was to be given a rest during the Jubilee year, a kind of fallow that farmers even today give to the land to allow it regain its nutrients.  The people could not farm any crops, but would only eat what the fields provided naturally.

The Jubilee year, therefore was aimed at resetting relationships among people and relationships to property.  In this way the jubilee year stopped unchecked selfishness and refocused people on God and the community.

And so, when Jesus wants to describe what he has come to do, he uses this familiar image of the jubilee year, the year of the Lord's favour.  But while Isaiah had invoked the jubilee to speak to the exiles about freedom from political oppression, Jesus used this image to speak about the freedom of God's eternal Kingdom.  Jesus came to bring the good news of salvation, freeing people not only from their physical shackles of illness, materialism, oppression, but especially freeing them from the captivity of sin and ignorance of the Lord.

Christian Life

The Church has inherited this mission of Jesus, of preaching freedom and salvation to the whole world.  Every day the Lord uses the Church to bring glad tidings to you and me who are poor; he proclaims liberty to you and me who are captive to sin; he restores sight to our blindness caused by sin and hatred; in the Church's sacraments, especially confession, he sets us free.

But the Church has also continued to periodically set aside a jubilee year, like the Book of Leviticus prescribed, to help us do a full or partial reset of our lives.

·        The first Christian jubilee year was in 1300.  At a time of much suffering from war and the plague, many people had come to Rome, to the tombs of St. Peter and St. Paul, as a sign of repentance.  And so Pope Boniface VII called a jubilee year for the forgiveness of sins.  Thereafter, jubilee years were to be called every 50 years, like in the Old Testament.

·        But soon it was realized that if the jubilee year was only every 50 years, with the short lifespan of people at that time, those born in between would miss out on the benefits of the jubilee experience.  So it was decided to call a jubilee every 25 years, in other words, once every generation.  Many of us probably remember the great jubilee in the year 2000; some might remember the jubilee of 1975, some few the jubilee year of 1950.

·        But besides the ordinary jubilees every 25 years, some popes have also called extraordinary jubilee years for special purposes.  In 1933 Pope Pius XI called an extraordinary Jubilee to mark 1900 years since the death of Christ, since our redemption.  Fifty years later in 1983, Pope John Paul II did the same thing, marking 1950 years of our redemption.  As we know,  Pope Francis has made 2016 an extraordinary jubilee year of mercy.

But what does this have to do with you and me?  Let me offer two thoughts.

First, we must take Jesus at his word, when he says that he has come to proclaim a year of jubilee, to free us from all captivity.  Sometimes we are too bogged down with the weight of our daily sufferings and our daily sins, to experience this freedom of the children of God.  Like Martin Luther King said, we are free at last, thank God almighty, we are free at last.  Do we realize that?

And if we are free, then we must celebrate our freedom.  Jubilee is not just about liberation; it is also about jubilation.  In fact, both words, jubilee and jubilation, come from the Hebrew word "jobel," the ram's horn that was joyfully sounded, to kick off the jubilee year.  Like the Jewish people in today's first reading, celebrated their return home after the exile, with the reading of Scripture, with rich foods and sweet drinks, we Christians must go about our daily lives with joy and gratitude, for the amnesty that the Lord has given us.

Secondly, as we rejoice in our liberation, we share that fruit of jubilee with others as well, particularly as we cancel debts and restore relationships.  You may have heard about the atrocious civil war that raged on in my native Uganda for nearly twenty years.  Joseph Kony and his men committed untold atrocities against the people of his own tribe.  But when the war ended, the victims and their families did not want the perpetrators tried in court; they wanted them returned to their villages to undergo a community system of justice.  Basically they would have to confess their sins publicly, take on some form of community punishment and then be restored to the community.  This same way of resetting relationships was used in Rwanda after the genocide as well as in the Truth and Reconciliation Commissions of Northern Ireland and South Africa.  As difficult as it was for these victims, somehow they embraced the meaning of jubilee.  They decided that letting bygones be bygones was the best way to reboot their communities.

Conclusion

May this Jubilee year when Jesus proclaims mercy give you and me a fresh start. 

·        Does your relationship with God need resetting?  Why not go to confession, pass through the Holy Door and perhaps make a pilgrimage?

·        Does your relationship with a family member or friend need rebooting?  What about making a phone call or writing them an email or a letter?

May this jubilee year not go to waste.  May it be truly a year of the Lord's favour.