Homily - 1st Sunday of Lent – B - Sunday 18th February 2024

Over the last few days, there has been a lot of rain. On Friday the bands of rain were dispersed with some breaks in the clouds and sunbeams brought out the saturated hues. A coloured arch stretched across Slieve Gullion as the reflected light within the water particles separated into the electromagnetic spectrum, what we call a rainbow (Evers, 2023).

Something you notice flying to other countries, where they get less rain, is how dull the colours are. Here in Ireland, with so much rain, we get to see the freshness of the bright colours as the rain washes away the dirt and grime. The greens are always vivid here and the various shades are amazing.

Over the last few years, we have seen more storms, causing damage to buildings, and trees and taking of life. Science shows how much our planet is rising in temperature and many governments around the world are determined, so we are told by the media, to bring CO2 levels down to zero by the middle of this century. The UN (2024) claims that “75% of global greenhouse gas emissions and nearly 90% of all carbon dioxide emissions” come from burning coal, oil, and gas.

What is CO2? CO2 is carbon dioxide and is created both naturally and through our everyday actions. Humans and animals take in oxygen and then breathe out carbon dioxide (NTL, 2024). Plants take in CO2 and water from the atmosphere using photosynthesis, which allows heat from the sun to make oxygen and activates chemical energy from a type of sugar called glucose, to create the nourishment the plant needs to survive (NGS, 2024). To achieve this, the plant cells contain a pigment called chlorophyll which captures the blue and red light but reflects green light (NGS, 2024). This is why our eyes see plants coloured green (NGS, 2024).

This effect describes how gases such as “carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide and water vapour” (NTL, 2024) known as greenhouse gases, heat up the earth. Like me, you probably have come to think that humans are causing all the greenhouse gases and that we must eradicate such gases to protect our planet. The confusion comes when government leaders promise to achieve zero CO2 within the next decade or two. Scientists tell us by a “collective societal response” (Witze, 2023) that we can adapt our way of using certain fuel types to generate the energy we need to power our world. Clean electricity is the suggested way forward, probably by nuclear power plants.

Yet the biggest contributor to CO2 emissions is not humans but nature itself (NTL, 2024). Animals breathe in the oxygen produced by the plants which need the carbon dioxide for their survival.

Though I started off looking at the rain and the rainbow I had seen arching over Slieve Gullion, you’ll notice, so far there is no mention of God. Yet, today’s Gospel, though brief, mentions how Jesus was driven into the desert for forty days. This happened straight after he had been baptised in the river Jordan. Satan tempted Jesus but he was looked after by the angels. No more description is given in Mark’s account. John the Baptist was arrested, and Jesus began to proclaim the Gospel, saying “The time has come, and the kingdom of God is close at hand”.

Last Wednesday, I had the privilege of joining Fr Seamus in Dromintee and Jonesborough Churches to distribute the ashes. As we both made the sign of the cross on each member of the congregation’s forehead, we asked them to “repent and believe the Gospel – the Good News”. The last line of today’s Gospel.

The first letter of St Peter reminds us of Christ’s innocence, but that he died only once for our sins to bring us back to God. Through Jesus’s actions, our guilt has been washed away. Through the waters of the flood, God made a covenant with Moses not to again destroy the surface of our planet through water. His sign of this promise was the rainbow. Through Christ Jesus a new Covenant was made through the sign of the cross that we receive at baptism.

God brought about the flood in Noah’s time and only a few were saved. In the book of Genesis, God had witnessed the evil humans plotted in their hearts, scheming all day long. He wished he had never created humans and decided to use water to cleanse the planet from their wickedness. The flood lasted forty days, the same amount of time Jesus was tempted by the devil in the desert. This is also the same amount of time we have during Lent to reflect upon what we have done, to repent and believe in the Gospel.

The grass is green, cleansed by the rain, we are cleansed through baptism and need to focus on Jesus Our Saviour. He stopped the storm from destroying the boat the disciples were in when they called for him to help. Now is the time for us to call him to rescue us. We must repent and believe in the Gospel.

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