New Levels

Fourth Sunday of Lent

    In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.  A few people in the parish know that I play the online game, Clash of Clans.  For those who know, I’m Town Hall 17.  For those who don’t, probably best not to wonder too much.  It’s a game on the phone or tablet where you collect resources, build and defend your village, and war with other plays to get more resources and collect special rewards.  It’s not a role-playing game, but just a fun, online pass time that gives me a distraction a few times a day when I can use a rest for my brain.
    Inevitably, as I get close to getting to the highest level for all my buildings and troops (maxing out, we call it), they release new levels and new things which moves the finish line farther away.  For example, just as I was about to complete most of my buildings for Town Hall 16, they added Town Hall 17 and new upgrades on most of the buildings, which means I had to start saving resources to get to the next level.
    All this “nerding out” does have a point.  In our Gospel today, and to a lesser extent in the epistle, we have different layers that lead somewhere else.  In the epistle it’s a bit simpler: we start with the story of Abraham and Sarah and their slave Hagar.  Now, Abraham and Sarah and Hagar were all real.  They lived life as the Bible describes, including Sarah “convincing” Abraham to have relations with Hagar because Sarah was barren, and Hagar giving birth to Ishmael.  But then God allows Sarah to give birth to a son Isaac after she has relations with Abraham.  And, like the good soap opera which it sounds like, the two women who bore sons to Abraham don’t get along.  But St. Paul notes that this true story was also a foreshadowing of the Law of Moses (represented by Hagar and Ishmael) and the Law of Christ (represented by Sarah and Isaac.). But it also points to the earthly Jerusalem (again, represented by Hagar and Ishmael) and the heavenly Jerusalem (again, represented by Sarah and Isaac).  Just when you think you understand one story, it’s taken to the next level.  And the epistle, as I mentioned, is the easier reading of the two.
    In the Gospel, we have all sorts of levels going on, some of which are directly mentioned, but some of which only make sense in the broader Biblical and theological context.  We start with Passover in the Book of Exodus (the anniversary of which is the time in which the Gospel takes place).  Hopefully we remember what happened: the Israelites put the blood of the unblemished lamb on the doorposts of their houses in Egypt, so that the Angel of Death would pass over their houses.  God established it as a liturgical feast to be celebrated every year as the making present of the past event of the thing that made Pharaoh free the Israelites from slavery.  That’s the first level.
    The second level is the Gospel today, which takes place around the feast of Passover.  In the Gospel, Jesus miraculously multiples five barley loaves and two fish into enough for 5,000 men, not counting women and children.  After this miracle, and after the Lord flees from the Jews who wanted to make Him King, because it was not yet His hour, Christ gives the famous Bread of Life discourse, teaching us that if we wish to have eternal life, we must eat His flesh and drink His blood.  Many of the Lord’s followers reject this hard teaching and walk away, but He doesn’t change what He says or even modify it.
    But, the multiplication of the loaves points to something which is coming up: the Last Supper.  Christ gives His Apostles, His first bishops, a new liturgy, connected to the Passover, but superseding it, in which ordinary unleavened bread and wine, which were used in the Passover, becomes His Sacred Body and His Precious Blood.  Christ uses language to assert that this is a new rite for His new Church, and asks that they repeat this ritual in His remembrance.  This is level three.
    But we’re not done yet.  Because the Last Supper points to and intimately connects to the offering of the truly unblemished lamb, the Lamb of God pointed out by John the Baptist, on the cross on Good Friday.  The Eucharist, the sacrament of the Flesh and Blood of our Savior, first preached in John, chapter 6, was instituted on Holy Thursday, but is the unbloody presentation of what happened on Good Friday.  The Precious Blood of the Lamb of God save, not only the first born in Egypt, but all of God’s people in all time and space whom God has chosen.  Death is conquered when Life Incarnate dies on the tree, and Christ gives us a way to access that conquest of death each time we receive the Eucharist in a state of grace.  Level four.

Ghent Altarpiece

    But wait; there’s more!  Because the Eucharist, the re-presentation of Calvary in an unbloody manner on the altar points to the heavenly Jerusalem (connecting us with the epistle) where Christ eternally offers Himself to the Father in the wedding banquet of the Lamb of God, the heavenly worship to which the Mass points.  This is the fifth level.  The beautiful bottom panel of the Ghent Altarpiece shows the Lamb, pierced with blood flowing into a chalice, on an altar, with a cross nearby, with angels and saints around the altar worshiping and singing, which brings together most of those levels in one artistic rendition.  
    In the Scriptures, so many things connect together, and so many Old Testament true stories point to New Testament fulfillment and realities, which themselves prepare us for heaven.  May our Lenten sacrifices keep taking us deeper and deeper into our understanding of what God has revealed, until we hopefully see the final fulfillment in the kingdom of heaven, where Christ lives and reigns with God the Father in the unity of the Holy Spirit, God for ever and ever.  Amen.  

On Pilgrimage

Feast of the Presentation of the Lord/Purification of the Blessed Virgin Mary
    [In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen].  On this past Christmas Eve, Pope Francis opened the 2025 Jubilee Year, choosing as its theme “Pilgrims of Hope.”  There are numerous opportunities to gain plenary indulgences during this Jubilee, including pilgrimages to our Cathedral in Lansing, to two of the three churches on the pilgrimage to Kentucky that we hope to do in June, or to certain churches in Rome and Jerusalem.
    We hear in our Gospel of the first pilgrimage of our Lord to Jerusalem for the two-fold purpose of celebrating the purification rites for a woman who had given birth, in accord with Leviticus, chapter 12, and the redemption of the first born son, from Exodus, chapter 13.  Our Blessed Mother offers the sacrifice for her purification, and our Lord is given back to God as the firstborn son, remembering how the angel of death passed over the Israelites who marked their lintels with the blood of the lamb.
    This idea of pilgrimage to the Temple, for various reasons, finds its root in the Old Testament, which our Lord fulfilled.  Generally, a good Jew would travel to the Temple each year at least for the Feasts of Passover, Pentecost, and Booths.  The temple signified the dwelling place of God, and so all the people would travel to God’s home to be near Him and to thank Him for freedom from slavery and the life of the firstborn (Passover), for the blessing of produce and giving of the law (Pentecost), and the blessing of the harvest and exodus from Egypt (Booths).  But in each case, one traveled to be near God.

Simeon and the Christ Child

    In Christ’s first pilgrimage, the Holy Family did not, technically speaking, need to go to the Temple to find themselves close to God.  They had God with them at all times!  And yet, they still humbled themselves to obey the Law.  Yet, in that Law, God came into His temple in a new way, unlike even when He dwelt in the Temple of Solomon in His presence with the Ark of the Covenant.  By their humility, the Holy Family participated in the fulfillment of the prophecy of Malachi that we heard in the first reading/epistle: “there will come to the temple the Lord whom you seek.”  And in the fulfillment of this prophecy, another promise is fulfilled, that to Simeon, whom God promised would not taste death until he had seen the Lord’s Messiah, His Anointed One.  And from that fulfilled promise, Simeon also prophesies that Christ will be the rise and fall of many in Israel, and that a sword of sorrow would pierce Mary’s Immaculate Heart.  
    So how are we on pilgrimage to God?  Our life is meant to be a pilgrimage, not to Lansing, or Kentucky, or Rome, or Jerusalem, but to the heavenly Jerusalem, the Temple not made with hands.  Bethlehem to Jerusalem is a 5.5 mile walk.  You could easily get there and back in a day.  But Jerusalem was built on a hill, and so there were ups and downs.  This time of year in Jerusalem it is around 60 degrees, but there is also rain at this time of year.  So the Holy Family maybe dealt with sun or rain.  Likewise, in our life, which passes before God like a day, there will be ups and downs.  Some days trying to live as a disciple and love God and neighbor as He commanded will be easy; other days it will be difficult.  There will be sunny days where we are full of smiles while following the Lord and there will also be rain when we feel like God has absented Himself from our life, or like the cross He has allowed us to carry seems too heavy.  But you can’t get to the destination of a pilgrimage by stopping.  Sometimes little breaks may be necessary for rest, but the point of the pilgrimage is to keep moving.  
    And as we go towards the heavenly Jerusalem, we, too, should seek the purification of God.  Sin darkens our soul.  It makes us unworthy of temple worship, unworthy of being in God’s house because our actions have communicated that we don’t want to be with Him, and prefer our own ways to His.  It clouds our intellect so that we cannot understand what God wants us to do and how He wants us to love Him and others.  But God offers us purification through the Sacrament of Penance.  He washes us clean by His Precious Blood so that we can enter the Temple and bask in the warmth of His presence.  
    Pilgrimages are also based on hope.  We hope that we will arrive.  Nowadays, as we travel by car or bus or plane, or sometimes all three, our travel is less unsure.  But pilgrimages were historically a matter of walking, and you didn’t know where you might stop, or how safe the way was, or even if you would arrive.  So on our pilgrimage to heaven, we have to have hope.  We hope that God will protect us from anything that seeks to do us harm.  We hope that God will help us arrive at our final destination.  We go from what is seen, our starting point, to what is unseen, our destination.  In the end, until Christ returns in glory, only God knows who arrives safely, unless God grants the Church a knowledge that some have already arrived (our canonized saints).  But we hope that our loved ones are there, cheering us on, encouraging us not to give up, not to turn aside to other false gods or paths that lead away from God, and to persevere through the hills and valleys, the sun and the rain.  
    May this Jubilee Year inspire in us the hope that we will arrive in heaven someday, where Christ will welcome us all as parts of the Mystical Body of the Son redeemed in the Temple forty days after His Birth, the Light of Salvation for all peoples, Jesus Christ[, who with the Father and the Holy Spirit is God for ever and ever.  Amen].

Living the Paschal Mystery

Solemnity of the Ascension of the Lord
    [In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.]  Sometimes we use words in the Church that are very important, but whose meaning is not always clear.  For example, in December we celebrate the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary.  But many Catholics think that it refers to the Annunciation, when Jesus was conceived by the power of the Holy Spirit in the womb of the Blessed Mother, while it really refers to our Blessed Mother’s conception without original sin.  Another phrase that is especially important today is Paschal Mystery. 

The place from which Jesus ascended in Jerusalem

    The Catechism of the Catholic Church defines the Paschal Mystery as, “Christ’s work of redemption accomplished primarily by his Passion, death, Resurrection, and glorious Ascension.”  Today, as we celebrate the Ascension of our Lord, we celebrate the closing out of the Paschal Mystery.  Paschal means related to the Passover, and Mystery, in this sense, means the great work of God that is invisible, but which was manifested in visible ways (the suffering, death, resurrection, and ascension of the Lord).  Christ’s Passover saved us from death and brought us from slavery in sin to freedom in the heaven, just as the Jewish Passover saved them from the angel of death wiping out the first born in Egypt by the blood of the unblemished lamb, and inaugurated their flight from Egypt, that place of slavery, into the Promised Land.
    But while the Jewish Passover happened some 3,450 years ago, and the fulfillment of that Passover in Christ happened some 2,000 years ago, God does not relegate the Paschal Mystery to the past.  No, we celebrate it each time we come to Mass, and especially each Sunday, the Lord’s Day, as we enter into the moments of our redemption in a mystical way, and participate, as it were, in our own redemption because we join ourselves to Christ’s Passion, death, Resurrection, and Ascension at each Mass.  We do not simply remember what Christ did for us; God through visible signs, allows us to join in what Christ did for us so that we can share the fruits of that Paschal Mystery, which is resurrection and glorification. 
    But as disciples of Christ, God calls us to live that Paschal Mystery each day of our life, and not just in the church building.  Each day we have the opportunity of living out in ourselves what Christ did once for all some 2,000 years ago.  This is what St. Paul means when he says in the first chapter of Colossians: “in my flesh I am filling up what is lacking in the afflictions of Christ on behalf of his body, which is the church.”  So how do we live each day in the Paschal Mystery?  How do we participate in Christ’s Passion, death, Resurrection, and Ascension?
    We participate in the Passion and death of the Lord in our daily lives through the sufferings that come to us.  We don’t have to seek out suffering.  It readily makes itself available to us.  Suffering, by itself, is a lack.  But suffering united to Christ’s becomes redemptive by participating in His Paschal Mystery.  We all have various sufferings each day.  Maybe we hate our job; maybe our family drives us up a wall; maybe our sports team lost; maybe gas is more expensive than we would like it to be; maybe we lack trust in our political leadership.  However we experience it, we suffer daily.  But when we unite it to Christ, when we suffer in obedience to the will of the Father and seek not to do our own will, but “the will of the one who sent me,” we participate in redemption, both of ourselves and of the whole world.  This is what the sisters meant when they would say, “Offer it up.”  Now, I know we can use that phrase to basically mean, “stop whining,” but in its truest sense, that phrase reminds us to live out the Paschal Mystery, to suffer (the passion) and die (the crucifixion) to what we want and offer that pain to the Father, who receives it as an offering of love. 
    We participate in the Resurrection when we see God change our suffering that we have offered to Him into new life.  This is when we offer up that bad driver and find that our heart actually grows in love and mercy for whoever he or she may be.  This is when someone at work commends us and maybe even gives us a raise when we think they don’t notice the work we do.  This is when the child who has brought you to the brink of insanity and tested your patience to its last limit runs up to you, smiles, and gives you a hug saying, “I love you, mommy.”  When we offer our sufferings to the Father through Christ the Son in the power of the Holy Spirit, God transforms them into something which gives new life, just as the Father transforms ordinary bread and wine into the Body and Blood of His Son through the power of the Holy Spirit when we offer them to Him. 
    Our participation in the Ascension is something finds its fulfillment when the end of our earthly ministry is over, just as it did the same for Christ at the end of His earthly ministry.  Christ’s Ascension is His glorification, because the Father raises Christ up into glory at His right hand.  For us, the fullness of the ascension happens when we have done everything we can to offer our lives to the Father, when He has given us new life through those sufferings united to Him, and when He welcomes us into glory in heaven.  Christ led the way for us, but He wants us to follow Him–in His suffering and death; in His resurrection; and lastly, in His Ascension.  God does not keep glory for Himself, but shares it with us, according to our nature.  What a joy to allow God to raise us up to the fullness of who we are meant to be, a reality which can only be completed in heaven. 
    But that’s our hope, a hope based in following Christ, not just in His teaching (but certainly those), but also in His Paschal Mystery.  May we rejoice in this Paschal Mystery each time we assemble for Mass, and especially on the Lord’s Day, but may we also live out that Paschal Mystery every day of our lives, suffering and dying with God, allowing God to raise us to new life, and waiting for God the Father to glorify us with His Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, who lives and reigns in the unity of the Holy Spirit, for ever and ever.  Amen.  

Anamnesis: A Special Kind of Remembrance

Mass of the Lord’s Supper

    In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.  Usually at least once per lifetime, there is an event that looms larger than life, often times a tragedy.  Sometimes the event affects mostly local folk.  Other times it impacts an entire country or world.  No doubt those who attended MSU this year will talk about where they were when the shooting happened on campus.  For me, the major event was the terrorist attack on 9/11.  For those slightly older than me, maybe it was the explosion of the Challenger space shuttle.  For those in my parents’ generation and older, it was the JFK assassination. 
    These events weigh differently than other memories.  It almost always yields the question, “Where were you…?”  My mom talks about watching her mother, my grandmother, cry as the television reports of JFK’s death started to roll in.  I can remember walking down the hall of Lansing Catholic High School, and hearing our principal come over the PA and tell teachers that they may want to turn on the TV (we only had local channels) in their classrooms, and watching replays of the airplanes hitting the World Trade Center, and the buildings collapse before our eyes.  These events are not just memories in the sense that I remember my graduation; they etch themselves in a unique way into our very sub-conscience which seems to make the past present once more.
    The Greek word anamnesis is the word used for this kind of remembering, and which applied to the Passover celebration that Moses commanded the people to observe.  That night, the night that the angel of death passed over the houses of the Israelites marked with the blood of the lamb, was certainly one of those great events that etched itself in the memory.  But Moses commanded that it be celebrated each year in much the same way (though without the blood on the doorposts).  They were not only to remember the event, but, as it were, enter once more into that saving act which initiated their freedom from slavery in Egypt. 
    Since Christ celebrated the Passover (albeit a day early, due to His impending death), His celebration of the Last Supper dripped with that same significance and bearing.  The Apostles knew that they were entering into a sacred moment which brought to the present they ancient liberation from the Egyptians.  But our Lord changed some of the celebrations, which would have been noticeable.  First, He began with what we heard in the Gospel today, where He washed the feet of His Apostles.  Certainly the Apostles would have been shocked at this happening, but perhaps more so because it proceeded the ancient ritual.  Peter, never one to simply go with the flow, objects, but then wholeheartedly embraces such a new ritual.
    But even at the Passover meal, Christ changes the ritual.  No longer so much about a liberation from slavery, but now the giving over of His own Body and Blood, as He creates a new ritual for His Chosen Band, and for the Church which will embrace, not only Israel, but the entire world.  Again, the Apostles would have noticed this stark difference, and would have understood the words “Do this is memory of me” as a command for this new ritual to be repeated into the future, just as the Passover had been commanded by Moses. 
    As we enter into this new ritual, as we obey the command of the Lord to celebrate this sacrifice in His memory, we are not simply thinking back some 2,000 years to what happened in an upper room.  At this Eucharistic celebration, and at every Mass, we do not only recall what Christ did for us.  We enter into His offering of His Body and Blood under the sacramental signs of bread and wine.  We participate in that to which the Last Supper points, the death on the cross on Calvary. 
    No longer is it the blood of a dumb animal that covers the lintels of our doors, but the Precious Blood of the truly unblemished Lamb of God that paints the lintels of our lips as we receive the Body and Blood of Christ.  No longer does that blood tell the Angel of Death to pass over the house so that the children of Israel can be freedom from bondage in Egypt after they passed through the Red Sea, but the Precious Blood tells Satan not to enter the holy temple of God that we have become by baptism, and we are freed from any venial sins and oppression by the devil. 
    Remembering is good, and provides some benefits.  But entering in allows us to share in the benefits of what happened.  Our participation at Mass is not meant to be like watching an old Super Bowl on TV.  We are meant, using that analogy, to be on the field in that old Super Bowl game.  Yes, it happens sacramentally, but it still happens, nonetheless. 
    And so, at this Mass, as at every Mass, may we not simply act like spectators at an ancient event, but truly give our hearts and minds to being in that Upper Room with our Lord.  As we walk in procession tonight, may we see ourselves walking with our Lord from that Upper Room, across the valley, to Garden of Gethsemane, where Christ will ask us to watch and pray with Him.  As the ancient hymn from the Divine Liturgy of St. James sings, “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”, who, with the Father and Holy Spirit reigns for ever and ever.  

It's Not Supposed to Be This Way

Mass of the Lord’s Supper

The Upper Room in Jerusalem (now a mosque)

    Many people presume that the Passover meal that Jesus celebrated was a Seder Meal.  I myself remember being in Catholic elementary school during Holy Week and having small Seder Meals in a classroom.  I wasn’t a fan of the egg, but I did enjoy the matzoh, parsley and the charoseth (which was a mixture of apples, walnuts, cinnamon, and honey).  Instead of real lamb, we had a paper lamb cut out for us (when I first tasted lamb many years later, I learned how truly disappointing it was to only have paper).  But scholars, even Jewish scholars, that I have read, state that the Seder Meal originated sometime after the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem around the year of our Lord 70.  So Jesus, at the Last Supper, most likely was not celebrating a Seder Meal.  But, that’s not to say that the Passover didn’t have rituals.  Indeed, our first reading starts to outline some of the rituals of the Passover meal.
    Rituals are repeated actions, sometimes associated with religion.  The beauty of ritual is that, for the most part, it’s not supposed to change.  So the Apostles, gathered in the Upper Room with Jesus, had some idea of what was going to happen, even if it started out oddly, as it was a day earlier than the first Passover celebration was supposed to begin. 
    But those ideas were quickly shattered.  Before the celebration begins, Jesus takes off his outer garments and serves the Apostles in the task usually reserved for the lowest slave.  You can imagine the Apostles thinking, “It’s not supposed to be this way!”  Peter is the only one who has the courage to actually say what’s on his mind: “‘Master, are you going to wash my feet?’”  Jesus is the Master, the Messiah, the Anointed One of God who is supposed to lead Israel into a new kingdom of prosperity!  What is Jesus doing?  It’s not supposed to be this way!
    And then, as they celebrate the Passover (in whatever way that happened), Jesus changes things.  When it comes to the unleavened bread, Jesus changes the ritual and says, “Take this, all of you, and eat of it, for this is my Body.”  And then when it comes to the wine, Jesus again changes the ritual, and says, “Take this, all of you, and drink from it, for this is the chalice of my Blood, the Blood of the new and eternal covenant, which will be poured out for you and for many for the forgiveness of sins.  Do this is memory of me.”  As they ate the Body of the Lord, and drank His Blood in the celebration of the first Eucharist, I can imagine them thinking, ‘It’s not supposed to be this way!’
    After the first Eucharist, Jesus then has a beautiful prayer and conversation where He goes back and forth between a conversation with the Apostles and a conversation with His heavenly Father.  We call this the Last Supper Discourse, and if you’re looking for a beautiful read tonight and tomorrow and Saturday, you can read the Gospel of John chapters 14-17.  This was certainly not part of the Passover meal (you’ll get why if you read the chapters), and so probably the Apostles were thinking, ‘It’s not supposed to be this way!’
    As I celebrate Mass tonight, the same thought is on my mind: it’s not supposed to be this way.  The church is not supposed to be empty; there’s supposed to be the optional ritual of washing feet; there’s supposed to be a Eucharistic procession.  None of that will happen.  In fact, Cardinal Sarah, speaking for the Pope, had to give special permission for priests to celebrate this Mass with only one minister, as that has, from time immemorial, never been allowed.  Don’t get me wrong: Jesus is still here, the bread and wine will still become His Body and Blood, but I think that we realize that it’s not supposed to be this way.  The Mass of the Lord’s Supper is meant to be our special entering into the Lord’s Passion for all parishioners, not simply for the few who are necessary to pull off a beautiful, but minimal, celebration.
    But what followed from that first Eucharist, administered by the hands of Jesus Himself?  Salvation followed.  Dark days, yes, but light, too.  Suffering, intense suffering, but later, peace and joy.  Death, a death unlike any before or any after, but also resurrection.  All those came through a celebration that wasn’t supposed to be the way it happened.
    So, what will follow from this year’s, “it’s not supposed to be this way”?  Jesus is offering the same gifts, but our response will dictate whether or not we receive those gifts.  Will we treasure our reception of the Eucharist, rather than simply see it as the weekly routine we go through?  Will we prepare better for the celebration of the Eucharist, perhaps by confession, but always by quieting our hearts and minds to hear what the Lord wants to say to us?  We will allow the Eucharist to transform us and change the way that we interact with each other after we leave Mass? 
    There are many tragedies during this time of pandemic.  But the biggest tragedy of this time of fasting from public Mass in our churches will not be those who are infected or who have died, tragic as that truly is.  The biggest tragedy of this time of fasting from public Mass will not be the economic changes that churches have to make to adapt.  The biggest tragedy of this time when we cannot pray together in person in our parish church will be if, after all of this is over, we return to the same life we had before and not appreciate the sacrifice that Jesus allows us to share in every time we get to come to Mass by either not even coming when we don’t feel like it, or receiving the Eucharist in an unworthy state.  Tonight Jesus teaches us: it’s not supposed to be that way.

Too Good To Be True...But It Is

Easter Vigil

There are more movies than I can count where the ending seems too good to be true: the awkward guy gets the gorgeous girl; the bomb is defused in the last second before it explodes; the lies of the villain are exposed and the persecuted hero is vindicated.  We’ve all seen it in movies, we’ve all read it in books.  But when it comes to real life, very rarely do those things happen.  Life, it seems is more tragic than fiction could ever create.

But tonight is not an example of tragedy.  Tonight, in fact, is when we celebrate something that is too good to be true, but is true, nonetheless.  No one, save perhaps the Blessed Mother, would have dared to hope that Jesus would rise from the dead.  Even the holy women who went to the tomb, weren’t going because they thought Jesus might rise.  They were going to complete the mourning rites which had to be suspended due to the celebration of Passover on the previous Friday night and Saturday.  In fact, none of the disciples can believe the news that Jesus rose from the dead until they see Him and recognize Him.

All of our Old Testament readings from Genesis, Exodus, Isaiah, and Ezekiel were all examples of stories that looked like they were going to have a happy ending, but didn’t.  Adam and Eve are created by God as the crowning of His creation; they are made in the image and likeness of God.  Yet, as the story continues, we know that they disobey God and put mankind on a trajectory of pain, suffering, and death.  

The Chosen People are doubting God as the Egyptians grow closer.  Then God, through Moses, splits the Red Sea in two and they pass through it, even as the water closes in on the Egyptians who follow and destroys Pharaoh’s army.  But, we all know that story.  Not long after they sing their song of freedom, which was sung by our choir after the reading from Exodus, they once again doubt God, and worship false gods.

Isaiah and Ezekiel both prophesy about a time when Israel will be restored to glory, when God will shower His love upon them and give them a new heart and new life.  God promises to take care of Israel, give them peace, and forgive them of their sins for the sake of His Name.  But even after the Israelites return to the Promised Land from their exile in Babylon, after they realize that they were sent away because of their infidelity to God, they still turn away from God, and eventually lose their land and their sovereignty to the pagan Romans.  All of those Old Testament stories have so much potential, so much build up, but never seem to come to the desired climax.

But not so tonight.  Not so with the Resurrection.  This is the night when the good ending finally happens.  This is the night when evil and darkness are conquered, once for all, and good and light win the day.  This is the night which “sets Christian believers apart from worldly vices and from the gloom of sin, leading them to grace and joining them to his holy ones.  This is the night, when Christ broke the prison-bars of death and rose victorious from the underworld.”  Tonight we celebrate that we are not relegated to tragic endings, to falling into sin and darkness.  Tonight we participate in and God renews in us the truth that in Him we can thrive and succeed.

And that new life in Christ, made possible by the Resurrection, will be imparted through the waters of Baptism, which Christ Himself makes holy, to Alexis, Brooklyn, and Camryn.  They will put on Christ and have the opportunity to live a life free of grave sin, free of separation from God, free from Satan.  

The new life of Christ will also be perfected in Christine as she makes her profession of faith and as she and Alexis are confirmed and receive the Eucharist for the first time.  They will be strengthened by the power of the Holy Spirit not only to claim that new life for themselves, but also to share it with those they meet by word and example.  And for those of us who are baptized, for those of us who are confirmed, we, too, have that new life of Christ in us, and tonight we can start afresh in living that new life.  

Tonight, as we come to the empty tomb of Christ to worship Jesus and His Resurrection, leave at the tomb all that is not of God.  Do not be afraid to place all your sins, your worries, your fallenness at the place of death, and walk away tonight with the Risen Christ, who offers to us the best ending that we could ever imagine: the new life of the Resurrection.

Union in the Face of Separation

Holy Thursday–Mass of the Lord’s Supper

One of the hardest things that we learn as humans is the pain of separation.  Sometimes that separation is between friends who have grown up together who are now leaving for different colleges; sometimes the separation is a break-up between and man and a woman who thought they were in love, but who are now going their separate ways; sometimes it is the separation by death of a husband from a wife who have lived together for most of their life; sometimes it is the separation of a priest from his parish.  Separation is a hard lesson to learn, a lesson that brings with it pain and tears.

Probably all of us have experienced some form of separation, whether the ones I listed or different ones.  We all know that pain, that pit in our stomach, the tears that flow from our eyes at the separation either already experienced or coming in the future.  Jesus, as fully human, also knew this pain, and it is in that context of separation that He celebrates the Last Supper with His apostles, anticipating the celebration of the Passover by one day.

Jesus “knew that his hour had come to pass from this world to the Father.  He loved his own in the world and he loved them to the end.”  He knew that He would not be able to celebrate the Passover, the great feast of redemption from slavery in Egypt, with his apostles because He would be on the cross, dying to truly redeem the world from its greatest enemy: sin.  We get some sense from the Gospel tonight and the Gospel passage we heard last Sunday of the trouble the Last Supper caused the apostles.  There is much confusion, concern, and anxiety.  No one knows what will happen next.  

So what does Jesus do?  St. Paul tells us that

the Lord Jesus, on the night he was handed over, took bread, and, after he had given thanks, broke it and said, “This is my body that is for you.  Do this in remembrance of me.”  In the same way also the cup, after supper, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood.  Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me.”

Jesus, at the same time, institutes the priesthood and the Eucharist, so that all of Jesus disciples not in the upper room, that is, every disciple beyond the Eleven, could have something to hold on to in the midst of their separation.

We call the Eucharist Holy Communion, and it truly is Holy Union With Christ.  It is not simply a memory of what Jesus did.  It is a way, in the present, that the anxiety of separation can be lifted.  Because when we receive the Eucharist worthily, we are not separated from Jesus, but are united to Him.  When we eat His Body and drink His Blood, Jesus is one with us, and we are one with Him.  And, for those who are baptized into His Body and remain in it after Baptism, because we are members of the Church, the Body of Christ, we also have union with each other.  Only those members of the Body who have cut themselves off from it by mortal sin are truly separated from Jesus, even if they receive Holy Communion, until they are reconciled with God and rejoined to the Mystical Body of Christ.  Otherwise we are connected by Jesus by sharing in His Body and Blood.  

Jesus knows the pain of separation.  In fact, on the cross, feeling the full weight of sin, the full weight of enmity and rejection of God, Jesus will cry out, “Eli, Eli, lema sabachtani?” which means “My God, my God, why have you abandoned me?”  Jesus, in His human nature, feels the worst separation that any human can have: separation from God.  But that is not His plan for His followers.  Jesus institutes the priesthood so that His presence and His power will continue in the world through the sacramental life of the Church, especially the Most Blessed Sacrament of the Eucharist.  He gives all of His disciples a way to be united with Him, not separated from Him, until He returns in glory.  And not only Him, but also with each other, even when we are separated by long distances, or even by death.  In the Eucharist, the Sacrament of Love, death is overcome and we have union with Christ and with each other, whether our life continues on earth, or if it continues in Purgatory or Heaven.  

How do we show appreciation for such a great gift as continuing communion with Jesus?  We try to live as He did, in total obedience to the Father, in holiness of life.  If we fall and separate ourselves from God by mortal sin, we seek reconciliation with God through His Sacrament of Reconciliation, and change our life to be more like His.  How do we show appreciation for such a great gift?  We offer the “sacrifice of thanksgiving, and…call upon the name of the Lord.  [Our] vows to the Lord [we] pay in the presence of all his people.”

Why is This Night Different from All Other Nights?

Easter Vigil 

 

At the first question at the Seder, the meal that celebrates the Passover, the youngest child asks: Ma nishtana ha-laila ha-zeh mi-kol ha-leylot?  The English translation is: Why is this night different from all other nights?  On this night, the Passover in the Book of Exodus, when the angel of death passed over the house of the Chosen People, is fulfilled.  And so it is right for us to ask this same question: why is this night different from all other nights?

Why do we read these four readings from the Old Testament rather than one like we usually do at Mass?  We read these readings that point to the Resurrection all throughout Salvation History.  We begin with the creation of the world, and how God created all things beginning on the first day.  So on this, the eve of the first day of the week, the day after the Sabbath, we remember that Jesus Christ began a new creation in Himself, as He conquered sin and death.  We then hear about how Moses and the Chosen People were saved through water as God had them pass through the waters to safety, while He destroyed the evil Egyptians, the symbol of oppression of God’s People, in those same waters.  So, too, our Elect will pass through the water and be saved by it, while Satan’s kingdom will be further destroyed.  We hear from the Prophet Isaiah about being satisfied by the Lord, whose Word will have its effect to make the earth fertile and fruitful.  So God will feed us in the Eucharist and His Eternal Word, Jesus Christ, will continue the work of our baptism to change us to be more like Him.  We hear from the Prophet Ezekiel next as the last Old Testament reading how God, who had allowed His People to undergo the punishment of their infidelity will now save them because of the holiness of His Name, so that all may know that God is truly God and there is no other.  God will sprinkle clean water upon His People and pour out His Spirit upon them.  So we recall that God has now saved us through Christ and sent His Holy Spirit upon us, and especially upon those who will receive the Sacrament of Confirmation tonight.  

Next we sing the Gloria for the first time since Thursday night at the Mass of the Lord’s Supper.  This recalls for us the moment of the birth of Jesus Christ when the angels sang the glorious hymn: Glory to God in the Highest and on earth peace to people of good will.  We light the altar candles as the visible reminder that when Christ was born, a new light shone upon the world, and the light is Christ Himself.  So the candles around the altar, the altar which symbolizes Christ, are lit.  Then we turned to the New Testament, to the Apostle Paul, who reminded us that in baptism we died with Christ so that we could rise with Him to new life.  And that death that we experienced was meant to be a death from all that separated us from God, and all our sinful ways, into the new life in union with (we can also say communion with) God.  

And, in the high point of the Proclamation of God’s Word, we heard the Gospel of the Resurrection proclaimed.  We listened to the account of the holy women who went to the tomb, early on Sunday morning, only to find that the large stone had been rolled back, and Jesus was not there, but an angel, announcing that Jesus has been raised from the dead.  While we will likely not be here until after midnight, very early in the morning, we wait with watchful eyes and ears, in vigil, to solemnly celebrate the Resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.  

Tonight we gather because all of time, and especially all of how God revealed Himself through the Old Testament pointed to this moment.  Tonight we gather because from all people, katholicos in Greek, God has desired His children to share in the Paschal Mystery: the suffering, death, Resurrection, and ascension of Jesus Christ.  And tonight that same Paschal Mystery will be entered into by those receiving the Sacraments: the Elect who will receive Baptism, Confirmation, and the Eucharist; the Candidates who will profess their faith in all the Catholic Church teaches, and then be confirmed and receive the Eucharist as well.  They will begin to make the fullness of that Paschal Mystery theirs through life in the Catholic Church.  

Very shortly we will celebrate that Paschal Mystery in sacramental form.  I won’t explain that yet.  As in the early centuries of the Church, I want our Elect and Candidates to experience it for themselves first, and then to understand the mysteries that they celebrated afterwards.  I will let the symbols speak with their own power to communicate, and then, having joined the Church of Christ, they will have a chance to be guided in their understanding of what happened.  

But, whether you will become Catholic tonight or are already Catholic, tonight is different from all other nights because on this night the doors of our hearts were marked with the Blood of the Unblemished Lamb of God who by His death destroyed death and took away the sins of the world.  On this night life was changed forever because death no longer held sway over us.  This is the day the Lord has made, let us rejoice and be glad in it, alleluia!!

Peering into Jesus' Last Hours

Mass of the Lord’s Supper

I invite you to close your eyes.  Take a deep breath in.  Breathe out.  Breathe in.  Breathe out.  Calm your heart, mind, and soul.  Put behind you the busyness of the day and just be with God.  Now, imagine for a second that you were going to die tomorrow, and that you only have a few hours to speak with anyone.  Who would be with you?  Would it be a spouse, your immediate family, or a friend?  What would you say?  What would you do?

We gather tonight, glancing in on Jesus’ last hours with His closest friends, the Apostles.  It almost seems like snooping.  The upper room is likely decorated in a noble, yet simple way, ready for the celebration of Pesach, the Passover.  Unleavened bread is on the table.  There are bitter herbs, charoseth, and wine in ceremonial dishes.  But the Passover, the sacred remembering that is more than just calling a past event to mind, is not supposed to be celebrated on Thursday, but on Friday night.  Still, Jesus knows that He will not be able to celebrate it with them on Friday.  As the Apostles enter the room, Jesus takes off His outer garment to wash their feet–feet crusted with dirt from walking, likely with some small sores from pebbles.  He, the Master, performs the task of the slave, giving the Apostles a command, a command they will not understand for at least three days, that as princes themselves of the New Israel, they are to follow the example of the Master and wash others’ feet.

Having finished washing their feet, Jesus begins the celebration of the Passover.  But before the breaking of bread and before the sharing of the cup, Jesus prophesies that one of the Twelve will betray Him, and Judas leaves.  Having, then, only the Eleven who are faithful, as faithful as they can be, Jesus institutes at the same time the Most Holy Sacrament of the Eucharist and the Priesthood, as He, the Lord of the Passover, changes the Mosaic Rite and adds His own words.  But even in the midst of His most faithful, Jesus also tells St. Peter that he will deny Him before the cock crows.  And then Jesus begins His High Priestly Prayer, speaking to the Father in words so intimate that the Apostles must have simply sat there and listened and felt they were intruding on something that was profoundly personal.  

In His last hour, Jesus gathers His friends, not even His mother, and gives them a way to be connected throughout all time by establishing a presence through the Eucharist and a  presence through priestly ordination and configuration.  In His last hour, Jesus expresses His love and confidence to the Father, even as the powers of darkness are closing in around Him.  In His last hour, Jesus reassures his Apostles, His friends, and tells them not to let their hearts be troubled, and that while they cannot follow now, they will follow Jesus later, because He is the way and the truth and the life.  He promises them an Advocate who will defend them, even as the world hates them.  And then Jesus goes to pray on the Mount of Olives, exchanging the camaraderie of his chosen band for the utter loneliness of knowing what will happen next, as the Apostles sleep, exhausted from the weight and the power of those moments in the Upper Room.

Tonight we peer into that sacred moment.  We begin the three days that are one, the Triduum, with a Mass that will not be concluded until the dismissal at the Easter Vigil.  We recall, not simply in a retelling, but in an event that seems to take us back in time, the mandatum, the mandate of service in the washing of feet; we are connected to Jesus’ Passion once more in the perfect sacrifice of the Son of God, made present to us by the Eucharist, and offered by the Priest, configured to Christ the Head and Shepherd through Holy Order, to join the offering of the entire People of God to that of Jesus on the cross; we walk with Jesus to a place where we can feel the darkness closing in.  

We do not know when our last hours of life will be.  But if we did, who would we ask to be there with us?  What would we say?  What would we do?  As we enter into the last moments of Jesus’ earthly ministry, He gathers His closest friends, serves them, and establishes two ways that His presence would continue through them.  Tonight Jesus desires to be with us, to serve us, and have union with us through the Eucharist.  Will we watch and pray with Him?