Re-discovering the Joy of the Resurrection

 Thirteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time
    There is nothing so jarring to human existence as death.  Whether it’s the suddenness or the finality of it, death simply seems wrong.  It feels so wrong when it’s a young person, when a parent has to bury a child.  But even with a person who lived a long life, and who went through a prolonged illness, death still hurts and seems like it doesn’t belong.  And it doesn’t.
    Our first reading reminds us that “God did not make death.”  That hearkens back to Genesis, where God, the source of life, breathes His life into Adam and Eve.  But then, after they rebel against God and are banished from the Garden, God puts a limit on mortal life.  In one sense, this was a mercy, as God did not want us to live forever in a fallen state, always subject to the reign of sin.
    But then in our Gospel, we hear a kind of undoing of death in two ways: in an older woman, and in a younger child.  You may have missed the part about the older woman, but she had been suffering "with hemorrhages for twelve years.”  I’m no doctor, but a hemorrhage is a flow of blood.  Blood, to the Jews, was life, so if she was “leaking” blood, she was, in a sense, dying; the life was flowing out of her.  So both were, at least in one sense, dying.  And Jesus brings them both back to life.
    The Resurrection of Jesus is part of the good news that is at the heart of being Catholic.  And it’s good news because death is not, despite our experience, final.  It is the answer to a question that sits on every human heart.  Every human experiences death, and senses the wrongness of it.  As we sit in the funeral home with the casket in front of us, greeting family and friends, crying at the loss, laughing at favorite memories, we know it’s not supposed to be that way.  Jesus helps us to know that it no longer is that way, because He rose from the dead.
    Jesus’ Resurrection wasn’t like the new life that He gave to the woman with hemorrhages, or the daughter of Jairus, or the son of the widow of Nain, or even Lazarus.  They still died again.  But Jesus will not die again; His death was once for all.  Death was the poverty that Jesus took upon Himself, because Jesus is Life.  It’s like light becoming darkness, or gold becoming clay.  But Jesus did so because He knew that darkness cannot conquer light, and He wanted to make us who were clay into gold.  St. Augustine talks about this as the admirabile commercium, the wonderful exchange.  We gave Jesus death, which He willingly took upon Himself, and He gave us life.  
    So how do we get this deal?  How do we participate in this exchange?  Baptism begins this, as we die with Jesus in the waters of baptism, and rise to a new life of grace.  But it’s more than baptism.  Baptism is only the beginning.  What is meant to follow is a day-by-day deepening in our friendship with Jesus, and giving Him our death, and receiving His life.  
    The woman with the hemorrhages and Jairus, the father of the young girl, are beautiful examples of this exchange.  They have faith in Jesus, and so they go to Him.  Jairus goes to find Jesus, and the woman approaches Jesus as He walks in the crowd.  How often do we truly seek after Jesus, rather than fatalistically figuring that what is going to happen will happen?  How often do we take our death to Jesus to receive life?  It’s as simple as asking.
    But we also have to be willing to receive.  The life that Jesus wants for us is not the life we gave to Him.  We give Jesus a fallen life, a life of sin and death, and He wants to give us life.  But in order to receive life, we have to give up sin and death.  We have to do our best to put behind us those things that we want to do because of the fall, because of our concupiscence, our desire to do evil and avoid good, rather than doing good and avoiding evil.  Too often, we want to give Jesus our death, but we’d like to hang on to it a little, because, while deadly, it’s also familiar, and sometimes even a bit of fun.  But if we hang on to death, we cannot have life.  It’s not so much a punishment, as simply the way things work in the spiritual realm.  If our hands are still clenching onto what we have, they are not open to receive what Jesus wants to give.
   

As Catholics, we need to reclaim our faith in the Resurrection.  We need to reclaim our faith that death is not final, as troubling as it is.  Death is meant to be the last thing that we give Jesus, our last bit of life, so that He can give us His life.  Start engaging in the great exchange today.  Be in the habit of giving Jesus your all, especially your sin and daily deaths, so that He can give you His life.  Come to Jesus, and live.

If I Only Had a Heart

Solemnity of the Sacred Heart of Jesus

    In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.  In the movie version of the classic book, The Wizard of Oz, one of the main characters is the Tin Man.  Dorothy and the Scarecrow meet him on their way to see the Wizard of Oz.  The Tin Man seems perfectly normal (for a man made out of metal), but he reveals to Dorothy that the tinsmith neglected to give him a heart.  Dorothy invites the Tin Man to come with her so that the Wizard can give him a heart, in addition to giving the Scarecrow a brain, and return Dorothy home.
    Spoiler alert: as the Wizard is giving the Tin Man his heart, he says, “Hearts will never be practical until they can be made unbreakable.”  And for those who have had their heart broken, there seems to be some logic in his quip.  Anyone who has gone through a break-up finds the cliché phrase, “’Tis better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all,” very unsatisfying.  At the time of the heartbreak, it seems like it would have been much better to not get into a situation which could cause such pain, pain which cannot be healed by any medicine.  Indeed, there can be a sometime-attraction to the character of Spock from “Star Trek,” who, though he has emotions, does not seem to be affected by them, but exhibits a remarkable kind of stoicism. 
    And yet today’s celebration, transferred from this past Friday, is precisely the celebration of not only a broken heart, but also a pierced heart!  A twice-pierced heart, in fact, pierced once by the lack of love from the beloved, and pierced twice by the lance of the soldier, making blood and water flow out.  But that broken, pierced, Sacred Heart is the riches of God, and the expression of the breadth, length, height and depth of God’s love for us, the hope and consolation of all the saints.
    We often associate a broken heart with one that has been betrayed.  Just think of what Michael Corleone in “The Godfather II” says to Fredo, his brother, when Michael finds out Fredo has betrayed him: “You broke my heart, Fredo.”  And certainly we have betrayed God.  Every time we sin we betray Jesus; we become a Judas.  We are supposed to be the friend of God, and yet we do what we know will hurt our Divine Friend.  And so the Lord’s Sacred Heart breaks, is pierced.  Indeed, with every sin that we commit, we put our hand on the very lance that was thrust into the body of Jesus.  We not only look upon Him whom we have pierced, we are the ones who pierce. 
    But the Sacred Heart is also pierced because, in the end, the love of God cannot help but overflow and burst out, not to call for vengeance, but to shower upon us mercy.  Pope St. Gregory the Great writes in his “Moral Reflections on Job,” “The blood of Jesus calls out more eloquently than Abel’s, for the blood of Abel asked for the death of Cain, the fratricide, while the blood of the Lord has asked for, and obtained, life for his persecutors.”  Even though we deserve the just punishment for our sins, which, as the Apostle writes, is death, God calls down upon us not death, but life, when His Blood and water flow upon us through the Sacraments of Baptism, Penance, and the Eucharist.  Christ would certainly prefer that we not betray Him, and yet, as many times as we do, He allows His Sacred Heart to be pierced to forgive us that betrayal and restore us to holiness.
    What a love that is so generous!  What a love that breaks open because of the expanse of love that cannot be contained!  What a love that recreates the beloved from the wound the beloved caused! 
    It is, in the end, better to have a heart that can break, than to have no heart at all.  It may indeed be unpractical that hearts break, but it is better that they do, because only hearts that love can be broken, including the Sacred Heart of our Incarnate Lord.  One cannot lose in love, even when a beloved breaks our heart, because God is love, and in God is our victory.  Love is not a loss, but a creative force.  We do not have to set ourselves up to be betrayed, or to be an emotional punching bag, and sometimes we can only love from afar.  But love, as with God who is Love, is a good in itself. 
    It can be hard to love when a heart has been broken.  It may seem easier to close ourselves off to love when our love has been betrayed.  But the Sacred Heart of Jesus invites us to love even when it hurts, even when our hearts are broken, even when our hearts are pierced.  May our hearts always be open to receive and share the transformative love of God, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.  Amen.

Start Small

Promising obedience at my priestly ordination

Eleventh Sunday in Ordinary Time    

     This past Friday I celebrated my 11th Anniversary of being a priest.  It’s honestly hard for me to grasp that I’ve been a priest for over ten years already, as the years have just flown by (and everyone tells me that life only speeds up the older I get!).  I remember when I started college seminary in the fall of 2002.  I had 8 years ahead of me of studying and being formed to be a priest after the Sacred Heart of Jesus, at least as close as the seminary could make me.  But I remember thinking that it would take such a long time, and at times it felt like ordination would never happen!
    But the eight years did fly by, and now 11 years have somehow gone even faster.  The days were long, but the years were short.  Still, by trying to do my best each day, and working hard to be receptive by God’s grace, those long days added up becoming a much shorter period than I expected. 
    When we have a daunting task, it can seem like it will never get done.  For gardeners it can be weeding a flower bed after it’s been let go for some time.  For homeowners it can be a major project around the house.  For parents it can be raising children.  For children it can be looking forward to graduating from high school when you’re in 6th grade.  Whatever it is, if we try to think about the entire picture, we can easily give up because it’s too challenging, it seems too big of a project, it appears like it will never get done.
    The same can be said for spreading the faith and preparing for heaven.  It can seem like we’re never going to make a difference or have someone come back to or join the Church.  Or living a saintly life can seem like we have to change so many things immediately, and it will never get done.  St. Paul reminds us today that we are to be courageous.  We should not let the magnitude of the task at hand as followers of Jesus get us down.
    Instead, Jesus reminds us in the Gospel that great things start from small things.  The mustard seed is quite small, but it turns into a larger bush.  The plants never seem to grow quickly enough, but then, before you know it, they are sprouting and bearing fruit.  If you were to look at the growth each day, it would seem miniscule.  But, over time, the growth is real and measurable.
    I would suggest that, for at least some of us, this is the approach that we should take to evangelization.  Perhaps we think about evangelization as walking around the City of Flint, knocking on doors and telling others about Jesus.  And that is one way.  Or maybe we think about a big event, with a world-renown speaker, with showy lights and technological wonders.  Those things can work, and especially for extroverts those can be great avenues for spreading the faith.  But what if you’re an introvert?  What if the idea of going door-to-door and talking to strangers about Jesus sounds as enticing as a root canal without novocaine? 
    If that is you, then I would encourage you to remember to start small.  And you may not even be starting small to finish big; maybe you’re just continuing to spread the faith in small ways.  But those small ways will pay off.  Despite the requirements of my job, I’m not a “big crowds” kind of guy.  I would rather have a conversation with one or two or maybe even three people, max.  While my vocation foists me into opportunities where I am with larger groups, I really feel most comfortable talking one-on-one.  And I find I’m most effective that way.
    So the way I try to spread the faith is to find one person with whom I can talk about Jesus.  Sometimes they’re already believers, and they just want to grow in their faith more.  Sometimes they don’t know Jesus.  But I find that it can really help them to understand who Jesus is, or what the Church believes, when I can just be with one or two persons.
    Now, converting the world to Catholicism (which is our goal), would seemingly take forever just one or two people at a time, especially when that conversion often takes months, or years, or sometimes even decades.  But those relationships that are formed with one or two individuals can often be long lasting, and can be relationships of trust that allows a person more easily to open him or herself up to Christ.  And, if that one person is transformed by Christ, then hopefully he or she can find one or two people with whom they can share the Gospel.  And pretty soon, what started small has become a conglomerate of people who are alive in their faith, all because a person decided to share about Jesus with a friend or a neighbor or even a stranger. 
    Our call to be a part of the New Evangelization can seem daunting when we look at the big picture.  But if it’s overwhelming, just bite off a smaller bite; think about one person with whom you can talk about Jesus, and share the faith with that one person.  It may start small, but the good things in the Kingdom of God often do.

What We Make Time For

 Second Sunday after Pentecost

    In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.  One of the areas that I have been blessed to be able to participate in throughout my past 5 years in Flint has been extra-curricular activities for Powers Catholic High School.  I love football Friday nights, I played and still love soccer, and I was active in drama and band when I was in high school, so part of attending is just having fun.
    But part of what I’m doing is more than enjoying a good game or a beautiful performance.  I decided early on as a priest that, as I can, it’s important for me to be involved in the lives of young people in their hobbies and extra-curricular, and to show up as much as I can.  Not infrequently, other parish responsibilities will lessen my availability, but when I can, it’s nice to be able to support the young men and women.
    It’s also sending a message that I, and, by extension, God, care about what they do in life.  So often, people only see a priest at confession or Mass, and it can lead to this skewed vision that the priest only cares when I’m repenting of my sins or going to Mass.  By meeting them at their joys, the activities that make them feel alive, I’m showing them that God loves not just their religious practices, but their entire life, and wants to be a part of it.
    We make time for what we love.  We show, by our attendance, what is important to us.  Part of the struggle in the Catholic Church right now is Mass attendance, and not simply because of COVID (but certainly exacerbated by it).  Young people, present couple excluded, do not attend Mass regularly, even monthly.  Why not?  Among other reasons, because their parents didn’t go, and/or didn’t make them go.  And kids are very quick to pick-up that if something is important, you will be there.  In my own life, going to Mass was never a question of “if,” it was always a question of “when.”  Even if I had a Boy Scout lock-in Saturday night, which meant that I was up until about 2 or 3 a.m., we were going to be at Mass, and I can remember where I still had to be ready for 9 a.m. Mass on Sunday morning (I may have slept through the homily).
    In the parable our Lord gives us today, we are presented with a great feast, for which no one has time.  The excuses aren’t all that bad, either.  If you had just bought a farm and needed to see what needed to be planted, what weeds need to be cleared, a feast might not sound like something important.  Or if you just got married, you probably want to spend time with your wife.  In fact, in the Old Testament, one could be released from military service if a marriage had just occurred.  Maybe inspecting the five oxen wasn’t such a good excuse, but they would have been worth a precious sum.  And yet, the man giving the feast is angered because no one will come!  
    The man considers the great banquet the most important thing, which no one should miss.  He values it above property, above livestock, even above marriage.  But no one values it as much as he.  So the man throwing the feast tells his servants to gather all those whom society has rejected–the poor, feeble, blind, and lame–and invite them in.  And there is still room, so the servants are sent to beat the bushes to drum up more people so that the house is filled for the feast.  
    It’s easy to tell the face-value message of this parable.  Jesus is letting the Pharisees know that they have been invited to His great feast, but they are finding excuses for not attending.  They are showing their lack of love for God by rejecting the one He has sent.  So others are being invited in whom the Pharisees would’ve rejected.  But how easy it is to notice the splinter in the Pharisees’ eyes, but not notice the plank in our own.  Isn’t it the sign of a troubled conscience that we so quickly try to put the spotlight away from our own souls and on to another.
    Now, obviously, you are here for the Mass, the wedding feast of the Lamb.  But what about in your daily life?  Are there times when the Lord is inviting us to spend time with Him in private prayer, in works of charity, in simply silence, and we find excuses and things that we would rather do?  St. John tells us in the epistle that we are called not to love in word or speech, “but in deed and truth.”  
    How do we spend our time?  How do we betray what we truly love by the time and attention that we give to it?  What witness are we providing about what is most important in our life?  The world may mock us, as St. John also reminds us, for putting our Lord, our Church, our family first.  But we are still called to give witness to the importance of those first things.  
    And as our best example, we have Jesus, who showed His love for us in laying down His life for us.  That’s how we know the love of God.  God not only showed up, but gave His all for our eternal salvation.  May we make time for God, not only here at Mass, but also in our daily lives, so that the world and God may see the importance we place on our relationship with the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.  Amen. 

Charging our Spiritual Batteries

Solemnity of Corpus Christi

    One of the great thing about our technology like phones and Apple watches, is the ability to stay connected while one is on vacation, and eliminate the need for paper plane boarding passes.  However, those devices don’t operate on hopes and dreams.  So now, I don’t only have to pack clothes and toiletries.  Part of my packing protocol now is to make sure that I have both my phone charger and my watch charger.  If I forget the charger, then my phone and watch won’t work, and won’t be any good to me.
    As disciples of Jesus, we need to be charged.  The call to follow Christ in all areas of our life takes a lot of work to die to our fallen selves.  We need to recharge ourselves on a regular basis, or we’ll be spiritually dead.  And the way we do that is through the Eucharist.  The Eucharist is the food that strengthens us for our daily pilgrimage with Christ.  It gives us the spiritual nutrients we need to die to our fallen self and live for Christ.  It is, as we could say, plugging in to the source of our spiritual power.  How often do our young people (and perhaps ourselves) make sure that their iPhone has power so that they can text, chat, gram, and tweet?  But do we take care to make sure that our spiritual batteries are charged, and that we don’t run out of juice?  You cannot be the Catholic that Jesus wants you to be without the Eucharist.  Even with the Eucharist, we can reject Jesus, but without the Eucharist, we have no chance to have the fulness of Divine Life that God wants to communicate to us.
    But into what are we plugging ourselves?  Why is the Eucharist so powerful in helping us to be whom God wants us to be?  Our readings for today’s celebration of Corpus Christi remind us of the most important fact of the Eucharist: that it is the sacrifice.
    In our first reading, we hear about the sacrifice that foreshadowed the sacrifice of Jesus.  The people belong to God and show that they will be faithful to Him by being sprinkled by the blood that was sacrificed “as peace offerings to the Lord.”  Jesus’ perfect sacrifice was truly the peace offering that reconciled us to God as His People. 
    The author of the Letter to the Hebrews also takes up this theme that, while the sacrifices of the Old Covenant could bring some holiness, some sanctification, how much more does the Blood of Christ make us holy?  St. John Chrysostom also said that, if the blood of the Passover lamb could cause the angel of death to Passover the doors of the Chosen People, how much more will the Blood of Christ on our lips keep eternal death away from us?
    As we listened to the Gospel, perhaps we think that we moved away from sacrifice, and went to a meal only.  But the meal that Jesus held was a Passover celebration, a celebration of a sacrifice.  And it is in the context of a sacrifice that Jesus institutes the Eucharist.  Yes, it is in a meal, but in the sacrificial meal of Passover. 
    Jesus knew that we needed a connection to His once-for-all sacrifice, which only one apostle would attend.  And He wanted that connection to last through the centuries, not just for the lifetime of the first apostles.  So Jesus instituted this way that we could always connect to Him, connect to His sacrifice that saved us from sin and death, His sacrifice which reconciled us to God and brought the possibility of peace for all people. 

It is that sacrifice which recharges us, because it is that sacrifice that is the source of all of our power in Christ.  Baptism changes us because of the sacrifice of Christ; we are forgiven in the Sacrament of Penance by the sacrifice of Christ; we are able to receive the Holy Spirit in Confirmation because of the sacrifice of Christ, who said that if He did not leave, we could not receive the Holy Spirit; the anointing of the sick heals us by the sacrifice of Christ; marriage finds its fullest expression and model in the death of the bridegroom from His bride; and the Sacrament of Holy Order exists to connect us to the ministry of Jesus through the work of Jesus’ bishops and priests, as well as Jesus’ service through deacons.  All of our life in Christ goes back to the sacrifice of Jesus.  The meal of the Eucharist means nothing without it being connected to the sacrifice of Jesus. 
    And that is why we have the crucifix behind the altar: because through the Eucharist, the Body and Blood of Christ, we are connected to the sacrifice of Jesus that is before our eyes in the sacred image.  We look upon and remember what is made present for us and what we receive in our mouths as we consume the Eucharist.  And if we receive it in a state of grace, not aware of any mortal sins, then it recharges us; the Eucharist gives us power. 
    Don’t let your spiritual batter run out!  You will not be as effective, and you may even run out of any power to communicate Christ in your daily life.  Keep your soul like you keep your iPhone or Apple Watch: keep it fully charged by worthily receiving the Eucharist at least each week.  You will be charged by the saving sacrifice of Jesus!

Source and Summit

 Solemnity of Corpus Christi

    In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.  First of all I want to say what a joy it is to celebrate my first Extraordinary Form Mass with you on this wonderful day in the life of the Church!  I also want to especially thank Michael Haggerty and Isaiah Rex for helping me get to this point where I feel I can comfortably say this form of the Latin Rite.  I realize it may still be a little slower than what you’re used to, but I appreciate your patience as I grow more and more familiar with it.  It is also so appropriate that my first celebration with you, even though I’m not your pastor yet, is on this Solemnity of the Body and Blood of Christ.  Sacrosanctum concilium of the Second Vatican Ecumenical Council states:
 

“…the liturgy is the summit toward which the activity of the Church is directed; at the same time it is the font from which all her power flows….From the liturgy, therefore, and especially from the Eucharist, as from a font, grace is poured forth upon us; and the sanctification of men in Christ and the glorification of God, to which all other activities of the Church are directed as toward their end, is achieved in the most efficacious way possible.”

So, this is the source, the beginning, of my celebration of the Extraordinary Form, but what we celebrate today is also the goal for all of our lives, going to heaven where God is eternally worshipped.  
    I also have to say that this Mass is special to me as I’m a member of the Priestly Fraternity of St. Dominic, the Third Order Dominicans for priests, and this Mass was composed by St. Thomas Aquinas, to whom I have a special devotion.  So certainly a special day for me to begin this new part of my priestly life!
    I would hazard that many here, if not most here, already understand that we believe that, by the ministry of the priest and the working of the Holy Spirit, the bread and wine are changed into the Body and Blood of Christ.  And if you didn’t, now you do.  Every time we come to Mass we get to participate in a miracle that God works for us.  Transubstantiation, the changing of the bread and the wine into the Body and Blood of Christ, is nothing less than a miracle.  How often do we ask the Lord in our lives if we can see a miracle, and yet we get to see one at least every Sunday!
    But that miracle, like all of our Lord’s miracles, are not meant as a stupendous event that is supposed to wow the crowd and then fizzle away.  It is meant to help us believe more, and then, believing, to share the good news that we have received, and cooperate in the transformation of the world by God.  Our Gospel today from John, chapter 6, is the middle of the Bread of Life Discourse, that started with the multiplication of the loaves and fish.  Jesus did a great miracle for the people, but the people got stuck on simply being awed by the miracle, and did not follow what our Lord was intending to instruct them, that He is the Bread of Life, and if we want to have eternal life, then we need to eat of Him, and then be sent by the Father just as Christ was.  In fact, after our Lord revealed the Eucharist to the people, most disciples walked away because they found His teaching too difficult.  I’m hoping my teaching doesn’t have the same effect!
    Yes, we see the miracle of the Eucharist, but Christ also wants us to be sent by the Father, just as He was, to share the good news that eternal life is possible for us who are connected and transformed by Him.  Christ also wants us to cooperate with Him to transform the world from something ordinary, like bread and wine, into something extraordinary, like the Body and Blood of Christ, the “supersubstantial bread,” as the Greek version of the Our Father literally says.  
    Part of that witness we will provide tonight as we walk in procession and bear witness to our faith in the Eucharist.  And that public witness is so important!  But that witness needs to continue in what one chart I read called, “The Mass During the Day.”  If you have a hand missal, you notice that the first part of the Mass is the “Mass of the Catechumens,” Mass for those who are not initiated into our Catholic faith.  Starting with the offertory, we begin the “Mass of the Faithful,” the Mass that is for those who have been baptized into Jesus’ Death and Resurrection.  Then, beginning with the dismissal, we have the “Conclusion of the Mass.”  But, in this “Mass During the Day,” we utilize the graces we receive from our Eucharistic Lord to be a good husband or wife, father or mother, priest, deacon, or religious.  We continue the Lord’s ministry to proclaim the truth, to heal, to reveal God’s love with the people we encounter so that others know what it means to be a Catholic and are drawn by our witness to draw closer to Jesus.  
    Just as today is a beginning for me, may the Eucharist always be a beginning for all of us, a beginning of new opportunities to witness a miracle, to be transformed in our own lives, and to continue the mission of our Eucharistic Lord, sent by the Father to give the world the life of the Father, which makes us ready for heaven, where Father, Son, and Holy Spirit live and reign, world without end.  Amen. 

Communion with God

 Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity

    One of the questions people have been asking me most about my role as pastor of both St. Pius X and St. Matthew (especially now that the new Mass schedule has been released) is how I’m not going to burn out.  And it’s a valid concern; there’s a lot of work and I’ll be kept quite busy.  But I’m not just relying on myself.  I have some good friends that I see almost every week who allow me to relax with them, have some dinner, and set aside the concerns of work.  Sometimes we run together, we often eat (and drink) together, and we just hang out.  My time with them allows my batteries to recharge so that I’m ready to go with whatever the week throws at me.
    I think we all have people that we lean on to help us unwind.  For some people it’s a phone call to mom and/or dad.  For others it’s a spouse or a friend.  Maybe it’s your Bible study group, or a group of friends with whom you go to dinner.  But time with those people seems to make things better, and allows us to enjoy life again, and handle whatever stresses come our way.
    As we celebrate the Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity, we celebrate our God who is both One and a Communion of Three Divine Persons.  Jews and Muslims recognize the oneness of God, but only Christians recognize the Trinity of Persons.  We believe in God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit, One God, equal in dignity and majesty, co-eternal.  God is transcendent, beyond the confines of our reason.  And yet, in Jesus, God the Son, God also humbled Himself to imminent, to be like us in all things but sin and to be with us in communion.  
    God didn’t need us.  God–Father, Son, and Holy Spirit–is perfect in Himself, and lacks nothing.  And yet, out of an abundance of love, God created the universe and everything in it, and then, even beyond any imagining, extended that perfect Communion in Himself to the creatures He had made in His image and likeness.  
    That’s the message we hear from Deuteronomy in the first reading.  Moses says, “‘Did a people ever hear the voice of God speaking from the midst of fire, as you did, and live?  Or did any god venture to go and take a nation for himself from the midst of another nation?’”  We might not think of that as so great, but, as Moses points out, it was unheard of!  God didn’t simply deign to speak with His creatures, but saved them from their oppressors and gave them a law to help them live the fullness of life for which God created them.  And, as far as Moses was concerned, that was proof enough that God is God, and that He is worth obeying.
    But Jesus did more than simply speak to us from fire and thunder.  Jesus spoke to us while looking like us and sharing our human nature.  He communicated even more of what would truly make us happy and give us joy.  Jesus built on the Ten Commandments that were given on Mount Sinai with the Eight Beatitudes that He gave in the Sermon on the Mount.  He filled out the deeper meaning of the law, and showed us that true happiness comes from giving of ourselves, rather than taking.  
    But by Jesus’ Incarnation, and then by His Passion and Death, He allowed us to be joined to Him through baptism, and to be sustained by Him in the Eucharist, so that the Communion that the Most Holy Trinity enjoys, we could also enjoy.  St. Paul writes about this in the second reading as he talks about our adoption that the Holy Spirit accomplishes so that we are children of God the Father, brothers and sisters of Jesus Christ.  We are not simply slaves to a law, but co-heirs to glory and the Communion of God.
    And communion is what God wants for us: He wants to have communion with us.  And that is what truly sustains us, even in the most stressful times of our life.  Friends are great, and I value mine.  But God is the one who can sustain us through anything.  He lightens our sorrows and increases our joys.  He gives us strength and wisdom to deal with the hardest parts of life, beyond even what our human friends, even beyond what a spouse, can help.  
    And that is the greatest gift of our God.  He is transcendent, higher than the heavens.  And yet He is also imminent, closer to us than we are to ourselves.  God does not only want us to know that He is–Father, Son, and Holy Spirit–a Communion of Divine Persons, He also wants us to be united to that Communion.
    So when things are rough and when things are easy; when life is painful and when life is full of joy; when storm clouds gather and when the sun shines brightly; yes, turn to friends on earth to share in the experiences of life, but turn even more to God, the Communion of Three Divine Persons, and know the strength and happiness of being in Communion with our Creator.

The Empowerment of the Holy Spirit

Solemnity of Pentecost

    What scares you?  What causes you fear?  I would say that, since I started my work with the Michigan State Police, I am less fearful than I once was.  By learning from experience from the Troops and scenarios I have done at the Training Academy, I’ve learned how to better size up a situation and evaluate for potential dangers.  But I still can be afraid.  I’m afraid of drowning (even though I enjoy swimming); I’m afraid of being totally alone, abandoned by friends; and I’m afraid of failure.  Those are probably my top three.  What are your fears?
    As the Blessed Mother, the Apostles, and the disciples were in the Upper Room between the Ascension and Pentecost, perhaps they were afraid.  Over a month before they had seen their leader, whom they thought to be the Messiah, arrested, charged, and executed in the most horrible way.  That’s what made them stay in the Upper Room between Holy Thursday and Easter Sunday.  St. John the Evangelist tells us that the disciples were in the locked room, “for fear of the Jews,” for fear that their fate would be the same as Jesus’ fate.  And yet, Jesus breaks through and says to them, “‘Peace be with you.’” 
    So in that Upper Room again on Pentecost, after Jesus had ascended, maybe there was some fear.  It had been nine days since Jesus ascended, they were waiting in prayer, they had chosen Judas Iscariot’s successor, St. Matthias, but the Holy Spirit had not yet come. 
    But, when the Spirit did come, as we hear in Acts, chapter two, their fear was gone.  The fear of the Jews that filled them during the three days between Jesus’ arrest and Resurrection was turned into preaching to the Jews, in languages heretofore unknown to Mary, the Apostles, and the disciples, but understood by the many visitors who were in Jerusalem for the Jewish feast of Pentecost.  The gift of the Holy Spirit led the followers of Jesus from fear to boldness, from cowardice to courage.
    Today as we celebrate the gift of the Holy Spirit, that same spirit is renewed in us, not only in memory but in fact.  Today we “stir into flame” the tongues of fire that have been given to us, in most cases invisibly, through baptism and confirmation.  Today we are invited to move from fear to boldness in proclaiming and living our faith.
    Over the pandemic, we have been conditioned to fear.  At first, we learned to fear a microscopic virus that was new (novel was the word that was used).  Any time there is a new virus that can cause serious health problems and even death it is easy to fear.  We then became quite afraid that there wouldn’t be enough toilet paper (which I still don’t quite understand).  But then our fear turned into fear of each other.  And then previously existing racial divisions were exploited to pit one race against the other.  Political parties, too, became both aggressors and victims of fear-mongering, as each major party accused the other of being seditious and treasonous.  Even in churches we were encouraged by some to fear simply worshiping God, even with different hygienic practices in place to keep people as safe as possible. 
    I lost at least one of my grandparents to COVID, and I have other friends who died of it.  I have known many who have contracted the virus, some still with lingering side-effects.  So I don’t mean to suggest that we should be cavalier with our own or other people’s safety and health.  I feel like I have to say that these days, because of the fear that people will think that I don’t care about them or their health, or don’t understand the cost that COVID-19 has had for some families.
    But the Holy Spirit does not call us to fear.  And as we gather for the first time without the dispensation from our obligation to attend Mass on Sundays and Holydays, we assemble, not to pretend that there are not serious issues in the world, but to proclaim that, by the power of the Holy Spirit, we are not afraid.  We have been empowered by the Holy Spirit both to make prudent decisions about our health, but also to say with St. Paul that if God is for us, who can be against us?  We have been empowered to remind ourselves and our friends that we all need God, and that our Sunday obligation is meant to give us a nudge to give God His due and be strengthened by the graces of the Eucharist to share God’s truth and love with people who need it, with people who need our courage to be courageous themselves. 
    We have been empowered not to give in to division and the fear of the other, whether due to race or political party, or whatever other label can divide us, but to unite, in the Holy Spirit, in loving each other, in working for justice for every person, for working towards the common good and the dignity of each human being, not just my platform and my agenda. 
    It’s easy to be afraid.  The disciples were at one point.  But we are not called to fear, but to be models of courage, so that others can lean on us for a little bit of that courage that they want for themselves.  The enemy wants us to be afraid; he wants our fear to silence us.  But God gives us, today and every day, the Holy Spirit, that we might follow the example of those first disciples on Pentecost, and proclaim by word and deed, in ways others can understand, the wonderful love and truth and work of our God.  Do not be afraid!!

Sweet, Juicy Fruit

 Fifth Sunday of Easter
    When I was young I had a bad encounter with chocolate (I ate too much), and so I tend not to eat very much chocolate candy.  I’ll do the occasional Snickers bar, but when it comes to Hershey’s chocolate bars or kisses, or other types of pure chocolate candies, I tend not to eat them.  What I do love is fruit.  Especially berries, but also grapes, apples, oranges, pears, kiwi, pineapple, mangoes, etc., I tend to satisfy my sweet tooth with fruit.

    So when Jesus starts talk about grapes today, He has my attention!  We’ve heard this Gospel numerous times before, and Deacon Dave even mentioned it last weekend when he mentioned Jesus saying to us, “‘I am the vine, you are the branches.’”  Often times we focus on remaining connected to Jesus, and that is certainly important.  As Jesus reminds us, we cannot do anything good without Him.  
    How do we stay connected?  We read the Word of God, the Bible; we pray daily; we go to confession regularly and worship God at Mass at least each Sunday and Holyday; we serve Jesus in our service of the poor.  Think about how much time we devote to all sorts of other things, but how much time do we devote to Jesus?  
    But, rather than talking about remaining connected to Jesus, today I want to focus on the result of staying close to Jesus.  What happens when the branches stay connected to the vine?  You get grapes!  Sweet, delicious grapes!  The grapes are the fruit that are produced by staying connected.  So Jesus promises us that if we remain in him, then we will bear much fruit.  If we don’t bear fruit, then we will be thrown into the fire, like a brach that no longer produces grapes.  
    How do we bear fruit?  So the word “Catholic” is thrown around as is being baptized means that a person doesn’t need to do anything else  Sometimes in my mind I start wondering if I ever saw the person at Mass, if the person read the Bible regularly and prayed daily.  I wonder how much the person cared for the poor and the marginalized.  It is easy, as St. John reminded us in the second reading, to love “in word or speech,” but bearing fruit means loving “in deed and truth.”  
    It some ways it used to be easier to be Catholic.  We had external markers that at least gave an appearance of our faith.  When Betty Baptist invited Charlie Catholic over for dinner on Friday night, Charlie made sure to say that he couldn’t have meat.  Many families spent part of Saturday morning not on the soccer field, but in the confessional.  And, to the extent possible, many Catholics avoided any sort of menial work on Sundays.
    Those externals don’t necessarily mean that you’re bearing fruit.  You can abstain from meat and not love Jesus; you can go to confession but not be truly sorry; you can avoid work on Sundays but not do it to grow closer to God.  But bearing fruit does mean that our life is different.  
    I know we don’t like to be different.  But being Catholic means being different, just as Jesus was different.  It means being patient with the person who cut in right before the construction zone starts.  It means not participating in the office gossip about the employee who doesn’t seem to get along or get the job done.  It means treating all people, regardless of race, gender, religion, sexual-orientation with respect and dignity because all of us are created in the image and likeness of God.
    But being different also means that we avoid taking God’s Name in vain.  It means being here, at Mass, every Sunday, whether we feel like it or not, or whether we think we’re getting anything out of it or not, because our time during Mass is about worshipping God well more than it is about us “getting” something.  Being different means that we help women to choose life rather than abortion; that we conceive a child according to God’s plan rather than through artificial means like in vitro fertilization or surrogacy.  It means we give time, talent, and treasure to taking care of those who cannot care for themselves.  Those are all ways that we bear fruit, though there are, of course, more.
    Do we do it perfectly?  I know I don’t!  I try to be, but realize that I am not always a paragon of discipleship.  But when I fail, I turn back to the Lord, asking for His mercy in the Sacrament of Penance, and with true sorrow and a desire to sin no more with God’s help, I start again, to stay connected to Jesus and bear fruit.
    It’s easy to say, “I’m Catholic.”  You can say that without doing much of anything else.  But in order to bear fruit, as Jesus asks us to, we have to respond to the graces God gives us by remaining with Him on the vine.  And Catholics bearing fruit is exactly how this, and any parish, can grow, so that we, like the "church throughout all Judea, Galilee, and Samaria” that we heard about in our first reading, can be “built up and [walk] in the fear of the Lord, and…[grow] in numbers.” 

Three Words or Phrases

 Second Sunday of Easter
    Here’s an interesting experiment: thinking only to yourself (not out-loud), what three words would others use to describe you?  Again, this is a rhetorical question, but what words did you think others would use?  Are they different from the words that you would use to describe yourself?  Were there mostly positive or mostly negative?  
    This weekend, as we close out the Octave of Easter, there are three words that should describe every Catholic.  It may not (probably should not) be an exhaustive list, but these three words or phrases should describe every Catholic.  And these three words come from our celebration today.  Those three words or phrases are (in no particular order): a believer; concerned for others; merciful.
    The first reading, second reading, and Gospel all talk about believing.  To be a Catholic is to be a believer.  Bishop Mengeling loves to use this word.  But what do we believe?  At the heart, we believe that Jesus is who He says He is–the Son of God–and we trust in His words about how we are to live our lives.  Our belief is sometimes based upon observable realities, like St. Thomas seeing the risen Christ.  Sometimes our belief is not based on things that we can see.  But we are believers in the promises of God and the teachings of God, both as recorded in the Scriptures and as recorded in the teachings of the Magisterium, the teaching office of the Church entrusted to the Pope and the Bishops united with him on matters of faith and morals.
    Jesus claims everything in our life.  He claims our love, our obedience, our fidelity.  The only one who can do that is God.  So our belief that Jesus is God affects how we live.  If we feel that we can ignore Jesus when we disagree with Him, we’re not believers.  Fully believing in Jesus is a challenge to which maybe we don’t always live up, but it’s our goal.  It’s one thing to fail at a goal; it’s another altogether to have a different goal.  Our goal as Catholics should be to believe in Jesus, not just as a mental exercise, or a pious thought, but in ways that truly change the way we live.
    As an example of putting belief into action, our first reading from the Acts of the Apostles describes the first Catholics as being of one heart and one mind, not claiming any possessions as one’s own, and, in fact, selling property and putting the proceeds at the disposal of the Church for those in need.  This is where some might say, “See?!?  The first Catholics were socialists!  They owned everything in common!”  Wrong.  The first Christians weren’t socialists.  But they were concerned for others.  Rather than thinking about themselves, and because they believed in God, they thought about the needy as much or more than themselves.  And some on their own volition would decide to share what they have with the poor and live a life radically detached from ownership, relying on the each other to support themselves.  There is no evidence that the government or the Church instructed them to sell their house.  And some didn’t sell their homes, as this was where the first Christians would meet for early examples of Christian-style synagogue services, and perhaps even the Mass.  No one was compelled, but people freely gave.
    This is the witness that many of those in consecrated life still give.  They give up personal ownership of property and their own bank account to live as a brother or sister, monk or nun.  They rely on the community to care for their needs, so that they are more devoted to serving Jesus.  
    But before you sell your house to live with me in the rectory and let me take care of you with the money you donate, let me consider other ways to live as a man or woman concerned about others.  We all have a responsibility to care for ourselves and our families.  The Church teaches that the government should only get involved in providing for people’s needs where family and friends and local charities are unable.  But, while providing for our needs, we should also look to support those, to be the family and friends and local charity for those who, through no fault of their own, cannot provide for themselves.  People today are good at providing for programs.  But we are called, to the extent that we’re able, to help people out personally.  This is what Pope Francis means when he talks about serving the poor by being with them and looking into their eyes, and not simply letting an NGO (non-governmental organization) worry about the poor and needy.
  

  Lastly, the first Catholics were merciful.  Today, the Second Sunday of Easter, is also called Divine Mercy Sunday.  Pope St. John Paul II instituted this feast in order to help us all know of God’s mercy towards us.  Pope Francis declared a Year of Mercy in 2015.  The revelation to St. Thomas the Apostle of Jesus’ wounded hands, feet, and side, were really a revelation of His mercy, that He forgave us and did away with our sins when He shed His Blood on the cross.  Mercy does not pretend that a past offense did not occur.  Jesus did not pretend the wounds of His crucifixion were not there.  But rather than letting those wounds become an opportunity for vengeance on all those who led Him there, and all those who abandoned Him during His most needful hour, Jesus simply greets the apostles and disciples with the Hebrew word, “Shalom,” “Peace,” which means more than just non-conflict, but a wholeness and fullness of life.  
    Jesus earlier had told the parable of the unforgiving steward, and told us that we are to forgive as we are forgiven.  He also told us that the measure of forgiveness that we give to others is the measure that will be given to us.  Our reception of God’s mercy is the catalyst that allows us to be merciful to others, and that should most definitely be a hallmark of our life.  
    Certainly there are other aspects to being Catholic.  There are other qualities that should be present in our life.  But this week, let’s work on being a believer; concerned about others; and merciful!