Silence and Stillness

Sunday with the Octave of the Nativity
    In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.  “When peaceful stillness encompassed everything and the night in its swift course was half spent, Your all-powerful word from heaven’s royal throne leapt into the doomed land.”  This is the translation of our Introit today, and it’s one of my favorite verses connected with our liturgical celebration of the Nativity of our Lord.  Which is funny, because it comes from the Book of Wisdom in the Old Testament.  And it forms part of a pericope about the Chosen People, while they were still enslaved in Egypt.  In the New American Bible, the title of this particular passage is: “Fifth Example: Death of the Egyptian Firstborn; the Israelites Are Spared.”  That may seem very fitting as we also commemorate the Holy Innocents today, but this Introit is not for the Holy Innocents, but for the Sunday within the Octave.
    But, the Church reads these two particular verses, numbers fourteen and fifteen, in light of the Nativity, when the All-Powerful Word, Jesus Christ, came to us from heaven in the middle of the night, into the land of sinners doomed to eternal death.  Like so many passages from the Old Testament, we didn’t come to know the true meaning, even though we could understand these verses in light of the plagues of Egypt, which is how the human author, no doubt, intended it, while the Divine Author intended so much more.

    Msgr. Romano Guardini, a magnificent Catholic teacher and author from the mid-twentieth century, has a beautiful Christmas meditation precisely on this passage.  And he makes the point that the great works of God happen in silence and stillness.  We can point to the creation of the universe, which happened without anyone else other than God there.  We can point to the Nativity of the Lord, which happened in a backwater part of the Roman Empire without any great human celebration.  We can point to the Resurrection of Christ, which happened without any human witnesses, except the guards at the tomb.  The great works of God happen in silence.  We can even point to the creative cooperation in human conception.  While the act which brings about children might not be so silent in terms of the spousal union, the moment the sperm fertilizes the egg happens in silence, without the parents knowing for some weeks after.  
    So if we wish to see the great things of God, we need to cultivate periods of silence in our lives.  Now, I’m saying this to a group of families who, each in their own way, have taken seriously God’s call to be fruitful and multiply.  Whether you have one child or ten children, you probably dream about silence for any amount of time, rather than the din of one or more children crying, screaming, or just making noise seemingly for noise’s sake.  Some of you parents may be thinking: “yeah, right, Father, I don’t get silence in my life; I have kids.”  
    But the silence in which the great things of God happens cannot simply equate with the lack of noise.  I love that we have so many children at Mass, and applaud you parents for bringing them to Mass, even when it’s very difficult and even when you spend half or more of Mass trying to keep them quiet, or keep them from crawling away, or taking them to the bathroom, etc.  Do I notice the noise?  I’m not deaf.  But it’s a great blessing.  St. Pius X, which closed in 2024 while I was pastor, had no noise because it had practically no kids.  If you don’t hear cryin’ your parish is dyin’.  
    But the noise generally doesn’t distract me.  As I’m celebrating Mass, I may hear it, but I can still stay focused on what’s happening and how I’m leading the worship of God by His Church.  And I don’t mean the way a husband says he’s listening to his wife while he’s watching a football game (because, generally speaking, he’s not really listening to you at that point).  I can create an atmosphere of silence even with the noise of children, bells, crashing kneelers, etc., by focusing on God.  And I think that’s not impossible for parents, either, though it does take practice.

    But even if you don’t feel you can find silence there, I know that there exists moments of silence that you can take advantage of each day.  The question is do we protect that time for God and prayer, even if it’s only the five minutes between a child starting to sleep and a child waking?  Or do we decide that doom scrolling, or finding every funny cat video on YouTube, or catching up on Facebook, or seeing what political parties are up to seems better to us than a quick five minutes of prayer?  As a parent, your vocation does not consist in praying like a monk or nun in a cloistered monastery or convent.  But God does want you to take even the few minutes you have throughout the day, or at the end of the day, after the kids are asleep, for Him, rather than simply looking to social media, the Internet, or the television to numb your minds.  It doesn’t mean we can’t find a funny cat video at all, or that we can never watch our favorite episode of “The Office,” but do we capitalize on the time that we have and utilize it for growing in our relationship with God?
    When God appeared to Elijah, He didn’t come in an earthquake, a fire, or a storm.  He came in a whisper.  God so often works in silence, an reveals Himself in stillness.  If we distract ourselves with noise (and I’m not talking about kids), we won’t attend to what God wants to say to us our wants us to do.  Take time for silence, as you can according to your vocation and circumstances, as often as you can.  Because in that silence and stillness, the All-Powerful Word will leap down from His royal throne in heaven and enter your heart, Jesus Christ, who with the Father and the Holy Spirit is God, for ever and ever.  Amen.  

Two Ingredients for a Holy Family

Feast of the Holy Family of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph
    Not long before Christmas, I continued a tradition from my Belgian side of the family to make Christmas cookies called lukken.  You start with a pound of melted butter (a great start to any recipe), then add 6 eggs, 2 1/2 cups of sugar, 2 1/4 cups of brown sugar, 8 cups of flour, and a shot of whiskey.  The dough sits overnight, and then is rolled into small balls, and the placed in a heated press, where they make thin cookies.  If you have ever enjoyed stroopwafel, lukken is basically the hard cookie without the caramel.
    To make the cookies I have to have the right ingredients.  But what are the ingredients that go into the recipe for a holy family?  Probably we think of basic human necessities: food, drink, clothing, a house, a job to provide for the family.  But there are two other ingredients that take a group of people, who could have their basic needs provided for, and make them a family, and those ingredients are love and obedience.
    Sadly, in my work as a Michigan State Police chaplain, I encounter families who have, in varying amounts, the basic human necessities, but lack the ingredient of love.  Children are treated as nuisances, or sometimes as ways to get more money from the State or federal government.  The parents, or often times a single parent, is more concerned about him or herself than about any other person.  Love changes a number of people living together into a family, even if sometimes that family is not related by blood, but related by adoption.

    Love helped make the family of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph into a holy family.  And that love started with God.  Mary and Joseph both loved God, and so they were able to welcome God’s plan into their life, though it was quite different than a normal family’s life.  Mary conceived, while a virgin, by the power of the Holy Spirit, and Joseph and Mary never had marital relations with each other.  But they both accepted those realities as the will of God, and because they loved God, they were able to accept the incredible and unexpected.  And that love for God increased as they cared for and raised the Second Divine Person of the Blessed Trinity, Jesus Christ.  In feeding, clothing, cleaning, and protecting the Lord, Mary and Joseph loved God, even when that was difficult.  They loved each other, too, with a love strong enough to endure difficulties and struggles.  
    If we wish to have holy families, we have to have love: love for God, first and foremost; and love for each other.  When we connect to the love of God, the love of other family members, even when difficult, becomes more likely.  When we connect to the love of God we can endure things that, on our own, we could not.  And having the love of God first purifies our other loves so that they don’t become disordered.  A person can love a spouse too much (so that it bankrupts the family because a spouse wants certain material goods) or can love a child too much (like skipping Mass because a child has games on Sunday).  Of course, those are disordered loves that are not really love, but still, “love” can be the excuse for going beyond what God desires.  Love of the other is important, but should always be directed towards our highest goal: heaven.  If our decisions don’t help a person get to heaven, then we can’t really say we love that person.
    The second ingredient to a holy family is obedience.  Like love, obedience is first owed to God, then to other members of the family, with a certain hierarchy.  St. Joseph had to obey God when the angel told Joseph to flee to Egypt.  For a good Jew, Egypt was not the place to go.  Egypt was the place of slavery, and while there was a sizable Jewish community in Egypt, there were also many pagan gods and practices.  But St. Joseph obeyed God and kept Mary and Jesus safe from King Herod’s murderous decree.  We should always do our best, whether you’re the father, mother, or child, to obey God and follow His will.
    But there is also a certain obedience to each other.  The second reading seems to make the husbands the only ones who receive obedience.  But when we truly love one another, there is a way in which we obey each other, not just the husband or father, though there is a certain privilege of honor among fathers.  All the loving couples I know, if the wife said that something needed to happen, the husband would make sure it got done.  The husband obeys his wife, in that way, because of his love for her.  And parents, more often than not, obey their children, at least when they’re babies and crying because they’re hungry, or need to be cleaned, or simply want to be held.  Or I think about the many families who sacrifice great amounts of time and money to send their children to a Catholic school.  The child may not demand obedience in this way, but the parents obey what can be best for their child as far as their education.  And children should definitely obey their parents, as long as their parents are not asking them to sin.  But in the family, there is a certain obedience each member has to the others, which helps them be holy.
    The family is not meant to be only a group of people who live in the same place, or who share the same genetic material.  Those are often included in families, but do not complete the recipe for a holy family.  To be holy family means not only providing for basic necessities, but also pursuing love and obedience–first of God and then of each other–in order to be truly complete.  May the Holy Family of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph help each of us to grow in love and obedience, as we strive to be the families God has called us to be. 

No Man is a Failure who has God as his Friend

Nativity of the Lord–Second Mass

   In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.  While there are many classic Christmas movies, one of the great is “It’s A Wonderful Life,” starring Jimmy Stewart.  But, truth be told, it’s not the most joyful Christmas movie ever.  In the second half of the movie, after we’ve been introduced to George Bailey by an angel named Clarence, we see Bailey, a good man, go from failure to failure, as his absent-minded uncle loses a significant deposit that kept his bank in business, and then he foolishly decides that everyone would be better off if he hadn’t existed.
    How many of us here have been in George Bailey’s shoes?  Maybe not wanting to jump into a freezing river off a bridge, but wondering if our life has made a difference, or if anyone would really notice if we didn’t exist.  Maybe we feel like they would be better if we didn’t.
    Clarence, George’s angel, grants, if even for small while, George’s wish and shows George just what an effect he had on others: from his family, to those who benefited from his reasonable loans, to local citizens.  Spoiler alert: George realizes just the impact he has had on others’ lives.  He recognizes that when one gives of himself, when one treats others as human beings and not as means to gain power or money, one becomes rich, no matter how much or how little one has.  George recognizes that, despite what seems like earthly failures, he is, as his brother Harry calls him, “the richest man in town.”  Or, as his angel, Clarence, writes in the front cover of his Bible, “No man is a failure who has friends.”
    How poor we humans were, even the Chosen People of God.  We found ourselves trapped in cycles of sin.  The greatest king God had provided for His people, King David, was long dead, and his descendants no loner occupied a throne.  Even the voice of prophets had fallen silent.  A foreign, pagan power controlled the Holy City and daily oppressed the ones whom God had promised never to abandon.  We walked in darkness.  We were poor.

    And yet, “the kindness and generous love of our God…appeared.”  At the moment we had lost hope; when despair had almost taken us, God sent us an Angel of Salvation, the Angel that the canon references when it says, “command that these gifts be borne by the hands of your holy Angel to your altar on high in the sight of your divine majesty,” Jesus Christ, the fullest messenger (𝛼𝛾𝛾𝜀𝜆𝜊𝜍 in Greek) that God ever sent.
    And God revealed to us that we were not poor, as long as we enjoyed friendship with Him.  As long as we remained close to God, we had everything, because “everything belongs to you…and you to Christ, and Christ to God,” as St. Paul says in his first epistle to the Corinthians.  
    But it was not only the Chosen People who felt the sting of their poverty.  Even we, who have been washed clean from original sin and made the adopted children of God in Christ through Holy Baptism can feel like George Bailey.  We can feel like we don’t add anything to society, or even our friends or family.  Life gives us lemons, and we make sour faces.  
    The Good News is that God found us worth saving, though we had no worth in ourselves.  The Good News of the Incarnation is the grand love story of God for His People, who, though they walked in darkness, God did not abandon, but illuminated.  God doesn’t have to show us what life would be like without us; He shows us that we are worth humbling Himself and taking on our frail humanity in order to prove His love for us.  Our debt consists of much more than $8,000 that Uncle Billy lost and Mr. Potter took.  But like the village that rallied around George Bailey, God gives us what we need so that our debt does not mean that we are lost to eternal bondage to sin and death.  And unlike the fellow citizens of Bedford Falls, we didn’t do anything for God.  He owed us nothing.  And yet He still gave, up to and including the Precious Blood of His Beloved Son.  If the donation of money from George Bailey’s neighbors signified their support for the banker who had carried them through the Great Depression, financed their homes and businesses, and saved them from foolish decisions, how much more does the Incarnation and Paschal Mystery show us just how much God supports us and loves us.  
    And this gift from God, the reason for Christmas, truly changed the world.  Without Christ we don’t truly understand human dignity and individual liberties.  Without Christ we mark time altogether differently.  Without Christ we don’t have universities, hospitals, magnificent cathedrals, the scientific method, so many things that we take for granted.  But, above all, without Christ we don’t have salvation, and the kingdom of heaven remains locked to us, which would be the saddest fact of all.  
    But God gives Himself to us, to prove just how much we mean to Him.  Though we are poor, like the shepherds in Bethlehem, God calls us to Himself by the voices of other messengers, other angels, to let us know the good news that our lives have value beyond what we could ever imagine, no matter how good or how bad our lives seem to go.  
    One of the reasons that “It’s A Wonderful Life” continues to be a Christmas classic is because it tells a timeless truth on the silver screen: even when we are at our worst; even when life seems to crash down all around us; even when things seem the darkest; God loves us and values us and is willing to pay any price to save us and help us walk in the light.  If I may be so bold, I would slightly change Clarence the angel’s words to George Bailey, as words that we should always keep at the front of our minds, not only at Christmas, but every day: “No man is a failure who has God as his friend”: the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit.  Amen.

Buddy and Jesus

Nativity of the Lord–At the Vigil Mass/At Night

    One of the newer Christmas movies that has become a staple of most people’s Christmas movie watching is “Elf” starring Will Ferrell.  It’s hard to believe, but it came out in 2003!  For those who are not fans of Will Ferrell and didn’t watch the movie, “Elf” follows Buddy the Elf, a human child who was raised by elves at the North Pole, even though he is much larger than they, and Buddy’s quest to find his real dad, who works for a publisher in New York City.  Buddy goes from the innocence of working with the elves for Santa to the Big Apple and all that New York City entails.  One of the many classic lines from the movie is said by a narwhal who looks like the animals from the 1964 Christmas movie, “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer,”: “Bye Buddy, hope you find your dad!”  
    In many ways, Christmas is the opposite theme of “Elf.”  Instead of humanity, represented by Buddy, searching out his dad, the true meaning of Christmas is that our heavenly Father, through the Incarnation of His Beloved Son, sought us out.  God did not abandon us, like Buddy’s father, Walter, did.  Instead, we ran away from God by sinning.  Adam and Eve rejected God in their pride and by their disobedience, and created a chasm between us and God that only God could close.  Throughout the centuries God our Father sought us out in love, and showed us ways that we could approach him and reject sin.  But time and time again we returned to sin because it felt better, or because, in our own pride, we didn’t want anyone else telling us what to do.  God gave us the Law to teach us, and the prophets to clarify how God had created the world and how to live justly.  But we disobeyed the law, and ignored or even killed the prophets so that we didn’t have to hear the voice of God.  But God did not leave us to the death that comes from sin.

    God came to us in a way that would disarm our pride: through a tiny baby.  Jesus took flesh in the womb of the Blessed Virgin Mary, and was born for us [tomorrow,] Christmas Day, as the beginning of the way that God the Father would reconcile us to Himself.  Buddy the Elf, though naïve, did not always endear himself to Walter.  Christ, born in the humblest of conditions from the humblest of parents, was not naïve, but truly innocent, and, especially in His infancy, we couldn’t help but love Him.  Throughout the rest of His life, He would show us just how much the Father loves us, even to the point of shedding His Precious Blood on the cross to remove the chasm between God and us and open for us eternal salvation in heaven.  There is no greater love that God could have shown than humbling Himself to take on our human nature, and then, though innocent, laying down freely his life for us so that we didn’t have to endure eternal death in Hell.
    But while the Incarnation, God-made-man, is the greatest Christmas gift of all, we still have to accept that gift.  And like the Central Park Rangers who try to stop Santa, there are those who don’t want to see us accept the gift of eternal salvation, within and without us.  Outside of us, there are fallen angels who do not want to see us reunited with God.  They send us temptations and try to get us to fall into the same trap Adam and Eve fell in as they rejected God’s rules because they wanted to do it their own way, and disobey God.  Inside of us, even after we’re baptized, we still have concupiscence, that drive to disobey God.  We would rather be our own boss, our own god, even, than serve the true God.  Whether from within or without, when we tell lies, even small, white lies; when we skip Mass out of laziness or lack of interest; when we fail to pray every day; when we allow our desires to take control of us; when we use others as means to an end, no matter how good our intentions, we show God that we do not want Him as our Father.  We show God through our actions that we don’t want to receive the best Christmas gift ever: the gift of eternal life.  And God, because He loves, us, respects our free will; He will never force His salvation on us.
    But, as a loving Father, He will also never stop searching for us, seeking to draw us to Himself.  And even if we do claim God as our Father and avoid rejecting Him through mortal sin, He works each day to draw us closer and closer to Him, through Christ, in the power of the Holy Spirit, so that we can receive all the good things He desires for His children.  
    So today let us recommit ourselves to our heavenly Father.  We don’t have to travel from the North Pole to New York City to find Him.  He is right here, in this church, offering His love for us.  Accept that love that so wanted you that He humbled Himself and truly became for us a little baby.  And show that acceptance by the choices you make each day, the love you give back to God through obedience and love to Him, which is the only gift He desires from you.  O come, let us adore Him. 

It Really Happened

Fourth Sunday of Advent
    In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.  Modern American society struggles with accepting some historical facts.  Part of this could stem from the things that began as conspiracy theories and turned out to be true.  But there exists a certain suspicion of facts that cannot be verified to a modern American’s mind.
    This same phenomenon existed at the time of Christ, not so much as when came to history but as it applied to theology.  All over the western world people had told stories about the gods and goddesses and their encounters with people.  Usually, the pagan deities were basically exaggerated versions of humans: in their power; in their strength; in their violence; in their lust.  But for some time, a skepticism had crept in especially among the well-educated that the gods didn’t exist at all.  Yes, everyone kept the festivals, but fewer and fewer actually believed in the realities behind the festivals.  Divinity especially came to be doubted when the emperors started to claim divine status for themselves even though, demonstrably enough, they were mortal.
    In the midst of this doubt, St. Luke describes the real, historical fact of God-made-man.  He starts out today’s Gospel passage: “In the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar, Pontius Pilate being governor of Judea, and Herod being tetrarch of Galilee, and Philip his brother tetrarch or Inure and the country of Trachonitis, and Lysanias tetrarch of Abilene, under the high priests Annas and Caiphas.”  Luke points out that this is no pagan myth that goes back before anyone could witness it, or where the witnesses are all dead.  He points to a particular time in a particular place where St. John the Baptist begins his mission to prepare the way for the Lord by preaching a baptism of repentance.  His thesis stands thus: Jesus is real; just as real as Caesar, Pontius Pilate, Herod, Philip, Lysanias, Annas, and Caiphas.  

Icon of St. John the Baptist

    And it matches the preaching of the Precursor of the Lord: God is real, and He is finally fulfilling His promise to come among us and save us, so get right with God, because our salvation is at hand.  John wasn’t only telling the well-known Jewish stories about how God promised to send a redeemer who would conquer sin, as Genesis foretold; or how God would raise up a prophet like Moses to whom everyone would need to listen, as Deuteronomy said; or how God would install a Davidic king who would rule for all ages, as 2 Samuel said.  John didn’t simply point back to vague prophecies that waited to be fulfilled.  He told the people that now was the time of salvation, as the long-awaited Messiah came.  
    It is good for us to hear Luke’s account, and to remind ourselves that God is not trying to hide anything from us in way of history, and that our belief in God is not some long-ago wish that bears no relation to reality.  God is real, and the Second Divine Person of the Blessed Trinity came to us to redeem us at a particular time in a particular place.  And even though we were not there, we can trust those who were.
    But Luke also benefits us because Christ will return in glory.  And I think that sometimes we can treat that return like the first-century Jews treated the prophecies about the Messiah: yes, they’re real, but they won’t happen in our time.  We profess, each week, “Et iterum venturus est cum gloria judicare vivos et mortuos;” “He will come again with glory to judge the living and the dead.”  But do we really believe it?  Do we act like it could happen any day, which it could?  Or, do we think that because it didn’t happen in the time of our parents or grandparents, it won’t happen in ours?  
    Advent comes each year to remind us that Christ will return in glory, for which we should be ready.  God reminds us not to let our hearts grow weary because the Bridegroom seems delayed, and not to act as if he’s not coming, like the foolish bridesmaids.  Rather, we are to wait in joyful hope for the coming of our Savior, as St. Paul writes to St. Titus.  
 

  It’s easy for us to get distracted.  We get distracted in Advent because we have Christmas parties to attend, presents to buy, a house to decorate, etc.  We get distracted in life because so many other things–family, a job, or the lack thereof, clothing, food and drink–all seem more real and more pressing.  But nothing is more pressing than our relationship with God.  Our hunger and thirst will pass away; we will outgrow our clothes or the fabric will break down; one day we won’t work; even our family will not always be with us on earth.  But God is eternal.  And, in the end, we will either spend eternity with Him (even if it includes some purification in Purgatory) in Heaven or eternity without Him in Hell.  And part of that calculation will connect to how we prepared for Him to return.  
    Does this mean we live perfectly?  Or that we are scrupulous about every small fault or failing?  No.  But it means we make confession a regular, even monthly or weekly, part of our life.  It means that we give our hearts and minds as best as we can during this Mass to worship God.  It means that we care for the poor, the sick, the suffering, the immigrant, the infant in the womb, the ailing senior citizen, and all those who have no one to rely on but God and His faithful.  It means that we read Scripture regularly and pray with our families.  
    In these last few days of Advent, may we recommit ourselves to making ourselves ready for the return of Christ in glory.  May today’s Gospel instill in us that Christ will, once again, change the course of history with His return, just as He did in His Incarnation some 2,000 years ago.  Who with the Father and the Holy Spirit live and reign for ever and ever.  Amen. 

Repeating

Fourth Sunday of Advent

    I used to have SiriusXM Radio in my car, but I got tired of having to verbally fight with them to get the lowest rates, so I decided to try streaming music instead.  And because I’m frugal (others would use the word cheap), I wanted a free source.  I tried Pandora at first, but then everyone I know encouraged me to get Spotify.  I like the idea of being able to like certain songs, and have what I’m sure is an algorithm suggest other songs like it to which I can listen.  
    But what I have noticed is that, with occasional exceptions, it tends to play the same songs over and over again in any playlist I have.  Even when I get a rare new song and like the song, it still tends to take me back into a rotation of about 30 songs, so I feel like I’m hearing the same songs over and over again.

    You may have the same feeling with today’s Gospel reading, though maybe not as strongly.  This Gospel passage, from the first chapter of the Gospel according to St. Matthew, was the Gospel for the day on 18 December; it’s the Gospel today; and it will be the Gospel for the 4:30 p.m. Christmas Eve Mass.  I can imagine what your mind goes to when you hear the words, “This is how the birth of Jesus Christ came about.”  It’s probably something like, “Didn’t I just hear this?”  
    Beyond the Gospel, Catholicism is built on ritual.  The Mass is, substantially, the same every week.  The readings change, the preface sometimes change, and I generally alternate between different versions of the Eucharistic Prayer week by week, but not that much changes.  I will admit that I even sometimes check my blog with all my homilies to make sure that I’m not preaching the same thing year after year, especially with these seasons and days that have similar themes.  
    And some will criticize the ritual nature of Catholicism.  Our evangelical brothers and sisters might have a different service every month, even if there is a similar format.  There’s much more sense of inventing something new and exciting every year, probably because it appeals to our desire to be entertained.  And entertainment is, generally speaking, putting out new things that delight the fact that we’ve never seen it before.  While Hollywood has leaned on remakes of past releases, generally they are always making new movies.  Singers tend to include some old favorites at concerts, but more so tend to focus on the latest album they released.  
    But, as much as we find ourselves drawn to what is new and exciting (or, to use a newer word, bussin’), the human person has a need for routine and things that do not change.  Routine creates a certain calm or stability that we need.  Even in the hectic mornings when you’re getting yourself and/or your kids ready, your routine, even if interrupted, of putting on deoderant, brushing your teeth, combing your hair, shaving, putting on make-up, using cologne or perfume, probably gives you some sense of stability, even if the rest of the day is anything but stable.  And it opens up success for the future that chaos tends not to support.  Imagine that, to keep things new and fresh, you decided not to wear deodorant or brush your teeth.  It probably wouldn’t help you out in your day, and would create more stress.
    Ritual in the Catholic Church creates calm because our encounter with God is not meant to be a flurry of emotions, though we sometimes do get an emotive response.  Our worship of God should create a peace and quiet in us that allows to hear God, who often works in the stillness and silence.  An emotive high is like a drug: it’s exciting (for you younger folk, it slaps) when you experience something new.  But then, as you get used to new and ever-changing, the level of new and changing has to increase because your tolerance for new has increased, and the old new and exciting doesn’t give you the same high.  That’s why Catholic Masses are not and should not be like rock concerts.  There’s a place for that kind of music, in our devotional life, but in the Mass, we need to create a quiet space to encounter God, who didn’t come to Elijah in an earthquake, fire, or storm, but in the stillness.
    Routine and ritual also allow us to do what novelty never allows: go deeper.  When I’m just concerned about getting something new each time, I remain that the surface level, because I’m adjusting to stimuli I haven’t experienced before.  When I hear the same prayer or the same Gospel passage again and again, God desires that I do go deeper than just the surface.  It was only after a while of praying the fourth Eucharistic Prayer (which I use during Ordinary Time), that I recognized the words, “Look, O Lord, upon the Sacrifice which you yourself have provided for your Church…” could refer back to Genesis, when Abraham was on his way to sacrifice Isaac, his beloved Son, and Isaac asks where the sheep for sacrifice is, that Abraham says that God Himself will provide the sheep for the sacrifice.  As I grow in my understanding of the Scriptures, I see how they intertwine with the Mass, something we can miss if we only stay at the surface level.
    So, yes, we will hear again (if you go to the Vigil Mass of Christmas on Wednesday afternoon), “This is how the birth of Jesus Christ came about,” a passage that we have likely heard countless times.  But, as with this Gospel, so with the Mass: don’t stay at the surface.  Allow the calm of the ritual to push you into deeper meanings and connections throughout the rest of the Mass, the Scriptures, and the Church’s other teachings.  Don’t miss the depth God wants to reveal because you want something new and exciting each time.  Remain with God, the source of beauty, ever ancient, ever new. 

Quit, Adjust, Or Stay the Course

Third Sunday of Advent

    [In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen].  The Introit/Entrance Antiphon today tells us to rejoice.  In fact, the name we often give this Sunday is Gaudete Sunday, from the Latin first word: the command form of the verb “rejoice.”  As a way of reinforcing this idea that we are to rejoice, the penitential and more somber violet gives way to a slightly lighter shade called rose (not pink).  
    We rejoice, all the liturgical guides tell us, because Advent is more than halfway over.  But as I thought about it, being more than halfway done with something is encouraging, but I wouldn’t necessarily say I would rejoice.  I thought about working out, especially cross-fit-style exercises: I am happy to be at set six out of ten.  But I’m still in the midst of the workout, and often times I’m fairly gassed by then.  I rejoice when I’m done with the workout and have successfully conquered the challenge that (more often than not) others set out for me.
    And maybe you’re on the same page when it comes to Advent.  Even though we are more than halfway done, we’re still in the midst of it all.  Two weeks ago I challenged us to be attentive to how Christ comes to us and to non-Catholics, as well as making sure we help others recognize Christ as He comes to them.  How are we doing with that?  Last week I encouraged us to hope: to focus on eternal salvation and allow the theological virtue to carry us through challenges that come to us each week or maybe even each day.  How have we exercised that virtue of hope?  Maybe Advent has felt like one of my workouts: we give a lot of ourselves, but we’re getting tired and worn out, even though we haven’t finished yet.

    But, like a workout, the key is to finish.  Of course, with Advent, we can’t stop time, and Christmas will come.  But the way we celebrate will correlate to how we finished.  Our options are: give up; adjust; or keep the same pace.  
    Giving up is an option.  It’s not a good option, but it’s an option.  There have been workouts where I’m giving my all, and maybe pushing myself a bit more than I should (especially when I’m working out with someone who is much better shape than I), and then I get to the sixth or seventh round, and I’m gassed.  I remember one workout where we were supposed to deadlift 225 pounds for three reps in one minute, then ride an assault bike for one minute for as many calories as possible, and then get a rest for a minute, and repeat this for ten rounds.  I really pushed myself, trying to keep up with my partner on the assault bike, so that after three rounds, I struggled to keep my breath.  By round six I felt like I had nothing left.  So when round 7 began, I had convinced myself that I couldn’t go on anymore, and I was going to quit.  The minute started for my deadlifts, and I sat on the bench, catching my breath.  I told my partner that I couldn’t go on.  I wanted to quit, and others may have.
    But quitting means that we’re out.  And while a workout is mostly inconsequential, when it comes to our faith, quitting means that we abandon God.  And that’s not a recipe for eternal life.  God never quits on us; He stays with us, no matter how weak or tired we feel we are.  And if we can give even some small bit, God will help us be successful.
    In that particular workout, I dug deep, and made myself finish.  But I had to adjust, which is our second choice.  My calories on the assault bike dropped somewhat significantly.  In other workouts, including one I did just last week, I set a goal that I thought I could attain, doing a squat to shoulder press with 30 pound dumbbells for ten reps, then riding an assault bike for 10 calories, and using the ski machine for 15 calories, each in one minute.  But by round four I realized that my original estimate was unrealistic.  So I had to adjust.  I dropped from ten reps with the dumbbells to eight.  It still pushed me, but I didn’t feel like my arms were going to give out.  My calories on the assault bike also dropped a bit.  But I didn’t give up.  I adjusted my original goals to reflect reality.  
    Maybe this Advent we have set very adventurous goals for our spiritual growth, and we’ve grown a little frustrated because we haven’t achieved those goals yet.  Don’t give up; adjust.  Sometimes we think we have more than we truly have.  We can lower our expectations without stopping altogether.  And when it comes to our relationship with God, continuing the fight, even if we slightly alter our goals, means that we’re doing our best to still respond to God’s grace which makes any good work possible.  Victory may not look like we originally intended, but we can still get a victory that challenged us and helped us to grow in our relationship with God.
    Lastly, sometimes we just keep our same goals.  Sometimes I have had times where I wanted to quit, but I didn’t, and I didn’t even adjust my goals.  My goals challenged me, and I wanted to give up or lower the goals, but I pushed through kept going for all the rounds at the original expectations.  And when I finished, I was so proud that I kept pushing through.  Sometimes when we face challenges in our spiritual life, we have what it takes, we just need to push ourselves.  We struggle, but we don’t give up and don’t let up, and then when the challenges pass, the victory feels all the sweeter.  
    God’s grace can help us succeed even when we think we will fail.  We rejoice at that success, but then we increase our goals, because, like working out, we’re never done; there’s always more we can do.  We can always love God and our neighbor more; we can always respond better to God’s grace; we can always trust God more and abandon our wills to His.  We rejoice at our victories that we have had thus far, and then set new goals that push us more and more.
    And maybe that’s why the Church has us rejoice today.  No doubt, we have had success this Advent in recognizing Christ as He came to us and to those we know.  I’m sure we have hoped even when we wanted to doubt.  Rejoice in those goals you have accomplished by the grace of God.  But do not rest on your laurels.  Because we’re not done.  We’re not done with Advent until Christmas, and we’re not done growing in our spiritual life until we die or until Christ returns in glory.  But, if we have given our all this Advent; if we have given our all in life, then Christmas and the end of time will be the time of complete rejoicing that we have responded to God’s election of us, and that we are achieving faith’s goal: our salvation.  [In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.] 

Hoping for Blanton's Gold

Second Sunday of Advent

    [In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.]  In October, when I travelled with two other priests and my two barbers down to Kentucky, we had an interesting experience.  It was Wednesday.  My two barbers had gone back to Michigan, because they could only take a couple of days off of work.  So the two other priests, Fr. Brian and Fr. Paul, and I were eating breakfast.  One of the barbers, Zach, texted me to let me know that he had seen that Buffalo Trace was selling Blanton’s Gold, a special kind of Blanton’s bourbon, that day.  It’s often hard enough to find Blanton’s in Michigan, let alone the gold variety.  
    But it was 8:30 a.m., and we three priests were finishing up breakfast in Shepherdsville, Kentucky, about one hour away from Frankfort and Buffalo Trace, and Buffalo Trace opened at 9.  I asked Frs. Brian and Paul if they wanted to try to get some Blanton’s Gold, even though they probably wouldn’t have a lot to sell, there would likely be lots of people already there, or quickly arriving, and we had a 10 a.m. distillery tour that we would have to cancel.  They agreed we should try.
    We got in Fr. Brian’s Jeep, and realized, as we got on the freeway, that we had around 53 miles worth of gas, and Buffalo Trace was around 59 miles away.  So we had to stop and quickly put in 3 gallons of gas, just to make sure we didn’t run out of gas in our effort to get there.  I don’t know how fast Fr. Brian drove, and I didn’t want to know, but we made good time.  When we made it, there was no line, which made me think they were all sold out.  We walked hurriedly into the check-in building, and said we just wanted to go to the gift shop.  The person working the desk said that they had E.H. Taylor and Weller Special Reserve that day.  And then he paused, and continued, “And we also have something else special, but I don’t know if there’s any left.  We just received a red warning, which means that they’ve put out the rest of the supply on the floor, and they won’t be restocking once it’s gone.”  We walked like professional Olympic power-walkers to the gift shop, I almost slipped on the wet floor once I got inside the building, and there, before our eyes, were about 30 more bottles of Blanton’s Gold (limit one per person).  We had hoped that we could get some before it sold out, and we achieved the object of our hope, with all the bottles selling out within 30 minutes of our arrival.

    Advent is a season of hope, not for Blanton’s Gold, but for Christ.  We hear St. Paul tell the Romans today: “Whatever was written previously was written for our instruction, that by endurance and by the encouragement of the Scriptures we might have hope.”  During Advent we enter in to the hope of the Chosen People in those centuries of waiting for the Messiah.  We enter in to the hope that children so wonderfully exemplify as we wait to celebrate Christmas.  We enter in to the hope of Christ’s return in glory at the end of time.  We do a lot of hoping during this Advent season.
    And before us stands the great prophet of hope, St. John the Baptist.  He is the one who prepares the way for the Lord, and informs the people that their hope is about to be fulfilled as the Lamb of God comes to them.  He calls others to repentance so that they are ready to attain the object of their hope, the Messiah.
    But what is hope?  “Hope,” the Catechism tells us, “is the theological virtue by which we desire the kingdom of heaven and eternal life as our happiness, placing our trust in Christ’s promises and relying not on our own strength, but on the help of the grace of the Holy Spirit.”  The Catechism continues, 
 

The virtue of hope responds to the aspiration of happiness which God has placed in the heart of every man; it takes up the hopes that inspire men’s activities and purifies them so as to order them to the Kingdom of heaven; it keeps man from discouragement; it sustains him during times of abandonment; it opens up his heart in expectation of eternal beatitude.

Hope, in its highest form, points us toward heaven and eternal salvation.  Hope keeps us going when the going gets tough.  Hope reminds us that this world is not all there is, but that all will be made right when Christ returns in glory.  
    But hope means that we do not yet possess what we desire.  St. Paul, earlier in his letter to the Romans, writes, “Now hope that sees for itself is not hope.  For who hopes for what one sees?”  I didn’t hope for Blanton’s Gold once I put it in my cart; I possessed it.  Hope carried us on as we traveled I-64 east bound and down, as the song goes.  

    And because we do not yet possess eternal life, we can doubt, which is the vice opposite hope.  We wonder if the waiting is really worth it, and if our reward will ever get here, like a child who wonders if 25 December will ever get here.  Even St. John the Baptist seems to have had some doubts.  After our Lord began His public ministry and Herod had arrested John, John sent messengers to ask Christ: “‘Are you the one who is to come, or should we look for another?’”  Even while Christ was on earth, the Kingdom was not established in its fulness.  But already, signs were present that it was breaking into the world, and that Christ would install it: “‘The blind see, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead rise again, [and] the poor have the good news preached to them.’”  
    So, in our own time, there are signs to us of the Kingdom’s approach.  More and more people come to faith and Holy Baptism; they receive strength to walk towards Christ and lead others through Confirmation; God cleans us of sin through confession; God heals our lack of openness to His Word; we rise to new life through Holy Baptism; and those who know they need God do not go away disappointed.  God continues to bring about His kingdom, if we have eyes to see.  St. Theresa of Avila encourages us:
 

Hope, O my soul, hope.  You know neither the day nor the hour.  Watch carefully, for everything passes quickly, even though your impatience makes doubtful what is certain, and turns a very short time into a long one.  Dream that the more you struggle, the more you prove the love that you bear your God, and the more you will rejoice one day with your Beloved, in a happiness and rapture that can never end.

    So, during this Advent season, may we continue to hope.  May it help us persevere when doubts creep it.  May hope strengthen us to keep walking when the pilgrimage through this vale of tears seems too difficult.  And may our hope be rewarded when, at our death or the return of Christ in glory, we see the object of our hope, God, face to face [the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit, who lives and reigns for ever and ever.  Amen].

Advent: A Time of Conversion

First Sunday of Advent

    [In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen].  One of the many duties with which I help out for the Michigan State Police, or MSP for short, is working with those who want to join the MSP.  Wednesday nights will generally find me at Grand Blanc High School as I help applicants with water rescue drills (like treading water while passing a 10-pound brick, water pull-ups, and rescuing me or others who pretend to be drowning).  I have also “helped” applicants with physical training (though, they have mostly been in better shape than I am).  There’s a new Trooper Recruit School that will start in January, the 150th since the Department was founded in 1917, and a few of the applicants I have worked with will be in that school.  I want to make sure they are prepared as they can be before it starts, and I’m excited and hopeful for them to make it all the way through the twenty grueling weeks and graduate in May 2026.  I can’t do it for them, but I can assist them before and pray for them during their training.

    In Advent we focus on preparing for Christ: for His first coming some 2,000 years ago; for our celebration of His coming at Christmas; for His return in glory (we often refer to this as His second coming).  But He also comes to us, and not only us, in our day-to-day lives.  Our readings today, especially our Gospel, focus us on remaining watchful for the return of Christ in glory.  But we should also remain on high alert for the ways Christ wants to come to us today, and tomorrow, and the days afterwards.
    I also believe that Advent is also a special time to recognize how Christ comes to those who do not know Him, or do not know Him fully.  Advent is a special time to focus on conversions for those who do not believe in Christ, or for those who believe in Christ but do not have full union with the one Church He founded (the Catholic Church), or for those who have fallen away from the practice of their faith.  Are we attentive to how Christ works in the lives of those who are, in any way, ignorant of Him?
    It might seem odd to think that Christ could work in the heart of someone who is not directly connected to God in one way or another or who has walked away from Him.  But God offers what we call prevenient grace, the grace that comes before a movement of the soul towards God.  If we didn’t acknowledge this, we would say that we do some good work without God, and that God simply affirms the good we work we have begun, or gives us an ‘atta boy for something He hadn’t planned for us.  Instead, we know that any movement toward God is already a grace, because God begins all good work, and our job consists in cooperating with that grace.
    So who are the people in our lives that do not yet know God or do not recognize Christ as the Messiah or do not practice their Catholic faith?  God desires the salvation of every person.  God doesn’t want us to force conversion (as if a true conversion could be forced), but wants us to help others understand that He does exist, and not only that, but He loves us and wants to be in a relationship with us.  How do we do this?  For starters, we pray for that person.  Saul, who later became St. Paul, did not at first believe that our Lord was the Messiah, but I’m sure people prayed that he, a great Jewish scholar, might have the scales fall from his mind that prevented him from acknowledging how Jesus fulfilled the Old Testament prophecies of the Messiah.  And we know just how powerfully that happened, and how St. Paul became one of the world’s greatest proclaimers of the Gospel.  And all that from the prayers of those who followed Christ and who probably suffered persecution from Saul.
    Secondly, we can be attentive to what’s going on in a friend’s life.  When a person struggles or when an unexpected favor happens, that’s a great time to talk to them about God and His Church.  Christ wants the other to see how faith in Him can conquer any problem, and that He showers His blessings upon every person so that they can believe in Him.  But Christ uses us to help others to see that.  Maybe the conversation about God is not too explicit at first, but helping others to see God’s plan, and the ways we can cooperate with that plan, can help bring a person to faith.
    Thirdly, we can help them see that a full relationship with God and the truth He has revealed happens in the Catholic Church.  Sometimes Catholics get a little queasy about this part, because they may not feel like they know enough about the Church to answer all questions a person might have.  Don’t be afraid of saying, “I don’t know; let’s find out together.”  Or maybe, “I’ve always just trusted that it was true.  I can ask around to make sure this makes sense.”  The truths of the faith will stand up to any inquiry and academic rigor.  We don’t have to be afraid of other people questioning certain teachings.  
    So this Advent, commit yourself to watching for Christ to make himself known in someone who is not Catholic.  Pray for a non-Catholic or fallen away Catholic; help a non-Catholic or fallen away Catholic see how God is working or could work in his or her life; explain why the Catholic Church means so much to you and how her teachings help one live a truly happy life.  Will you always see successful conversions?  No.  But you will fulfill the call of Advent to watch for Christ’s coming in your daily life, and what joy you will have if that person does decide to become Catholic and join us as we all watch and wait for Christ to return in glory [who, with the Father, and the Holy Spirit, live and reign for ever.  Amen].

Preparing for the End

Last Sunday after Pentecost

    In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.  No small number of people spend no small amount of time trying to figure out exactly when the end of the world will come.  It’s like the meme on the Internet of the Pepe Silvia conspiracy board from the show, “It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia.”  I’ve never watch the show, but from time-to-time I’ll see the meme with this office worker who has a stressed look on his face as he points to numerous sheets of paper push-pinned to the board with red lines going between the papers.  
    We ourselves may sometimes go down a rabbit hole or two as we hear these passages and then think of how the world seems to be spinning out of control.  Our Lord talks about false messiahs, the darkening of the sun and moon, stars falling from heaven, and the like.  Elsewhere Christ talks about wars, earthquakes, famines, plagues, and other calamities, all of which we have seen all too frequently.  And certainly we know that the return of Christ in glory is closer today than it was yesterday.  
    But the temptation can be that we’re so focused on trying to figure out if it’s now, or tomorrow, or next week, that we miss out on opportunities for growth in holiness, that will make the end times less problematic for us.  St. Paul tells us in the epistle that God desires us to grow in wisdom and spiritual understanding, to allow our good works to bear fruit, and to grow in knowledge of Him.  We know from Christ the God desires that we love Him with all of who we are and love our neighbor as ourselves.  Christ tells us that our judgement won’t go easier just because we had a passing familiarity with Him (“Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father in heaven.”).  And He tells us the way we treat the hungry, thirsty, stranger, naked, ill, and those in prison will determine our judgement because the way we treated them were the ways we treated Christ.  What Christ doesn’t say is that we will go to heaven if we can decipher on what day and at which hour the end will come (which, point of fact, Christ one earth even said that He does not know).
    Christ does say that the end will be difficult.  He reminds us in the Gospel that if He did not shorten the tribulations, not even the elect would be saved.  But, for those who follow God to the best of their ability, they will survive the tribulations and shine like the stars in the heavens.  Christ uses the image of a woman in childbirth for how painful the end will be, but then the joy of having the newborn child makes the nine months of carrying the child and the pains of delivering the child worth it.  Or, for men, the pain and suffering from a man-cold, and the joy that comes when it finally ends.  
    But if we remain faithful to God, no matter what trials and tribulations come, we will enjoy eternal happiness.  It is as our gradual said, “You have delivered us, O Lord, from those who afflict us.”  The end will be difficult because God will be setting everything right that was wrong.  And just like setting a broken bone, the healing begins with some pain.  It will remain painful for those who persist in their brokenness and rejection of God, because God will respect their free choice and allow them the pain and suffering that come from rejecting God and His eternal happiness.  But for those who reached out for the mercy of God, the healing, though painful at first, will result in great joy and wholeness as we finally fulfill the purpose of our lives: eternal worship of God and having our loves ordered correctly.
    So what do we do?  Maybe it’s better to say what we don’t do.  Don’t waste time wondering if this world event, or if this situation in the Church, or if that natural phenomenon means the end is about to come.  Don’t stress out about things beyond our control.  Worrying and trying to determine the exact signs and times doesn’t help us grow closer to God.  Yes, we may mourn that Christ is so opposed in the world and the evil seem to thrive and calamities seem to multiply.  But rather do live a holy life as a husband or wife, father or mother, child or sibling, employer or employee.  Care for your family; show them the love of God; instruct them in the faith.  Treat people justly and as you would want to be treated.  Love your enemies; pray for those who persecute you.  Be harsh on your own sins, but merciful, patient, and understanding with others’.  Take up your daily cross and follow after the Lord, even if it’s not the cross you want to carry.  
     Christ will return, and His return is closer today than yesterday.  But if we do our best to follow Him with all our hearts, we have nothing to fear and everything to gain.  Christ will make the world right and usher in an eternity of joy, peace, truth, and love as He creates a new heaven and a new earth where all the elect will worship God: the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit.  Amen.   

Not the King We Expected

Solemnity of Our Lord Jesus Christ, King of the Universe
    A bishop I know once had a meeting when he was a priest with his diocesan bishop.  During that meeting, the diocesan bishop said to this priest, “You know, you’re not everything I would want in a priest.”  Talk about demoralizing!  But this priest who became a bishop then used this story to transition to talking with his priests, and admitted that he knows he’s not everything his priests would like to see in a bishop.  But he does his best to follow God’s will and be the best bishop he can be.

    As we celebrate the Solemnity of Christ the King of the Universe, the Gospel presents us with perhaps a different version of a king than we were expecting or want.  When we think of kings, we probably think of pomp and circumstance, fine robes, jeweled crowns, and amazing power.  Instead, our Gospel presents us what looks like utter failure as Christ hangs on the cross as a common criminal, and those around Him mock Him.  In place of pomp there is jeering.  In place of fine robes Christ had his cloak torn off His Sacred Body before they put the nails in His hands and feet.  In place of a jeweled crown He wears a crown of thorns.  And in place of amazing power Christ allows the powers of the world and Hell to rush upon Him, seemingly powerless to stop any of it.
    But the best king the world has ever or will ever have is Jesus.  And yet, His kingship is a tension of seeming paradoxes.  Christ is King on the cross, and Christ is King in heaven.  Christ is King naked in suffering, and Christ is King robed in majesty.  Christ is King in His agony, and Christ is King in His glorification.  But often times, if we’re honest, we prefer one over the other.  We might say, like that bishop said to his priest, “You’re not everything I would want in a king.”  
    We try to keep that tension as Christ’s faithful on earth.  We should both venerate Christ as King in glory and Christ as King in the earthly way He manifests Himself.  Both have value and importance.  Both help us to be faithful subjects of Christ our King.
    As far as glory, we do our best to demonstrate that in our Mass.  This temple uses precious materials like stained-glass, marble, beautiful paint, and precious metal vessels to show that we give our best to Christ our King.  Christ is worthy of all of our best materials, and we give that to him.  I wear special vestments which cost a fair amount of money.  We use special books to convey the Word of God, especially the Book of the Gospels.  We use a special instrument, the organ, which both mimics the human voice, but also brings with it the sound of trumpets and strings.  So much of what we do is wholly unnecessary and superfluous, but yet fitting for a king, just as DaVinci’s “Mona Lisa” or Michelangelo’s “David” is not, strictly speaking, a necessary part of the world, but adds wonder and awe and glory to the world.
    But our best is not just in reference to the sanctuary or the different ministers.  You should also bring your best to lay at the feet of the King.  Do we come as attentive as we can to Mass, not drowsy from the night before because we stayed up too late watching college football or drinking?  Do we take a look at the readings a few days before so that we can more deeply appreciate them as the reader proclaims them to us?  Do we do our best to dress better for the King than we do for our usual daily tasks?  Do we fast one hour before receiving our heavenly King, the Body and Blood of Christ, to prepare our bodies for so great a guest?  Do we exteriorly respond to the prayers and sing, to the best of our ability, the hymns and sung responses?  Do we unite all that has happened since the last time we came to Mass with the bread and wine offered on the altar so that we truly give ourselves to God, as He desires?  Certainly, some of these are tough, especially with young children, but can we say that we’re doing our best?
    On the other hand, Christ is King from the cross and in His suffering that continues in His members.  Do we allow the beautiful, glorified encounter with Christ the King to transform us so that we can meet Christ the King as we meet Him in our day-to-day lives?  There was a chart that I received when I studied liturgy in Chicago, and it broke up the Mass into three parts.  It was based on the pre-Conciliar Mass, but easily translated into the post-Conciliar Mass.  The first part of the Mass was what used to be called the Mass of the Catechumens, or the Liturgy of the Word.  The second part of the Mass was called the Mass of the Faithful, what we now call the Liturgy of the Eucharist.  But the third part of the Mass was called the Mass During the Day, not reflecting the time of Mass, but demonstrating that what happens at Mass is supposed to affect how we live our lives outside the church walls.  Another term for this was Catholic Action, or how we work, rest, eat, drink, play, and treat the poor as Catholics.  It is in our homes, in our jobs, on the roads, on our vacations, in our encounter with the poor that we also encounter Christ the King.  And how do we serve that manifestation of Christ in His Kingship?  Are we ready to serve Christ the King in the more mundane and messy parts of life?  
    Christ is King both in the aspect of glory here in this church as well as in the beggar, the co-worker, the family member, the immigrant, the police officer or firefighter, the politician, and any other person we encounter each day.  May we recognize Christ as King not only in His glory, but also in His suffering.  And I’ll end with a prayer that can help us serve Christ our King, not only as we want Him to be King, but as He truly is King:
 

Almighty and ever-living God,
Author of Light and Life,
enlighten our minds and strengthen our wills,
so that we may practice in our lives 
what we have celebrated at your holy altar 
and received into our hearts.
Through Christ our Lord.  Amen.

Treasuring the Word of God

Twenty-third Sunday after Pentecost
    In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.  Earlier this week I was speaking with a friend I have known for a few years now.  I wouldn’t say I know him really well, but continue to get to know him in the few times when we see each other throughout the year.  He asked me how St. Matthew was doing, and I mentioned how we’re growing.  He told me that he attends a Protestant community, but then opened up and told me that he was baptized Catholic, and even was an altar server.  He said that he never really liked going to Mass.  At this Protestant community he enjoyed the music, but then also mentioned how he really enjoyed the Bible study that the community puts on for adults and kids.  He then shared that he never remembered his dad ever opening up a Bible, and how strange that was, and how he makes sure that his children know the Bible well and he, as their father, shares that with them.  After he had shared this, he had to get to something else, but I said we should sit down and talk about his experiences more when he has a chance.  We’ll see if that ever happens or not.
    Are we familiar with the Word of God?  St. Jerome famously said, while commenting on the Book of the Prophet Isaiah, that ignorance of the Scriptures is ignorance of Christ.  How familiar are we with the Scriptures?  Do you as parents, especially fathers, take leadership in sharing the Word of God and unpacking it for your children?
    The Bible is our book as Catholics.  The Catholic Church, under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, decided which books would be in it.  Holy Mother Church chose to include the books that the Jews venerated as God’s revelation to humanity, and chose to include four Gospel accounts of the life, Death, and Resurrection of Christ, letters from some of the Apostles, and the Apocalypse of Saint John, also called the Book of Revelation.  God didn’t send down a list on papyrus.  Those whom God called to act in the name of Christ and with His power, the bishops, discerned which writings were consistent with what Christ had revealed and the Apostles had passed down, and which were inconsistent, or even simply not necessary for salvation.  What a scandal that a Catholic wouldn’t feel comfortable with a big part of how God has revealed Himself until he left the Catholic Church!  

    When we starve ourselves from the Scriptures, we are like the young girl who is at the point of death, or the woman with the flow of blood.  We need Christ to heal us and raise us up.  If we are so near death from lack of familiarity with the Word of God, then sometimes it takes another to bring about the resurrection of our faith life.  In the Gospel it was the young girl’s father who pleaded with the Savior to heal his daughter.  Fathers, you often have an important role to play in reinvigorating the life of faith in your families, especially your children.  But I would also say mothers play such an important role in modeling familiarity with the Word of God as well.  
    Sometimes we can bring ourselves to Christ and the Scriptures, because we know they will bring us healing.  We have tried everything else, all the other doctors that are available to us.  We have tried every other kind of wisdom, but have found it lacking.  But in the Word of God, if we have faith in its power, as the woman had faith that she could receive healing even if she only touched the clothes of the Lord, we can find the healing we have desired that we have found nowhere else.  But we need to have faith in the power of God’s Word.
    Now, I know that Catholics often point out, and rightly so, that God’s revelation does not limit itself to the Scriptures.  The Bible itself is part of a greater revelation, because the Bible comes to us not from itself, but from the living Tradition of the Church.  And certainly we should also learn what the popes and bishops have taught us throughout the two millennia of the Church’s history, especially that which is part of the deposit of faith.
    But that deposit of faith always finds its roots in the Scriptures.  Not everything that the Church teaches explicitly connects to a particular passage, but everything at least implicitly connects to the Scriptures.  From our belief in the Trinity, our Blessed Mother’s immaculate conception and assumption, the seven Sacraments, and all that is part of Christ’s one Church, we find either direct or indirect evidence of it in God’s revelation through His Word.  The Church Fathers knew this all too well.  If you read any of the Church Fathers, they quote the Scriptures fluidly through their own writings.  The Bible was a story with which they were intimately familiar and through which they could understand the truths of faith.  One of the great fruits of the Second Vatican Council was a call to return to familiarity with the Scriptures that the Church had during the time of the Church Fathers.  We are still growing in that fruit of the Council, but it was a great blessing of the Holy Spirit, nonetheless.
    So many Catholic families need healing from the Word of God.  So many Catholic families are at the point of spiritual death because they do not read the Bible.  Today, reach out to the Lord to find healing in the Word of God.  Allow the Word of God to raise you to new life through its power and its wisdom.  May your children never say of you, as my friend did of his father, that you never opened the Bible for them and helped them know and love the Word of God, the loving communication of salvation from the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit.  Amen.  

Same Event, Different Experience

Thirty-third Sunday in Ordinary Time

    It was fun last Sunday to see the Detroit Lions dominate the game offensively.  No matter what Washington did, they could not seem to stop Detroit’s offense, with the worst results for most of the drives of the game being a field goal and only three points rather than the usual seven points for a touchdown and extra point.  After some rough games this season, it was good to see a strong Lions team again.
    But imagine for a second that you were cheering for the Commanders.  Sunday was not a day you really wanted to remember.  The things that made it so great for the Lions made it pretty horrible for the Commanders.  In any contest, what is good news for one is bad news for the other.
    In this penultimate Sunday in Ordinary Time before we begin Advent, our readings focus us on the end of time.  And the Prophet Malachi, in particular, presents us with this idea that the same event, the day of the Lord, will be bad for some, but great for others.  For some it will be a day of pain and suffering, with the proud and the evildoers burning up like stubble in a field.  For those who fear the name of the Lord, the sun (s-u-n) of justice will heal with its rays.  As Catholics we know that Christ is the true Sun of Justice because He is the Son (s-o-n) of God and Son of Man.  We look for the same event, Christ’s return in glory, but it will not seem the same for everyone.  For some it will appear as a day of joy, for others a day of wailing and gnashing of teeth.
    When we come to this time of year, the Church traditionally puts before us, as she did at every funeral in the old rite, the hymn Dies Irae.  The title means “Day of Wrath.”  And the first verses focus on what the return of Christ will be like for evildoers:
 

Day of watch and doom impending!
David’s word with Sibyl’s blending,
Heaven and earth in ashes ending!

Oh, what fear man’s bosom renders,
When from heaven the Judge descendeth,
On whose sentence all dependeth.

That certainly gives us a wake-up call for what the end could be like if we do not give our hearts over to God and open ourselves to His grace which transforms us.  
    But, it continues:

Faint and weary, Thou hast sought me,
On the Cross of suffering bought me.
Shall such grace be vainly brought me?…

Guilty, now I pour my moaning,
All my shame with anguish owning;
Spare, O God, Thy suppliant groaning!

Through the sinful woman shriven,
Through the dying thief forgiven,
Thou to me a hope hast given.

With Thy sheep a place provide me,
From the goats afar divide me,
To Thy right hand do Thou guide me….

Lord, all-pitying, Jesus blest,
Grant them Thine eternal rest.
Amen.

While not pretending to be blameless, the return of Christ for those who love the Lord means a time of salvation and the rectification of all that evil has ruined, so that the souls of the just can have eternal rest.
    The key, then, is what team we are on?  Not Team Edward or Team Jacob (you’re welcome, “Twilight” fans), but Dies irae-Day of wrath or spem dedisti–a hope given.  Because the end will mean suffering.  Our Lord outlines the things that will precede the end: wars, insurrections, powerful earthquakes, famines, plagues, and persecution of the followers of Christ.  Those who work against Christ will think that they have won.  They will try to get Christ’s faithful to abandon their virtue, to abandon Christ, and will offer apparent ways out of the tribulations that may even mean less or even no suffering in the short terms.  But for those who remain faithful to Christ, who persevere, the time of sorrow and suffering will lead to a day of hope and victory in Christ, who will reward those who remained true even when turning away seemed easier and more enjoyable.  
    [Ava & Wade: you are choosing to follow Christ today, and Christ receives you as His catechumen.  This means that Christ already recognizes you as a follower, even if you have not yet become part of Him through Holy Baptism.  You are abandoning the logic of the world, the flesh, and the devil, and striving to live according to the logic of the Logos, the Divine Word, who helps us understand how God has truly created the world.  You are choosing hope in place of wrath, and for that we give thanks to God and promise you our prayers.]
    The end comes, seemingly ever faster.  We find ourselves closer to the return of Christ in glory today than we were yesterday.  This time of year reminds us to take stock of our choices, which do not only have consequences in time, but have consequences into eternity.  Christ will return in glory, and how we view that day will depend on how we lived each day before that: for or against Christ.  May the words of Dies Irae apply to us as the just so that, “When the wicked are confounded, / Doomed to flames of woe unbounded, / Call me with Thy saints surrounded.”

Busting Myths

Feast of the Dedication of the Basilica of St. John Lateran
    [In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.]  Sometimes we hear things that sound good or make apparent sense, which, in the end, do not hold up.  I’m the sort of guy who generally fills up my gas tank when it’s half full, and I started doing this because, when I was young, someone (I can’t remember for sure who) told me that gas could freeze in the tank in the winter if there was room in the tank.  I recently mentioned that, and the other person challenged me on the factuality of that claim.  And it turns out, gas freezes somewhere between -40º and -200º Fahrenheit.  So it’s not going to freeze.  And even if the temperature at which gas freezes is higher, it would freeze whether they tank was half full or entirely full.  So, myth busted.  
    We might have heard another myth: that I can worship God just as well outside a church as I can inside a church.  People may say that they feel closer to God in nature.  Or they feel the comfort of God’s presence best in their home.  Or, in a post-COVID world, some will say that they prefer to attend Mass via livestream.  Certainly, God is present everywhere, indoors and outdoors.  Certainly our homes are places of comfort.  And, for a while, many people’s legitimate only access point to the Mass was through a computer screen.

    But as we celebrate the Dedication of the Basilica of St. John Lateran today, if those statements about worshiping God that I just mentioned are true, then why do we celebrate a church, albeit beautiful and awe-inspiring, in Rome?  And why even bother coming here?  If we can access God, who is omnipresent, anywhere, what’s the point in going to church on Sunday or any other day?
    The tricky thing about bad teachings is that something which is false tends to include something that is true.  If it had no truthful aspect, we would reject it outright.  But if it has some truth to it, we might choose to believe because we recognize some aspect of truth.  So yes, God is present everywhere.  Yes, people can easily experience God in nature.  Yes, God does sometimes give us comfort, and our homes can remind us of that comforting presence of God.  And yes, what churches broadcast through the livestream is the Mass, and for the sick or those who cannot drive to Mass, that is a better way to celebrate Sunday, the Lord’s Day, rather than just watching the NFL or playing Yahtzee.  
    But just because God is everywhere doesn’t mean He is equally present everywhere.  God can be experienced through a beautiful sunset, or a powerful storm.  But the Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity of the Son of God, Jesus Christ, brings God’s presence to us in a way that occurs no where else outside of a church.  I promise you that the Eucharist will not materialize before you in your hunting blind on Saturday.  Saints like St. Clare have had visions of the Eucharist (which is why she is the patron saint of television), but the unique presence of Christ in the Eucharist comes with a church building.  God makes Himself present to us in a special way and even wants us to receive the Body and Blood of Christ so that we can have God within us.  And receiving the Eucharist generally happens during Mass.  We may not always feel different from receiving the Eucharist, but we are different.  St. John Vianney said, “If we really understood the Mass we would die of joy.”  Extreme joy may not be your experience at Mass every week, every month, or even yearly.  But just because I don’t experience an emotional response doesn’t mean that the most beautiful union between God and man isn’t taking place.  
    Just because we feel comfortable in our house doesn’t mean that we are experiencing the consolation of God.  The comfort that God came to give was at a much deeper level than just physical comfort.  He came to heal our souls.  There are many ways in which we can be opposed to God and yet feel physically good.  Maybe it’s drinking too much, sleeping when we should go to Mass, or engaging in sexual activity outside of marriage.  Those things all feel physically good, and yet do not mean that God is with us our supporting us.  Also, the Lord reminded us that following Him may often include suffering of various kinds, which means that we are not made for comfort.
    Plus, while we all should have a personal relationship with the Lord, it’s not just me and Jesus.  Being baptized means that God joins us to the entire Mystical Body of Christ, the Church, and we are connected to each other.  That cannot be fully picked up simply by staying at home, even with other family members, because the Church is not just one family or even just one ethnic group or nationality.  To be Catholic means that we embrace all who want to follow Christ.
    Lastly, watching the Mass on the computer or on TV never means nor meant that we attended Mass.  One can watch the Mass as a lesser way of sanctifying the Lord’s Day, but to truly attend Mass one must be physically present.  My earlier words also apply: you cannot receive the Eucharist through livestream, and you cannot fully participate in the larger Mystical Body of Christ on your own through livestream.  If one is sick or homebound, then it helps us remember what we would want to attend if were were able.  But watching does not equal physical participation.
    We celebrate a church building today because it is a kind of sacrament.  It is a physical reality, instituted by Christ, which conveys invisible realities and causes graces that flow from the Paschal Mystery.  The physical building reminds us that we are part of something bigger than ourselves, each having a role to play to create the temple not made by hands in heaven, where all the elect are joined together, each fulfilling a role.  May we not accept the myths that we can worship God on our terms (often guided by our own laziness or preferences), but give ourselves to the worship that our Lord told us would be acceptable worship: worship in spirit and truth.  [In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.]