Pain and Glory

Sixteenth Sunday after Pentecost
    In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.  I recently spoke with a Powers Catholic High School graduate who played hockey for Powers Catholic when he studied there.  He has since graduated and, as part of his life, helps train kids who play hockey.  In our recently conversation he mentioned that some of the kids he trains have the drive to excel, and just need work with particular skill sets.  But he struggles with other kids who want the trophies and the medals, but don’t want to put in the work to excel.  They, like so many, have fallen prey to the cultural milieu that one can have it all without working for it and suffering for it.
    St. Paul mentions in the epistle that he suffers for the Ephesians, which is their glory.  Of course, St. Paul’s sacrifices for the spreading of the Gospel also meant his own glorification by God.  But whether the Apostle directed the sufferings towards the people or towards himself, the sufferings yielded the results, not the ease of sitting at home.
    To know Christ, in His expansive love, is to know suffering.  But to know suffering for Christ is to know glory.  Mothers know this when they carry a child in their womb for 9 months.  Especially towards the end, mothers often can’t wait until the child is (safely) delivered.  But the pain of childbirth leads to overwhelming joy at the birth of the fruit of marital love.  Men know this with sports or the weight room.  You cannot excel in a sport, you cannot grow muscles, if you’re not willing to push yourself beyond what you think your limit is and endure pain as muscle fibers break and repair.  But when you win the championship, or when you are able to bench 225 lbs. or more, you recognize how much the sacrifices contributed to your success.  Or for students when it comes to a class or test.  Studying often does not feel good.  The brain gets fatigued from going over again and again the material that you need to learn or be able to produce for a class or an exam.  You put other fun activities on the back burner to make sure that you can truly comprehend the material and reproduce it for a teacher or professor.  And when you pass the class or the exam, you feel a sense of relief and accomplishment.  

    Christ demonstrates for us, as do the saints, that the cross is the only road to victory.  We think it would be better to get to heaven without the cross, but that’s not possible.  Christ’s glorification only comes about because He willingly suffered for us.  Our glorification only comes about when we suffer with Him and in Him.  We like to think, as Christ mentions in the Gospel, that glorification happens when we seek and take the highest place of honor.  But our exaltation comes when we take the lowest place, which is a way of putting our ego to death, which often feels painful.  Our glory comes from our cross.
    That is true in my vocation as a priest and as your spiritual father.  You are my cross and my glory.  That’s not to say that I don’t enjoy being with you and serving you.  I love being at this parish and being your pastor.  I am blessed beyond measure to be at such a beautiful church and serve wonderful people striving for holiness.  But sometimes some of you drive me up a wall.  And you may not be doing anything wrong or sinful, but I suffer for you to help you grow as best as I am able, though I myself am also subject to sin and driving you up a wall, I’m sure.  You are my cross, but you are also my glory.
    For spouses: you are each other’s crosses and glory.  Again, it’s not like marriage should only be suffering through, like you grin and bear it.  But every couple I know has moments where they don’t like each other, even while they love each other.  Sometimes some idiosyncrasies manifest at just the wrong time.  Or a word said in jest hurts especially because of what happened earlier in the day.  Or the kids have decided that today is the day to get out all excess energy and fight with each other and ask a million questions, all while mom and dad are trying to provide and keep a good house.  Your suffering for each other and your children is the way you’ll go to heaven.
    If we wish to have true glory, we cannot seek after earthly honors and the highest place at the table.  If we wish to have true glory then we cannot be all about having our will be executed by all.  If we wish to have glory than we take up our cross and suffer for God through the daily crosses He allows in our lives.  Because our cross is our glorification, just as it was for Christ, who with the Father and the Holy Spirit lives and reigns for ever and ever.   

Remembering the Reason

Sixth Sunday in Ordinary Time
    Routines, while generally beneficial, can also lead to a certain amnesia about their purpose.  And in an age where we seek out something new and exciting, routines can make less and less sense, especially when the routine calls something out of me, and I don’t see the immediate returns on my investments.  

My JV Soccer Team Photo

    When I was a freshman at Lansing Catholic high school I played JV soccer.  We were bad.  We lost a lot of games.  Some of the cause of our losing record one could trace to the league in which we played, with much larger schools like Okemos and Mason.  But, speaking honestly, we also didn’t have a lot of skill, and I would include myself in that assessment.  We were all ok athletes, but not of us excelled at soccer.  And the routine of going to practice, which I rarely enjoyed, or playing games, where we rarely won, got old.  So, after my freshman year, I quit soccer.  I lost sight of why I played, so I quit.  And it’s a choice I regret to this day.
    In our Catholic faith, much can seem like routine.  Take even where you find yourself today.  I would bet that, for at least some of you, you come to Mass out of routine, out of habit.  What we saw before, but especially after COVID, were people who no longer found that routine helpful, or at least they didn’t appreciate what they could get out of practicing one’s faith (which cannot be limited to attending Mass on Sundays, but definitely needs to include attending Sunday Mass as a minimum), so they quit.  Only now, some four years later, do some parishes find themselves with a similar number of people attending as in 2019 (though St. Matthew actually grew during COVID).  
    So, in our second reading today, St. Paul gives us a reminder as he writes his first letter to the Corinthians.  Some, even then in the first fifty years of Christianity, when the Catholic Church was all there was, had already forgotten the importance of what they had first received.  They had not seen the resurrection, and they started to doubt those who had.  So they started to reject the resurrection of Christ, even while still keeping some loose connection to the Church.

    But St. Paul takes them to the heart of the issue: “If the dead are not raised, neither has Christ been raised, and if Christ has not been raised, your faith is vain; you are still in your sins.”  People knew that things were not the way they were supposed to be, that they were not the people they were supposed to be.  They missed the mark for which they were aiming (the Greek term 𝛼𝜇𝛼𝜌𝜏𝜄𝛼 means missing the mark, but is also the word for sin).  And St. Paul preached that there was a way that they could not only hit the mark, but that they could enjoy eternal happiness in heaven.  They knew, as we do, instinctually, that death was not normal, which is why we fight against it so much.  And St. Paul told them how they could live for ever.  They did have to die, symbolically, in the waters of baptism, but if they did, they would live forever if they followed the way of life Jesus set out for them.  And Jesus was worth following because He showed us the way.  He showed us, in His resurrection, that death did not have to have the final word.  At first it looked like sin and death conquered Jesus, on Good Friday, but on Easter Jesus showed us that He conquered sin and death; they could not keep Him down.  
    And that is what the Church has continued to proclaim for some 2,000 years.  For 2,000 years the Church has reflected on the life of Jesus and told us what is consistent and what is inconsistent with following Him.  We can reduce all the dos and don’ts of Catholicism to how we live for Christ and according to His teaching: from going to Mass every Sunday to not having sex before marriage; from serving the poor and the needy to being honest in all our words and dealings; from not idolizing money or power or fame to choosing to love and be kind to every person, regardless of their money or power or fame; from teaching that marriage is only between one man and one woman for life to helping to us to know that our bodies are a gift from God and reveal, even in our God-given gender, something important of who we are.  All of this, and all that the Church asks of us and teaches us, comes down to following Christ in the way He showed us.
    But when we forget this, either due to the routine nature of the faith or for any other reason, we easily walk away.  We forget what a precious gift God gave us in giving us the opportunity of new and eternal life.  If the resurrection is false, then we are “the most pitiable people of all.”  Not only because we have all these rules that often require real sacrifice and giving up what comes naturally to us, but especially because if Christ has not been raised from the dead, then we are still trapped under the oppression of sin and death, and no matter how hard we try to avoid or cheat death, it will be the end of us.

The empty tomb in Jerusalem

    But, I can tell you, that Christ is alive.  I have been to His tomb in Jerusalem, and it is empty.  I trust the eleven apostles who saw the Risen Christ, with the marks of His crucifixion, in the Upper Room.  I trust St. Paul, who saw the Risen Christ on the road to Damascus, where Paul was going to arrest Christians and persecute them for believing in the Risen Christ.  I trust the people who, for two thousand years, have received that good news from the apostles and passed it down to us, because if they lied, they would have no reason for joy, especially when giving up their lives.  But especially those who died for the faith, the martyrs, joyfully accepted death rather than deny what they knew to be true: that Jesus Christ is risen from the dead and has saved us from sin and death.
    Gentlemen on the hockey team: I am willing to bet there were people last year who got sick of practicing, who hated the drills that coach put them through, and who wondered if it was even worth it.  Maybe there were people who even decided not to play last year, because how much practices called them to sacrifice the year before.  But for those who stuck with it, who pushed through the routine, a big, ole’ ring and a beautiful trophy became their prize, a prize I know you hope to duplicate this year.  Heaven is better than a championship ring and trophy, infinitely better.  Yes, sometimes the faith may seem routine, and may call for sacrifices that you would rather not make on given days.  But keep your eyes on the prize.  Keep eternal life and joy in your mind.  And you will not be disappointed.