Fr Paul Gooley reads from the Gospel of (Luke 21: 20-28) in which Jesus tells the disciples, ‘When you see Jerusalem surrounded by armies, you must realise that she will soon be laid desolate’.

Fr Paul in this Gospel Luke focuses on a horror to come and that is the destruction of Jerusalem. He does this by emphasising two things. The first is accurate historical details. The Gospel mentions being ‘surrounded by military camps’, and this recalls the surrounding of the city by the Roman forces, and ultimately the captives being carried off to other nations. Secondly, by contrast, phrase after phrase drawn from the prophets.

This is the biblical way of indicating that the destruction of Jerusalem is the fulfilment of the prophecies. These prophecies were first used about the sacking of the city by the Babylonians. They are applied to the Roman operation, interpreting this agonising and utter destruction as the result of Jerusalem’s rejection of Jesus.

Then the Gospel turns from the fate of Jerusalem to the coming of the Son of man, the glorious figure from the Book of Daniel to whom God was to give all power.

We are now seeing not only the destiny of Jerusalem, but we are seeing the destiny of the whole world.

In Luke’s Gospel Jesus promises that they will see the Son of Man, but the question is – when? Yet, Fr Paul says it is a time of hope because, as we are told, our liberation is near at hand.