"We need to talk..."

Twenty-first Sunday in Ordinary Time

           

There are certain phrases in life that you never want to hear from a person.  If you are a student you never want to have the teacher tell you, “See me after class.”  If you’re dating someone, you never want to hear, “We need to talk.”  If you’re meeting with your doctor, you never want to hear, “We found something that we didn’t expect.”  All those things generally mean that there is some bad news coming, whether it’s a poor grade on a test, a break-up, or an illness or disease that was just discovered.

            At the end of our life, standing before the judgment seat of God, we don’t want to hear, “‘I do not know where you are from,’” coming from the mouth of Jesus.  That means that what comes next is not good news, and we should be prepared for the afterlife elevator to go down, rather than up.  So it makes sense that the person might say, as Jesus has them saying in today’s Gospel, “‘We ate and drank in your company and you taught in our streets.’”  But then they hear something even worse: “‘I do not know where you are from.  Depart from me, all you evildoers!’”  These probably sound like pretty harsh words from the Divine Person who is supposed to be a loving Shepherd.

            But both last week and this week the Church presents for us what can seem like the harsher side of Jesus.  Last week Jesus was saying how following Him will split apart families.  This week, He’s talking about eternal salvation and how many will be saved.  When we hear passages like the one we heard today, perhaps we try to theologize it away, by highlighting other passages from Scripture which talk about how God desires the salvation of all.  And certainly we take those very seriously and must read today’s passage in light of those.  But more often than not, we don’t read this passage in light of those other Scripture passages, we just ignore today’s and pretend that the one’s about God’s desire for all to be saved are the only passages that are important.  But we do so at our own peril.

            Because while God does desire all to be saved, God also tells us with great sobriety that “‘many…will attempt to enter [through the narrow gate] but will not be strong enough.’”  Enjoying eternal bliss is not the automatic destination, even one of one who is baptized.  It’s the destination God programmed into us, but sin so often takes us off course.  Just because we’re baptized doesn’t mean that we’re going to heaven.  Salvation is not a gift that is offered once for all and accepted or rejected in one moment, but is a gift that is offered to us each day that we have to receive each day in order for it to become our eternal reality.  Just because I lived a holy life yesterday, does not mean that I will today.  In fact, I could be particularly evil today, which could undermine all the good I did yesterday. 

            If you think about it in an academic metaphor, we don’t start class off with a 4.0, and then only lose it if we don’t turn stuff in, or answer questions correctly.  Rather, God offers us opportunities to respond to the love He first showed us, homework assignments and quizzes and tests, and if we do well, we can get that 4.0.  Or, if you prefer, think about it in terms of lifting weights.  We don’t start off with buff little bodies.  We need to work out in order to keep a good, muscular physique.  When we don’t, our muscles get weak and they appear smaller.  I’m living proof of that.  If muscles just came, I’d be pretty buff.  But because I never lifted weights or did any kind of muscle conditioning, I have these little scrawny arms.  Now, good grades are not the most important things in life, nor are muscles.  But what is true with getting a 4.0 and getting big muscles is true about salvation: it doesn’t just happen without any work. 

            It is not enough to be around Jesus, as if salvation comes by way of osmosis.  We might as well sleep with textbooks beneath our pillow in the hopes of learning the material.  The people in Jesus’ words today were around Jesus.  They ate and drank with Him and He taught them in their cities.  And yet Jesus says He does not know them.  It is not enough simply that we are baptized.  Each day we are called to respond to God’s love that He give us first, and the opportunities that He sends our way to share that love with others.  Each day we are called to offer to God the sacrifice of our lives as we seek to do His will in all things.  We discipline ourselves to choose God not ourselves; to choose love, not hate; to choose generosity, not selfishness; to choose truth, not lies.  Baptism is not a Get Out of Hell Free card.  It is, rather, a catalyst that can be used to propel us towards heaven.  Or it can just sit on a shelf and collect dust. 

            The work of the New Evangelization is to reenergize our own faith, and to bring others back into the practice of the faith in which they were baptized, to work out those spiritual muscles.  And our impetus in doing so is because we want them to go to heaven, just as much as we want to go to heaven.  And we know for them, as for ourselves, that the gate to heaven is not wide, but narrow, and the way to heaven is not the easiest path, but often is the hardest, and that new life in God comes only through death to ourselves.  It means that we form our minds around what God has revealed to us, rather than doing our own thing.  It means we go to Mass every Sunday and Holyday; we give of our time, talent, and treasure to the Church; that we talk about our faith in public and pass it on to our families and friends; that we live a life of chastity; that marriages for Catholics happen according to the laws of God and the Church; that we feed the hungry and give drink to the thirsty; that we do all this and more according to our abilities.  I pray that I, and all of us, and all those to whom we as a parish are called to evangelize, are not spiritually lazy, but do the hard work of responding to God’s love in everyday life, so that when we die, we will not hear, “I do not know where you are from.  Depart from me, evildoers!” but, “Come, my good and faithful servant; share your Master’s joy.”

Trying to See the Tracks

Nineteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time

           

I remember when I was finally tall enough to ride Space Mountain at Disney World.  I was excited, because everyone kept talking about how much fun the ride was, but I was still nervous because it was my first real roller coaster.  And it was in the dark.  So, as I bravely sat in the little car, my only real concern was trying to see the track ahead of me, so I would know when there was a dip or a sharp turn. 

            “Faith,” says our first reading today, “is the … evidence of things not seen.”  Faith is precisely not being able to see the track ahead of you, no matter how hard you peer into the darkness.  Some people find this exhilarating.  Some people find it scarier than anything else in the world.  But growing in faith means that we are growing in our comfort in the dark: not that our eyes adjust, but that we are less concerned with seeing.

            Faith, then, is all about trust.  Even though the tracks are not seen, the faith-filled person does not worry about seeing because he or she trusts in the one who brought them there.  We can trust that beliefs are true, and that is one aspect of faith.  But even then, our faith that this teaching is true is based upon trust in the One who said it.  Our faith in what God has taught us, through His Word in Scriptures and His Word in the teachings of the Church is based upon the fact that we trust that God is trustworthy.  We only doubt one whom we feel cannot be trusted.

            When we doubt something the Church teaches as part of God’s plan for humanity, we fail to trust Jesus’ promise in Matthew 16 that the gates of the netherworld will not prevail against it, and that despite their own individual sinfulness, the apostles and successors can teach without error what must be authentically believed and how one should live.  Surrounded by the darkness, we choose to trust in ourselves rather than in Jesus and the one Church He founded.  We figure we can do it better our way.  Maybe we trust ourselves more about our responsibilities in the Church: to attend Mass each Sunday and Holyday; to support the parish with our time, talent, and treasure; to go to confession at least once a year when we’re aware of a mortal sin.  Maybe we trust ourselves and our own opinions when it comes to human sexuality, marriage, contraception.  Whatever the issue, the temptation is always there to respond to the darkness, not with faith, but with self-sufficiency and over-confidence in our own opinions rather than by what God has communicated through His Word.

But, faith is not just the evidence of things unseen.  It is also, “the realization of what is hoped for.”  Faith does involve darkness.  But it is also a light, hence the title of Pope Francis’ first Encyclical, Lumen fidei, the Light of Faith.  Faith allows us to realize, even now, what will only be fulfilled in the future.  Abraham had faith in God, he trusted God, that everything would be ok if he left the only land he knew, Ur of the Chaldeans, and went to Canaan.  He trusted that God would give him a son, and that, even though God asked him to sacrifice his own son, that God could raise up another son who would fulfill the promise that Abraham would have “descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky, and as countless as the sands on the seashore.”

The Jews, as we heard in our first reading, had faith that God, who had promised the land of Canaan to Abraham, would fulfill His word, and so even in slavery in Egypt, they foresaw the Passover, the saving of God’s Chosen People from oppression. 

We are called to be a people of faith, to trust in Jesus to light the right path before us through His Body, the Church.  We are called to be the faithful servants who have faith that the Master will return, and so are ready to open the door for Him when He knocks.  When we trust Jesus, we find that we who are His servants are served by Him, as He prepares a meal for us, the Eucharist, and waits on us so that we are spiritually nourished.  And when we have faith in the Eucharist, we see already in these sacramental signs of bread and wine, made into the Body and Blood, Soul and Divinity of Jesus Christ, the eternal wedding feast of the Lamb in heaven.  We participate in a foretaste of it.  Faith in God allows us to see the good things that are in store for us if we are faithful servants, waiting for our Master’s return.  It enlightens us so that what we choose prepares us for the end God desires for us: heaven.  Faith enlightens our work, our recreation, the way we spend our time, the way we use our gift of sexuality, how we use our money, etc.  There is no aspect of our lives that faith does not alter if it’s being lived out. 

Faith is trust in the midst of darkness, the darkness that comes not because God is absent, but because He is so close that our eyes cannot take the brilliance.  Faith illumines every aspect of our lives to receive the good things God has promised to us, even if we do not possess them in their fullness yet.  In these last months of the Year of Faith, trust God: He will not disappoint.  Trust the Church He has founded to authentically communicate what we are to believe and how we are to live: it only leads to perfect happiness.  Do not be afraid!!  Have faith!!  

Lift Up Your Hearts

Eighteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time

            “Lift up your hearts.”  “We lift them up to the Lord.”  Do we?  We say or chant this response at least every Sunday when we gather for the celebration of Mass.  But maybe it’s become so common that we don’t even think about what we’re saying or chanting.

            This response should remind us of what we heard in the second reading today from St. Paul: “If you were raised with Christ, seek what is above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God.  Think of what is above, not of what is on earth.”  It’s so easy to get caught up in everything that is going on around us.  But, as Christians, our first priority is to be on God.  That is why the priest, in the name of Christ, reminds us right before the highest point of the Mass, to set our hearts, that is, all of what we love, on Godly things, on the mysteries of the death and resurrection into which we are about to enter.  In our English translation we follow the Latin, Sursum corda, “Lift up your hearts.”  In our second reading we heard the word “think,” but even that word in Greek, froneite, can also mean feel.  This is because the heart has always been seen as the decision maker.  And while we pride ourselves on being reasonable, how many times have we done stupid, reckless, or illogical things because we have loved something or someone?  Our heart, the part of us that makes decisions, should be drawn upwards toward the Lord.

            Because heaven is what is most real.  This is part of the Christian paradox.  Just as the poor are blessed, the lowly are raised up, the last are first, the greatest is the servant, so what is most real is life in Christ, especially in its perfection in heaven, whereas the earth that we inhabit now is passing away.  What should concern us most are not the things that we can sense, however good they may be, but the things that only our souls can begin to grasp onto because they are immaterial.  That is why we are reminded to lift up our hearts, to set our heart and soul and mind and strength on God, rather than on the vanities of the world.

            Because, as our first reading and Gospel state, setting our hearts on the things of this world leads to vanity and misfortune.  “Here is one who has labored with wisdom and knowledge and skill, and yet to another who has not labored over it, he must leave property.”  The man who is so rich in the things of earth that he has to build another barn, dies before he can store away his excess goods, and realizes that, because his heart was on being rich, he is actually poor in what matters to God.

            Now, as we set our hearts on the things of God, does that mean we neglect our earthly obligations to family, work, church, and the poor?  Certainly not.  When we make God our top priority, when we set our heart on Him, we realize that He lets the sun shine on the good and the bad, and allows the rain to fall on the just and the unjust.  If God is so abundant in his love, how can we, then, not take care of our family members, our employer or employee and co-workers, our fellow members of the body of Christ, and those for whom God Himself says He has a special love: the poor?  Setting our hearts on God means that we place God first, not that we neglect everything else.  In fact, because God has made us stewards of creation, neglect of our responsibilities to other persons and the world is precisely not putting God first.  We cannot make God just another part of our earthly concern, nor can we make the earth another god.  We set our hearts on God, and so take care of each other to the best of our ability. 

            Because, even as we set our hearts on God, we also learn to what extent we can assist others.  St. Paul writes about this in his second letter to the Corinthians:

…not that others should have relief while you are burdened, but that as a matter of equality your surplus at the present time should supply their needs, so that their surplus may also supply your needs, that there may be equality.  As it is written: “Whoever had much did not have more, and whoever had little did not have less.”

Money is not bad.  Jesus never condemns wealth in itself.  But when our hearts are not set on God, then greed takes over, and the riches become a god, rather than being an opportunity to be an icon of the generosity of God. 

In many ways we are a generous parish, on both sides of Burcham, and hopefully our Mission Appeal speaker will see that.  We have been very blessed.  Do we only use our income when we experience some benefit, whether it is getting back some service, or even just feeling good?  Or are we generous even when we get nothing in return?  “Seek first the Kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be given you besides.”

How to Pray

Seventeenth Sunday in Ordinary Time

            Do we know how to pray?  Maybe that seems like an odd question as we are gathered here in the greatest prayer of the Church.  But I think it’s one we need to ask: do we know how to pray?

            Now, probably all of us know prayers.  Hopefully we can recite the trifecta of Catholic prayers—the Our Father, Hail Mary, and Glory Be—from memory.  But the question was not if we know prayers, but if we know how to pray.  Simply knowing how to recite prayers is not the same as knowing how to pray. 

            Jesus in our Gospel teaches us how to pray.  Yes, He teaches us a prayer as well (we get St. Luke’s version of the Our Father today), but He also teaches us how to pray.  First and foremost, we are taught to pray to God our Father.  While God the Father is neither male nor female, and Jesus Himself, having male gender, even uses the image of a hen to describe His own care for Jerusalem, Father is not just an image of God, it is the way we are taught to address God, the Name we are to use in calling upon Him.  Whenever we pray, we should address our prayers to the Father, in the same way that Jesus always did.

            We also see that first we are to praise and thank God.  So often, and this is certainly true in my own life, we skip immediately to asking God for something.  But, if we are to follow Jesus’ model of prayer, then first we give God glory; not because it adds anything to Him by being praised, but because it is proper for the creature to praise and thank God for what has already been given.  Then, and only then, are we to ask God for what we need—daily needs, forgiveness, and the grace to persevere in living a Christian life. 

            This should be the format of our prayer: calling upon God as our Father, praising and thanking Him for his goodness, and then asking God for what we need.  We do the same thing in the Eucharistic Prayer, the high point of our prayer of the Mass: we call upon God, we praise and thank Him, and then we ask for what we need.

            Jesus also tells us to pray with confidence, because our loving Father will never deprive us of any good gift.  When we ask for what we need, we will receive it.  Of course, this has to be read in the light of the line from the Our Father: “thy will be done.”  Just because we think we need something, does not mean we truly do.  While some of us may think it at times, none of us is omniscient.  But God is, and so gives us exactly what we need to further our pilgrimage that hopefully ends in eternal salvation. 

            All too often, we approach prayer to God like making a list for Santa: Dear God, I’ve been very good this year (which may or may not be true), so please give me this, that, and the other thing.  But God is not Santa.  We cannot force His hand, nor do the answers to our prayers come because of any good thing we’ve done.  The answer comes not from our goodness, but from God’s.  And when we try to justify ourselves, to prove to God that we deserve something because we’ve been so good, we end up like the Pharisee in one of Jesus’ parables, who, when he prayed, extolled himself, while the Tax Collector, who stood at the back of the temple and beat his breast in sorrow for sins, and only asked God for mercy for his many sins.  Remember that Jesus said that the Tax Collector went home justified, while the Pharisee did not.

            Our Gospel, as well as our first reading, also reminds us to have confidence in prayer.  “‘Ask and you will receive; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you.’”  When we ask that God’s will be done, and when we are united to God by conforming our lives to that of Jesus, then what we ask the Father in the name of Jesus will be granted to us.  We see it in the first reading when Abraham pleads for Sodom and Gomorrah.  God truly would have spared those cities if there would have been 50, or 45, or 40, or 30, or 20, or even just 10 innocent people.  Abraham had confidence in his relationship with God, not viewing God as an equal, but knowing that he could make his desires known to God, and that God would listen.  God even saves Lot and his family from destruction, though he does destroy Sodom and Gomorrah for their sinfulness.

            I have seen the results of confidence in prayer in my own prayer life.  In the past year, I have had two experiences of prayers being heard.  Addressing God as Father, praising Him for his goodness and His love, I poured out my soul to God for a young man who had recently buried his father and then had been robbed.  I prayed that what had been stolen would be returned, since this young man had already lost so precious a gift as a loving father.  The stolen goods were returned the next day.  Calling upon God as Father, thanking Him for His generosity, I prayed for an MSU student who had been robbed of his moped.  I called upon God to be faithful, in the Name of Jesus, and through the intercession of St. Anthony, and have the moped returned, and it was on the next day.  Were either of the stolen items precious?  Not really.  Either could have been replaced.  But God, as a loving Father, looked with mercy upon me, and upon these two persons who had been robbed, and granted them back what they wanted.  For whatever reason, that was part of His will.  Maybe, the only reason was to allow me to tell this story to you, to inspire you in faith to have confidence when you pray. 

Will God always give us what we want?  As the Brad Paisley songs goes, “sometimes the answer is no.”  But prayer, true prayer, always brings us closer to God, and that is a gift that is more precious than all the gold in the world.  Whether we are praying using a prayer that we have memorized, or we our speaking with our own words, may our prayer always be like the prayer of Jesus, and so draw us closer to our heavenly Father.  

Putting Yourself in the Mass

Solemnity of Corpus Christi

            It was not uncommon, in medieval art, for the painter to put himself into his work of art.  From what I have heard, one of the faces on the back wall of the Sistine Chapel, in the great mural The Final Judgment is the face of Michelangelo.  Caravaggio put himself into most of his famous paintings.  And even if they don’t put their image into their paintings, a painter pours his or her heart and soul into creating a work of beauty, a work which shows forth the splendor of the truth.

            Today’s readings focus us in on offering what we have, of putting ourselves into what we are doing, no matter how little or how big.  The first reading from Genesis is the story where Melchizedek blesses bread and wine and offers them to God Most High, and then Abram offers him a tenth (or tithe) of everything.  The Letter to the Hebrews makes a big deal out of this event, because one greater blesses one who is lesser, and you only offer a tithe if there is a debt to be paid to another.  Now, Melchizedek must have been pretty important to make Abram, the Father of the Chosen People, the lesser of the two, and for Abram to offer Melchizedek a tithe.  The author of the Letter to the Hebrews focuses in on Melchizedek’s name, which means king of righteousness, and his country, King of Salem, from the root word, shalom, which makes him the King of Peace, and that, unlike almost everyone else in Scripture, there is no lineage.  Melchizedek just shows up without father or mother or ancestors.  For this reason, the Letter to the Hebrews states that Melchizedek was a foreshadowing of Christ, the true King of Righteousness and King of Peace, who is the co-eternal Son of the Father, without beginning.  When you throw in offering bread and wine, too, it is not hard to see why the author equated the two. 

            And in the Gospel, there are only five loaves and two fish to feed five thousand men, not to mention women and children.  But they are offered to Jesus who miraculously multiplies them so that it is enough, and not just enough, but enough to satisfy everyone. 

            And so we often talk about stewardship: sharing the time, talent, and treasure we have with the Church to continue the work of Christ.  Think of anything you like here at St. John or St. Thomas.  We can’t do it without people generously donating their time.  Think of anything you like here at St. John or St. Thomas.  We can’t do it without people coming together to use a diversity of gifts towards a common goal.  No one person has a monopoly on all the gifts necessary to preach Jesus Christ and His salvation.  Think of anything you like here at St. John or St. Thomas.  We can’t do it without people giving of their treasure to fund the staff salaries, the opportunities for retreats and programs, etc.  And the burden is not the laity’s alone to bear.  I also feel compelled to give to our parish each week, to the scholarship fund for St. Thomas Aquinas parish school, to the Capital Campaign we are in for the school, to DSA, and my list, probably like yours, goes on and on, even beyond this parish.

            But, as we celebrate Corpus Christi today, I want to ask you: do you put yourself in the celebration of the Mass?  Do you invest your energy when you come here each Sunday, or is it something to pass an hour on a Sunday morning?  I can tell you that, for me, celebrating Mass is exhausting.  Our sacristans and Mass coordinators and servers and tell you that it’s not uncommon for me to yawn out of fatigue after the first Mass and before the second.  Why?  Because each time I celebrate Mass, I try to pour myself in what I am saying or chanting and doing.  I try to bring all of who I am, and when I offer all of me, it can be exhausting.

            Because we are all members of the priesthood of the faithful, we have a priestly office, even if it isn’t the same as the ministerial priesthood.  All of us baptized are invited by Holy Mother Church to offer who we are to the Father with the Son in the power of the Holy Spirit.  Yes, we pass the basket to collect our treasure.  Yes, we bring up bread and wine.  But united with that bread and wine is supposed to be all of who we are.  Did you have a crummy week where nothing seemed to go right?  Offer it to God, united with the bread and wine as you silently listen to the words of Jesus offering His Body and Blood to the Father.  Did you have a great week where everything was just how you wanted it?  Rejoice and thank God by offering it united to the bread and the wine.  This morning, eight of our parish children have the opportunity to offer their excitement, and maybe a little nervousness, with that bread and wine, as they prepare to receive the Body and Blood, Soul and Divinity of Jesus Christ, the eternal High Priest and Victim for the first time.  All of us, no matter what our age, vocation, occupation, or race, can put ourselves into the Paschal Mystery and offer ourselves to God.    As Lumen gentium, 34 from the Second Vatican Council stated:

all their works, prayers and apostolic endeavors, their ordinary married and family life, their daily occupations, their physical and mental relaxation, if carried out in the Spirit, and even the hardships of life, if patiently borne—all these become “spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.”  Together with the offering of the Lord’s body, they are most fittingly offered in the celebration of the Eucharist.

Pour yourself into this, and every Mass.  Make it not just a routine, but a purposeful time to unite yourself to the Lord by offering your lives with the bread and wine, which will be given back to you as the Body and Blood, Soul and Divinity, of our Lord Jesus Christ.  Put yourself into the beautiful work of art that the Mass is.

The Root, the Shoot, and the Fruit

Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity

            One of my favorite classes at Sacred Heart Major Seminary was Theology of the Trinity. 

Bishop John Quinn,
Bishop of Winona, MN

Besides being a great subject to study (you can never go wrong learning more about God), I also enjoyed the class because of the professor, Bishop John Quinn, who was at the time an auxiliary bishop of Detroit, and is now Bishop of the Diocese of Winona, Minnesota.  He taught well, but also became a mentor to me, and a kind of friend, with whom I still keep in touch today with an occasional letter or email.  In that class we learned about the different images that were used to describe the Trinity: The Sun (s-u-n) Itself (God the Father), the Light of the Sun (Jesus), and the Warmth of the Sun’s Rays (God the Holy Spirit); the Root (God the Father), the Shoot (Jesus), and the Fruit (God the Holy Spirit); and many others.  But what was key to describing the Most Holy Trinity was the understanding that God was not simply a monad, but a Communion of Persons.

            Our belief in One God, yet Three Persons, distinguishes us from the other two major monotheistic religious of the world: Judaism and Islam.  They both hold, with us, that God is One, based upon the words of Deuteronomy: “Shema Yisrael: Adonai Elohim, Adonai Echad”: “Hear, O Israel, the Lord is God, the Lord is One.”  And yet, throughout the Gospels, Jesus makes clear that He and the Father are One, not just in some metaphorical sense, but in the core of their Being, shown when Jesus forgives sins, something which only God could do.  That is why the Sanhedrin condemns Jesus for blasphemy, for claiming to be God.  And in today’s Gospel, Jesus affirms the role of the Holy Spirit, who is God, as continuing His work.

            But while we can talk until the end of time about the Trinity, seeking to understand more fully who God really is, we experience the Trinity in our everyday lives.  For, if God is a Communion of Persons, and we are created in the image and likeness of God, then we too are called to be a communion of persons.  And we know this from the beginning.  We know, as the Book of Genesis states, that it is not good for the man to be alone.  It is not good for us to lack communion.  We have, built within ourselves, a desire to know another and to be known by another, and to pour ourselves out for another, just as God is known in His fullness by the Trinity of Persons, and shares that knowledge with each Divine Person, and each Divine Person pours out all of who He is to each other.

            First and foremost, our desire for communion leads us to desire God.  St. Augustine rightly said in his Confessions, “You have made us for yourself, O Lord, and our hearts are restless until they rest in you.”  Each person, even the most hardened atheist, has a desire for communion with that Communion of Persons in the Trinity.  We want to be connected to the infinite.  And whether we are single, ordained, consecrated men and women, or married, there is an aspect of our desire for communion that can only be filled by God.  And when we try to fill that with someone else, even a best friend or a spouse, we are perpetually frustrated, because they are finite, and we desire communion with the infinite.

            But we do also desire communion with each other.  For many here, that life of communion is fulfilled in a special way through marriage, which is itself a symbol, something which points to another, of the communion of the Trinity: each spouse pours their life out to the other, which is always open to new life, just as the Father and Son pour themselves out to each other, in a love which is so strong that it spirates, or breathes forth, the Holy Spirit.  That is why Jesus, and therefore the Church, teaches that divorce cannot be a possibility, because marriage is called to make visible the invisible total union of God, which will never be divided or broken up.  My dear married couples, you are the way that we witness what the love of the Trinity is meant to look like.  What an exalted vocation!!  For those who promise celibacy or take a vow of chastity or virginity, that spousal union is lived out with God, which then allows us to share that infinite love of God with you, whom we are called to serve. 

Sts. Gregory (l) and Basil (r)

            But all of us, no matter what our vocation, are also blessed with the communion of friendship.  In that platonic union, we are also able to pour ourselves out to another, such that sometimes friends become like another self.  What a great blessing to be able to have a person who accepts us as we are, but also calls us to the heights of holiness and virtue, with whom we can be open and honest.  Two of Christianity’s greatest friends, Sts. Basil and Gregory Nazianzen, lived this out, though they had their very rough patches.  St. Gregory wrote on the anniversary of the death of St. Basil, “We seemed to be two bodies with a single spirit.  Though we cannot believe those who claim that ‘everything is contained in everything,’ yet you must believe that in our case each of us was in the other and with the other.”  We can each experience something akin to that in our trusted friends.

            What we celebrate today, the Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity, is not some far-removed doctrine which has nothing to do with our life.  It is a defining part of who we are as Christians, and it is built into the very nature of our being.  May the Eucharist, though which we have communion with Jesus, and therefore communion with the entire Trinity, draw us each day deeper into the communion which is the basis for all others: the Communion of Divine Persons in the Most Holy Trinity.

An Optimistic Nation

Ascension of the Lord

            When it comes to the feelings of parishioners, there are very few, if any across-the-board statistics that apply to every individual.  It is dangerous to make assumptions for people, especially in a homily, because it might not be true, and you can lose that person’s attention for the rest of the homily.  But, I feel very safe in saying that every person here wants to go to heaven.  Good.  No one got up and left.  No one is offended to be in a group of people that want to enter paradise.

            What we celebrate today is the fact that it’s possible.  Yes, Jesus opened the pearly gates when He rose from the dead, but Jesus today takes His seat at the right hand of the Father, and what gives us hope is that, if we are members of His Body, then we, too, will be there some day.  While it’s a bit dated, a 2005 poll by ABC News stated that 89% of Americans believe in heaven, and of those who believe in heaven, 85% of them think they will be going there.  We certainly cannot be condemned as a pessimistic nation. 

            But it’s much easier to take the position of the disciples that we heard about in the first reading.  It’s much easier to gawk up in the sky and think, “Wow!!  That was really cool!!” and just remain there.  It took an angel to get the disciples to go back to the Upper Room and pray for the gift of the Holy Spirit which would empower them to do what Jesus commanded: “‘be my witnesses in Jerusalem, throughout Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.’”  While I may not be a perfect angel, allow me to communicate a similar message: pray for the gift of the Spirit!!

            Because the only way to go where Jesus has gone before, is to pattern our life on His.  Yes, we all want to get to heaven, but do we know how to get there?  The way is quite simple: Jesus.  Jesus didn’t say, “‘I am the way,’” to give bumper sticker manufacturers a job.  He said it because it was true: the only way to heaven, to the Father, is through Jesus.  If we truly want to go to heaven, then we must pattern our lives on His.  What does that look like?  Jesus tells us in our Gospel: suffering, death, and resurrection; and preaching of repentance.

            If we want to go to heaven, then our life is meant to be full of sufferings, deaths, and resurrections.  These are the times where we say, “It’s not about me,” and we do something that we know we should want to do, and then we actually find we enjoy it.  Imagine that: doing what we should do often comes with a feeling of accomplishment.  Huh.  Fr. Michal Judge probably had some trepidation about going into the Twin Towers on 9/11.  But, as the building collapsed, I’m quite sure he didn’t think, “I wish I would have concentrated more on myself.”  And standing before the judgment seat of God, I’m very sure he didn’t think that.  Or the volunteers who give of their time and talent to bring food to the hungry, while it may be painful sometimes, I’m quite sure they don’t regret living out the corporal work of mercy to feed the hungry.  We have to die to thinking of ourselves as the most important, which is painful, and then rise to new life where it is God, Others, Me.  After all, Jesus called His disciples to be His witnesses, which, in Greek, could also be translated His martyrs.

            If we want to go to heaven, then our life is meant to be a witness to repentance.  Now, in our culture, we don’t like to use the word repentance, because if you are repenting, it means you did something wrong, and no one does anything wrong in our culture.  But, the life of Jesus was a life of preaching repentance.  Jesus didn’t say, “You’re great, just keep up the good work!”  He said, “Repent, and believe in the Gospel!”  When we preach repentance, we preach to ourselves, to remind ourselves that we need to be formed constantly into disciples, and at the same time we preach to others that same message.  We don’t preach, “You’re doing pretty well,” because that’s not the message of Jesus.  Jesus didn’t preach mediocrity; He preached perfection, the fulfillment of who we are as human persons created in the image and likeness of God.  We preach new life, not old life with a few alterations.  But new life makes demands, and that’s where we get squeamish.  Who are we to make demands?  We, of ourselves, can demand nothing.  But Jesus demands that we model our life on His in totality, not just for one hour on Sundays.  And, out of love for others, and wanting to see ourselves and them in heaven, we, by the grace of God, change our lives, and ask others to do the same.  Mercy is only sweet when someone has done something wrong.  Mercy means nothing if there is nothing wrong.  So if we wish to receive mercy and be merciful, we have to acknowledge the evil that we do, and then do our best to begin a new life, and call others to the same.

            But none of this is possible without prayer.  Just as the disciples prayed for nine days in the Upper Room (the first novena), so we should be praying, not just for nine days, but every day, for the gift of the Holy Spirit who gives us courage to suffer, die, and rise, who forms us according to the mind of God, who gives us the words to use when we preach Christ and not ourselves.  Take these days until Pentecost and pray for an increase of the Spirit.  If you are open, God will not disappoint.  And then, by the grace of God, living a life after the pattern of Jesus, you will have firm hope, not just a flimsy wish, that in Christ, you can be seated at the right hand of the Father.  

Continued Presence

Sixth Sunday of Easter

"I have been, and always will be, your friend."
Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan

            It’s interesting the effects that friends have in our lives.  They can open us up to new experiences, which we can then make our own.  For example, when I was in elementary school, my best friend got me interested in Star Trek.  And once I had been exposed to it, I couldn’t get enough.  I loved the Original Series, The Next Generation, and Deep Space Nine.  I’ve seen all the movies.  One memorable scene is from “Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan.”  Be warned, this is a spoiler alert.  Towards the end of the movie, in order to get clear of an impending explosion, Spock has to enter a radioactive room to get the warp drive working again.  But before he does so, he merges his mind with “Bones” McCoy, the ship’s doctor, which becomes important in the next movie, “Star Trek III: The Search for Spock.” 

            While there is no merging of minds, Jesus, in the Gospel we heard today, promises to send an Advocate who “‘will teach you everything and remind you of all that I told you.’”  This promise, made during the Last Supper, is fulfilled at Pentecost.  But because of the greatness of this gift, the Church, two weeks earlier, starts focusing on the Person of the Holy Spirit.

            The Holy Spirit is the continued presence of Jesus, after He ascends into heaven, which we, in this diocese, will celebrate next Sunday.  He is the continuation of Jesus’ work on earth among the disciples.  He instructs, leads, and protects the Church.  The Spirit ensures that the apostles and their successors will continue to preach Jesus’ words, and not their own.  The Holy Spirit as Advocate, the one who speaks for another, is the fulfillment of Jesus’ promise to St. Peter, that the gates of the netherworld would not prevail over the Church, so that she would never teach as part of the faith nor as part of Christian living what was contrary to the will of God.  Sure, there have been individuals who have been grade A sinners in Church leadership, but, by the grace of God, they never taught anything major, probably because they were so concerned with their own, sinful lives.

            We need a guide to help us understand Jesus’ words.  The Word of God needs unpacking.  One of the great error of Protestantism is that the Scriptures are clear, and that any person can understand them simply by opening up and reading.  Reading Scripture is a beautiful and necessary thing, but we need a guide.  Because sometimes Jesus is literal, like when He says, “This is my body.”  Other times he uses figurative language, like when He says, “If your eye causes you to sin, pluck it out.”  We need the guidance of the Holy Spirit, and the guidance that was promised through the Church, to understand what God is making known through His word.  Otherwise, we end up straying from Jesus and just creating our own thing, which sometimes can be very weird.  Origen, a late second-, early third-century Catholic scholar, went to a weird place when he interpreted Jesus’ words to cut off the part of you that causes you to sin (he struggled with sexual sins, to give you some idea).  This was a theologian who knew Scripture, but he veered away from the right understanding of it, which causes some irreversible damage.

            We see the early Church dealing with understanding properly the Word of God in our first reading.  The big controversy, even at first among the apostles of Jesus, the ones He had ordained to govern His Church, was whether or not Gentiles has to become Jewish first to become Christians.  Did Gentiles have to be circumcised?  Did they need to wear Jewish clothing?  Did they need to keep the dietary law?  The very men who had walked with Jesus for 3 years and listened to all He said in public and private were not sure.  But, gathering together, in prayer and discussion, they decided that Gentiles did not have to become Jewish, but did have to follow some basic rules with their roots in Judaism.  And they make it clear that they needed guidance: “‘It is the decision of the Holy Spirit and of us not to place on you any burden beyond these necessities.’”  This was the basis for the 21 Ecumenical Councils that would follow later: the bishops convene in prayer and discussion to be open to the Holy Spirit to continue Jesus’ work in the world.

            So how open are we to the Holy Spirit’s work in the Church today, which includes both the hierarchy and the lay faithful.  We say the Prayer to the Holy Spirit each Sunday, but do we mean it?  Do we really want the Holy Spirit to be active in our lives?  Are we like wet clay that can be formed by the Holy Spirit, or are we hardened so that our lives are not open to formation by the Divine Potter?  If we are open to the Spirit, then the Gospel will spread like wildfire, as it did in the early Church, to whoever is open to the need for a Savior.  If we are not open to the Holy Spirit, then we become obstacles to God’s truth and God’s love in the world.  May we truly mean what we say as we make our Prayer to the Holy Spirit: “Come, Holy Spirit, fill the hearts of your faithful and kindle in them the fire of your love.  Send forth your Spirit, and they shall be created, and you shall renew the face of the earth.”

Do You Love Me?

Third Sunday of Easter

            When I was a freshman at Lansing Catholic in 1998, I had the great opportunity to be cast in our production of “Fiddler on the Roof.”  To this day it remains one of my favorite musicals. The part that I was assigned, I kid you not, was the Rabbi. One of my favorite songs in that musical (and there are so many great and memorable ones) is “Do You Love Me?”

            That is, of course, the very question that Jesus asked St. Peter in today’s Gospel: “Do you love me?”  And Jesus didn’t just ask it once; He asked it three times to make up for the threefold denial that St. Peter made when Jesus was being held by the Pharisees and the Sanhedrin.  Three times St. Peter says, “‘Yes Lord, you know that I love you.’”  And then Jesus explains what love means.

Jesus said to him…“Amen, amen, I say to you, when you were younger, you used to dress yourself and go where you wanted; but when you grow old, you will stretch out your hands, and someone else will dress you and lead you where you do not want to go.”  He said this signifying by what kind of death he would glorify God.  And when he had said this, he said to him, “Follow me.”

What must have been going through St. Peter’s mind when Jesus said this to him?

            Love, as Jesus explains to St. Peter, means binding yourself to another.  Peter binds himself to Jesus, to follow him, and even to be dressed by another and led where he does not want to go.  This was fulfilled when St. Peter was bound to the cross, upside down, and crucified, dying out of love for Jesus and following Him even through a similar form of death.

            We see how love binds in so many ways: it binds a man to a woman for life in marriage.  Because they love each other, they commit to an exclusive love for each other, a bond so strong that only death can break it.  We see how love binds in the example of parents who easily put thousands of miles on their vehicles driving Johnny and Alice to and from sports, band, plays, and other activities, even when the parent doesn’t feel like driving.

            Love binds the beloved to the lover.  And we, whether single, ordained, consecrated, or married, were all bound to another when we were baptized.  At that moment, God claimed us as one of His own in a bond which is so strong, it even survives death.  At baptism, we became the Lord’s beloved.

            But, even though love binds, that bond can be strong or it can be weak, based upon the response of the beloved to the lover.  The closer we stay with Christ, the stronger that bond is.  The more we wander away from Him, the weaker the bond is, though it is never broken.  If we wish to grow in love with God, then we must follow Him.

           

A painting of the Crucifixion of St. Peter in
the Church of Domine, Quo Vadis
outside of Rome

Each day Jesus renews His love with us.  Each day He asks us to renew our love with Him.  He asks us, “Do you love me? Will you follow me?”  Because love is free, it is never forced, but is an invitation.  Even St. Peter faltered a little.  As the story goes, when St. Peter knew that Nero was coming after him to arrest him and put him to death, St. Peter, at the advice of the Church in Rome, started to get out of Dodge.  And as he was walking on the Appian Way, he saw Jesus walking towards Rome.  This, naturally, startled St. Peter, who asked the Lord, “Domine, quo vadis?  Lord, where are you going?”  Jesus responded, “I am going to be crucified a second time.”  St. Peter than realized that he was not following Jesus, but was doing his own thing, and so returned to Rome and was crucified upside down.  We, too, falter at times, and would rather walk away from Jesus and not follow Him, but would rather do our own thing. 

            But love means being bound to the other, and in our love for God, it means following Him.  Sometimes that means that another leads us where we do not want to go.  Sometimes it means a change of heart and a change of mind so that the rule is not “my will be done,” by “thy will be done.”  It means making Him the top priority in our life, and forming our life around Him, not asking Him to form His life around us.  Sometimes it even means death.  But the beauty of love is that the beloved knows that the lover is worth it.  And in the case of our Divine Lover, God, we also know that His love is stronger than death, and He will never leave us.

            Jesus says to us in the words of the Song of Songs, “Arise, my beloved, my beautiful one, and come!  For see, the winter is past…Arise my beloved, my beautiful one, and come!”  He asks us, “Do you love me?  Will you follow me?  Will you strengthen the bond that was created when I claimed you as my own and saved you from sin and death in the waters of baptism?”  What will our response be to the love of God, a love so strong that He gave up His only Son to death so that we could live?  Do we love Him?