Do You Pray to God with that Mouth?

 Fifth Sunday after Easter
    In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.  “Do you kiss your mother with that mouth?”  This is a phrase that is sometimes used when someone uses crude or vulgar language, a colloquial way of telling the person to start using better language.  St. James talks about our speech in the Epistle.  He reminds us that, “if anyone thinks he is religious and does not bridle his tongue…his religion is in vain.”  That’s pretty strong language about mere words.  But mere words have meaning, they carry strength.

St. James the Lesser from St. John Lateran, Rome

    After all, we worship not a word, but the Word, the “speech,” as it were of the Father, our Lord Jesus Christ, the Second Person of the Blessed Trinity.  The words we use matter.  When we use good words, we build up.  When we use bad words, we tear down.  When we use good words, we help to communicate that we belong to the Word who is Sinless.  When we use bad words, we communicate that what we do and what we say do not have to have a relation to each other.  We confuse others by suggesting that following Christ does not make a difference in the choice of our vocabulary.
    Words can be in the context of many areas of life.  Our speech can be about God and His Church.  Or it can be about individuals.  Or it can be about the world or inanimate things.  God gave us speech precisely to glorify Him and to edify others, which is precisely also the purpose of the liturgy, the glorification of God and the edification of man, as Sacrosanctum concilium states.  
    We glorify God through prayer, both public like the Mass and the Liturgy of the Hours, and through private prayers like our devotions, our morning offerings, our prayers of thanksgiving.  We edify man by helping others grow in union with Christ.  Sometimes we do that by providing kind, gentle words that encourage.  At other times we need to warn and discipline with harsher words, but always undergirded with charity.  We are called to talk about our Lord to others, and, as St. Peter states, be ready to give a defense for our hope in the Lord.  We have a duty to stand up for the weak and the oppressed, as the prophets remind us again and again.
    Certainly, not all crude or bad speech is mortal sin.  Gossip is often a sin of speech with which people struggle, as well as detraction.  It can be hard not to talk about others, especially with our friends are doing so.  But if we wish our religion to be pure, St. James says, then our speech needs to be as well.  
    This also, perhaps especially, concerns members of the Church.  Detraction, lies, slander, and gossip can destroy parish communities, and we need to guard against it at all times, and avoid it whenever it rears its ugly head.  Satan is always seeking to divide communities of faith, and how often that happens in a parish among well-intentioned people.  If we are revealing the faults of others, or tearing down others in our words, we are not helping to build a larger, stronger parish community.
    It also goes for clergy and our speech about them.  We priests are especially bad at this.  Like a family, we are all too often quick to point out the faults of our brothers, and put them down, not only in front of brother priests, but also, sadly, sometimes in front of the lay faithful.  None of us, from me to the pope, are above reproach.  And yet do we offer criticism with charity, do we criticize the actions, rather than attacking the good name of the person?  Do we use phrases or terms that diminish the respect that we, and others, should have towards those who are engaged in holy orders?  I know this can be hard when we don’t agree with a priest, bishop, or even the pope.  But do we do so with charity?  If not, it is time that we repent, because our prayers may ring hollow if we praise God and ask Him for help on one side of our mouth, and then berate and belittle those whom God has given to lead His Church on the other.

    A priest I know in Mississippi recently had the opportunity to meet His Eminence, Raymond Cardinal Burke.  This Mississippi priest is a great devotee of the Extraordinary Form, and celebrates it in his diocese.  He works to promote the sacred liturgy and the beauty and transcendence that accompany right worship of God.  He related that Cardinal Burke gave a talk over breakfast, and said, “‘Those American bloggers who do things like call the Holy Father “Bergoglio” are not promoting Catholicism.  There is nothing Catholic about disrespecting the office of Bishop or the Papacy.’”  I know that many, myself included, sometimes struggle with Pope Francis’s prudential judgements and the way he expresses himself off the cuff.  But Cardinal Burke is echoing what we hear from St. James today.  If we are willing to share posts on social media that detract and slander, even if simply by innuendo or suggestion, then I hope we’re willing to share the same just divine punishments with those who composed the post or tweet.
    Our Lord tells us today that if we ask for anything in His name, He will give it to us.  Of course, this presumes that the desire of our hearts is in accord with His Sacred Heart and the will of God.  But perhaps the request, even in the name of Christ, would not be heard if we are trashing the Vicar of Christ, or if we are insulting those with whom Christ identifies, especially the “least of his brothers,” as He says in Matthew 25.  It is certain that our prayer will be more efficacious if we see Christ in others and treat them and talk about them appropriately.  Again, this doesn’t mean that we can’t disagree or criticize, but that we do so with respect.  Perhaps, instead of saying, “Do you kiss your mother with that mouth?” we should rather say, “Do you pray to God with that mouth?”  God wants to hear our prayers and answer them, but He may be more likely to grant the prayers of those who, even in their speech about others, honors the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit.  Amen. 

Frequent Dying and Rising

Tenth Sunday in Ordinary Time

For as stupendous as raising someone from the dead is, it happens somewhat frequently in the Bible.  We heard about God raising the widow of Zarephath’s child through Elijah in our first reading, and Jesus raising the son of the widow from Nain in today’s Gospel.  Jesus also raises the daughter of Jairus, a synagogue official, and Lazarus.  After Jesus ascended into heaven, Peter raises a young girl named Dorkas (what an unfortunate name!), and Paul raises to life a person who falls out of a window after that person had fallen asleep because of how long Paul was preaching (there are dangers with preaching too long!).  I don’t know why, but I feel like that’s a lot of times.  About a month ago, I was given credit for raising someone from the dead by some of our firefighters, after I was riding with the firefighters and we responded to a call of someone having a heart attack, who seemed to miraculously wake up when we arrived (in reality, that person was an example of why you should never mix alcohol and a prescription narcotic).

But God truly does raise people from death on a regular basis, if we take time to think about it.  God raises from death those who are baptized.  In baptism, children, men and women are taken from being at enmity with God to being His children.  By baptism, people are buried with Christ–they die–so that they can rise with Him to new life.  By baptism, the old self has to die, like the grain of wheat, so that the new self, the person alive in Christ, can live.  

But that process of dying and rising does not stop on the day that we are baptized.  Each day we have the opportunity to die and rise.  It starts for some of us at the moment our eyes open.  At that moment we have the opportunity to die to our laziness and the comfort of our bed and rise to the new day that is before us.  There’s nothing wrong with hitting the snooze button if we have time, but at some point for many of us, we need to get up and get prepared for the day.  That’s why, at the beginning of my day, before my feet hit the floor of my bedroom, I say a short prayer: Mater mea, fiducia mea!–My Mother, my confidence!, and I entrust my entire day to Jesus through the intercession of the Blessed Virgin Mary.  You could say any prayer that you like, but prayer is a great way to rise to new life.

Throughout our day there will be people trying to kill us.  Sometimes we are the people trying to kill others.  Hopefully not literally, but certainly figuratively.  What I mean by that is that we are all sinful, and we all give in to temptations, to not be disciples of Jesus.  Whether it’s others or ourselves, there’s gossip, slander, sharing secrets we have no business sharing, treating others as objects or as means to advancement, and the list could go on and on.  If we are the culprit, then we need to die to all of those sins.  We need them to be put to death, and Jesus does that by His suffering on the cross.  When we bite our lip, or treat someone kindly, we are dying to our fallen nature and its sinful tendencies.  If we are on the receiving end, then we die when we patiently suffer through them (correcting when necessary and prudent) instead of giving back what we received.  And whether we are putting to death our own tendencies, or suffering with Jesus because of others’ tendencies, new life, resurrection, is available for us, not only after our earthly life ends, but even on this side of eternity.

Because those who can accept suffering and unite it with Jesus do live happier lives.  They may still have the same sorrows, but they do not let the sorrows control their lives.  They cling to their new life in Christ, given to them in baptism, and live in the joy of the Resurrection, even in this vale of tears.  Which is the happier life: the one tossed about by uncontrollable forces, or the one who entrusts his or her life to God and stays on a steady course toward Him?

Everything in our nature rebels against death.  We were not made to die, but experience death because of sin.  We see that rejection of death and its power in our first reading and Gospel today.  But there is another kind of death, a healing death, a death to our sinful selves, a death in Christ, which is not contrary to who we are, but helps us to be the fullest person we were created to be.  May we allow our sinful natures to die with Christ on the cross, so that we can also rise with Him to new life, both in our daily lives, and especially in the life to come.