Currahee!

Twenty-first Sunday in Ordinary Time
    Why such difficulty to enter heaven?  Jesus says that the way to heaven is narrow, and many are not strong enough to enter.  Certainly, the easy answer is that our fallen human nature tends towards things that it should not want.  We call this concupiscence.  But I think that there’s a larger point that Jesus was making, and it didn’t really occur to me until around midday this/Saturday morning.
    For those of you who don’t know, I had been training to run the Crim, and had signed up to do the full 10-mile race.  I had never run 10 miles in my life (and this may be the only time I do so).  I knew I had to train, and in May asked one of the Powers graduates who ran cross country, Ethan Hamilton, for advice.  He suggested that I try to run 5 miles 3-4 times per week, and 7.5 miles once per week.  Because of my parish and State Police responsibilities, and especially never knowing when I would be needed for an emergency, I ran around the edge of the parking lot.  So you’re aware, the edge of our parking lot is about four-tenths of a mile, so I was running a little bit more than 12 laps for 5 miles, and around 18 laps for 7.5.  It was not the most entertaining path to run.  I trained pretty well in May, really well in June, and then in July things started to taper off a bit as my resolve wavered, and in the past few weeks, I did not run as much as I should, and I had only done one 7.5 mile run in probably 2 months. 
    So, I trained, and yesterday morning, I ran the CRIM.  I was nervous (I don't know why; it’s only running and I didn’t have a goal for time, I simply wanted to finish and try not to walk any of it).  One of our parish families helped me navigate getting to parking and getting around before the race began.  And then the race started.  My parents had come (they have both run marathons, including Boston) to support me, as well.  As I ran the race, there were people lining the streets, cheering everyone on.  But what I noticed is that, when I saw parishioners, or when I saw Troops from our Flint Post who were working traffic, I got an extra boost. 
    I had been warned about the dreaded Bradley Hills, the steep inclines on Bradley Street that occur around miles 5-6.  Honestly, and I don’t say this to brag, but they weren’t that bad for me.  And part of the reason was a word that I said when running up them (and all the hills): Currahee.  I learned the word from watching “Band of Brothers,” an HBO miniseries on Easy Company of the 2nd Battalion of the 506th Parachute Infantry Regiment of the 101st Airborne Division of the Army in World War II.  Currahee was the name of a hill they had to run up and down at Camp Toccoa for training.  And the word Currahee is a Cherokee word which means, “We stand alone.”  That word connected me to the heroes who worked hard to be prepared so that, when they landed behind enemy lines the night of D-Day; when they were surrounded and short of ammo in the snowy forest of Bastogne in the Battle of the Bulge; as they ran up Eagle’s Nest in some of the last holdouts of Nazi Germany; they could conquer any force that came their way.    I mention the CRIM because I realized that I was able to accomplish what I did because of others.  If I would have tried the CRIM alone, and had no support from parishioners and Troopers, I hope I would have finished, but maybe I would have walked, and maybe it wouldn’t have happened at all. 

    Salvation is hard, getting to heaven is hard, because we so often try to go it alone.  If Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob couldn’t get to heaven on their own; if Moses and Elijah couldn’t get to heaven on their own, then we probably don’t have much of a chance either.  Heaven is only possible when we support each other.
    The most important support in salvation is, of course, Jesus, without whom salvation is impossible.  Without Jesus, we can do nothing that will get us to heaven, no matter how many “good deeds” we do.  But how often do we try to make it on our own good deeds and best behavior?  And how often do we not even live up the weak standards we set for our behavior?
    It’s also important to work with each other to get to heaven.  Again, without Jesus, no matter how many supporters we have, we can’t get there.  But maybe we need to focus more on helping each other get to heaven.  It’s the reason the Church exists: as a band of brothers (and sisters) who help each other get to heaven.  Coming for Mass is the chance to root each other on, as well as to partner up again with Jesus through worthy reception of Holy Communion.  Confession is saying sorry for the ways that we tried to make it on our own, and weren’t successful.  But we need each other.  It’s not simply me and Jesus.  Jesus has a Mystical Body, and that Mystical Body is the Church, where we are assembled to help each other on the way to salvation.  That’s my mission as your pastor: to help you get to heaven.  I hope your mission as parishioners is to help me get to heaven.
    St. Paul compares life to a race.  He says in his second letter to St. Timothy: “I have competed well; I have finished the race…From now on the crown of righteousness awaits me.”  In the CRIM today I was given strength by the parishioners and Troops who waved and cheered as I passed them by.  I was able to finish (my official time was 1:34:58; not bad for a first-timer) my race because of others.  Heaven is not necessarily hard because of the moral demands that Jesus makes on each one of us.  It’s hard, and many fail to enter, because they try without Jesus, and without their brothers and sisters in the Church.  Don’t run alone; you’ll never make it.  Run with Jesus; don’t simply focus on yourself; help others get to heaven.  It will make the race much easier.
   

Read Receipt

Nineteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time
    One of the things I love about the iPhone is a feature that is part of iMessage, the texting platform for iPhones.  IMessage itself is great, because you can use it over wi-fi, without using your data.  This has come in helpful when I’m in a foreign country and want to text someone a message, but don’t want to use International Roaming.  But within iMessage there’s an optional feature called a “read receipt,” which, as the name implies, allows you to see if someone has read your text.    While I love the feature, others, especially young men in high school and college, aren’t always as enthusiastic about it, and often keep it off, because there’s no excuse or fewer excuses not to respond when someone, say your girlfriend, texts you.  Still, I have found myself wondering, if friends don’t have read receipts turned on, or if they don’t have an iPhone, if they received my text or not, and if they are ignoring me or not.
    Today in our readings we hear about faith.  As we heard in our second reading, “Faith is…evidence of things not seen.”  And the author continues to talk about Abraham and his displays of faith: leaving his homeland in Ur; the conception of his son, Isaac; and then trusting in God even when God asked Abraham to sacrifice that same son, Isaac.  I think it’s fair to say that we have a decent number of parishioners who are past the child-bearing age.  But put yourself in Abraham’s shoes: imagine that you had no heir, and then God tells you that you will conceive.  You would probably laugh like Sarah did when she heard the message. 
    And then imagine even further, when that same God tells you to sacrifice Isaac.  We have the benefit of knowing that God stopped Abraham from completing the sacrifice, but Abraham didn’t know that.  And yet, he trusted God, another way of saying that Abraham had faith.
    There are no read receipts when it comes to prayer.  Prayer is an act of faith, trusting that our loving God hears us and will answer our prayers.  How many prayers have been said in this building over the decades?  Of courses there are the Masses, where we pray and offer our lives to the Father through the Son in the power of the Holy Spirit, but also the prayers that are written in the prayerbook by the statues of Mary and Joseph, the prayers that accompany the lit candles, the prayers said during Adoration, and the prayers from people who simply come into the church to spend a few minutes with Jesus.
    Sometimes, like with the birth of Isaac, we know our prayers have been answered.  Sometimes, they may seem to float into the air and disappear, and we don’t know if God answered them or not.  I think especially of the prayers that we say that our deceased loved ones are in heaven: we pray for that to be true, but unless they are canonized, we take it on faith and hope that they are with God for eternity.  And while we’re unsure, we continue to pray for them and offer Masses for them in case they’re in Purgatory and need our assistance to be welcomed into heaven.
    The Church has also been praying, since the beginning, for Jesus to return.  We may not use the Aramaic words, Marana tha, which means, “Come, Lord Jesus,” but the constant prayer of the Church is that Jesus return and put a final end to sin and death so that we no longer have to suffer through this valley of tears.  We maybe have even asked, “Lord, can’t you come back now?”  And it takes faith to believe that Jesus will return, and He will right every wrong, punish every offense, and judge the world with justice.  Until then, we keep waiting, with faith, for the Master to return.
    And we do our best not to beat His servants while we wait.  This doesn’t only mean avoiding physical violence against the children of God, but doing our best to treat others like Jesus did.  We don’t grow lax because we’re not sure that Jesus heard us, but stay with our daily habits of prayer, our weekly penitential practices, spreading the Gospel by word and deed, and our Sunday worship of God at Mass. 
    And we stay with that for probably one of two reasons.  The first reason is not the fulness of the relationship God wants with us, but is a childish way of responding to God.  And that reason is we don’t want to be punished.  I say childish because it’s like a child who doesn’t want to clean his or her room, but does so in order not to get grounded or a spanking.  We get the job done, but it’s done merely out of obligation.  The second reason is that we love God, and that we want to please Him because we love Him.  This is an adult way because true love always seeks to make the beloved happy.  And nothing makes God happier than spending time with Him, especially in prayer, but also in acts of charity and service. 
    In our prayer, whether our prayers of need or our desire for Jesus to return, there is no read receipt.  On this side of eternity, our relationship with God is always an exercise of faith.  But, follow the faith of Abraham, our Father in Faith, to trust that God will give us every good gift that we need, and that Jesus will return one day to make all things right in Him.

Don't Lift Your Arms, Lift Your Heart

Eighteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time
    Well, it’s August.  And you know what that means: school is just around the corner.  By this time, parents are probably looking forward to the start of school, and I’m reminded of that Target commercial, where the kids are standing in the school supplies aisle, looking dejected, while the parent goes up and down the aisle on his cart like a scooter, and the song, “It’s the Most Wonderful Time of the Year” plays.  Hopefully, summer break was restful and relaxing, and it is a great time to get away, to experience “Pure Michigan,” and to put behind you the worries of work or school. 
    Vacation is the perfect time to set aside the daily grind.  This is especially true if you can set aside your smart phone, and truly disconnect from the hustle and bustle of the daily routine.  I know that can sometimes be difficult, but I know that when I really get a chance to unplug from work, it’s like a burden being lifted from my shoulder, so that I can come back with renewed energy to shepherd this parish.
    St. Paul tells us today to “seek what is above.”  He reiterates himself: “Think of what is above, not of what is on earth.”  So we know that he really means it.  He does not mean that we can ignore our daily responsibilities indefinitely.  But he does tell us to concentrate on heavenly things, the things that make us open to God’s grace, rather than the things of earth, by which he means the things that are sinful, like “immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and…greed.” 
    Jesus, too, reminds us to not obsess about earthly things, because they can disappear so quickly.  The man in the parable is not condemned for working hard and gaining riches, but for only making plans to make more riches and focusing on his wealth.  As Solomon said in the first reading, “Here is one who has labored with wisdom and knowledge and skill, and yet to another who has not labored over it, he must leave property.”  It’s not a problem if riches are not the focus of life; it’s just another reality of this passing world.  But if, instead, we have made money our main focus, our god, then the thought of losing it would be devastating.  But not as devastating as realizing at the end of our life that the things that last don’t really have to do with money, or any earthly things, but the things that are above.
    Lifting up our hearts is like our weekly vacation from the world, a weekly reminder to set our hearts on the things which are above.  It’s no accident that this invitation comes right before the Eucharistic Prayer, the holiest part of the Mass, where the bread and wine become the Body and Blood of Jesus.  Jesus Himself invites us to come to him, we who labor and are burdened, and have a rest.  That doesn’t mean you can fall asleep right now!  But it does mean that we can be at ease and not concern ourselves with work, with our daily anxieties, with our smart phones, but just be in the presence of God.
    Church buildings are meant to put our minds and hearts at rest, like we were in the Garden of Eden (before the Fall).  Church architecture is meant to put our mind at ease, because our minds understand that this type of building is different than a school, a gym, a bank, or a store.  The music is meant, not to get us riled up or excited, but to help us rest.  We train our readers so that they can read well and not make us wonder, “What was that he or she said?”  We train our servers to assist at the altar and not draw attention to themselves, but let our attention be put on the prayers that we say and hear, and the symbols that we see and hear (and sometimes smell).  The more a church looks like a church, the easier that is.  The more that we keep to what the Church has perfected over our two millennia in our sacred liturgy, the more the symbols and signs speak to us what they mean, rather than muddling the message with our own words and meanings. 
    If our hearts are focused on what is earthly, then rest, the rest that God wants us to have on His day, our Christian Sabbath, will not seem like rest.  It will seem odd, peculiar, and yes, boring.  But if we are practiced at setting our hearts on things that are above, then our earthly liturgy will prepare us for the heavenly liturgy, that rest that is our inheritance as children of God. 
    Especially in our days when life seems to be moving so quickly and our hearts and minds go from one concern to another, we need to reclaim the rest that we deserve, that God wants for us, each Sunday we come to Mass (and at daily Masses, too!).  Every time you hear, “Lift up your hearts,” don’t lift up your arms, but “seek what is above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God.”  In the words of the ancient hymn from the Divine Liturgy of St. James, “Let all mortal flesh keep silence, / And with fear and trembling stand; / Ponder nothing earthly minded, /  For with blessing in His hand. / Christ our God to earth descending, / Our full homage to demand.”
We’re reminded of this every time we come to Mass.  In the preface dialogue, I invite the people to “Lift up your hearts.”  I’m not inviting you to lift up your arms, which is very simple, but misses the point of that invitation.  The invitation is not to lift up our arms, but to lift up our hearts.  That’s much harder, but it’s much more powerful.