Jesus Loves Religion

4^th Sunday in Ordinary Time

Cycle B

Jesus Loves Religion

If I hear one more person say they’re spiritual but not religious I’m going to scream.

23-year old Jefferson Bethke posted a rap video on You Tube a couple of weeks ago entitled “Why I Hate Religion But Love Jesus”. In it he makes the case that religion is destructive to the message of Jesus. He says that religion either ends in pride or despair. Pride that you have all the answers and others don’t or despair that you can never live up to all the requirements for salvation religion places upon you. He says that religion is man-centered, Jesus is God-centered. Like many people these days, he thinks that we can love Jesus without the burden of religion.

It must have struck a chord because it received over ten million hits in one week. As of this morning there have been over 17 million hits. Of those who commented, five times more agreed with Jefferson than disagreed. I’m not going to get into a lengthly refutation of his position here. You can check out his video yourself, and if you like you can buy one of his t-shirts. But I am interested in the response he received, because I have been hearing people take similar positions for a long time now, especially among our young people, and it is disturbing.

People like Jesus, or who they think Jesus is. They like his nice teachings, all about loving your neighbor, feeding the poor, let the little children come to me. Jesus is welcoming, loving, and approachable. Following this image of Jesus is easy, because there really are no challenges in doing so. We all think we’re good people. We all try to love our neighbor, give to the less fortunate, and think we love God. It’s the religion part that we don’t like, because sometimes religion can be challenging.

I think one reason people feel this way is that they have no real understanding of what religion is. Jefferson Bethke has it exactly backwards. Religion is not man- centered, it’s God-centered, and Jesus is not God-centered, he’s man-centered. Religion is God-centered because it focuses us on the Almighty, and yes, God does place certain requirements on us. If Jesus wasn’t man-centered than why would he have bothered to come down here in the first place to suffer and die for us?

We are all given faith as a gift to some degree or other. In fact, if God did not give us faith we would have no way of believing there even is a God. Religion is the way we put that faith into action. Archbishop Timothy Dolan from New York said in his blog this week, “We Catholics have always believed that God chooses us and gives us the supernatural gift of faith. It’s not that we decide our faith. You bet, we freely decide how firmly and generously we will live out our faith, but we are “born into” a Church. Faith is a gift from God given us on the day of our baptism into His Church.” As Christians we all are called to not just believe but to act upon that belief.

Action. That’s the part about Jesus people are uncomfortable with. We don’t hear them talking much about the challenging teachings of Jesus. “I have not come to bring peace but division.” “Father will be pit against son and son against father.” “They will hate you and persecute you because of me.” “If you are my disciple you must take up your cross daily and follow me.” Jesus said that if you follow him you will be hated, despised, persecuted, and even killed, just as he was. If you don’t believe this is true, post something about abortion on Facebook and see the comments. Religion is hated because it causes us to actually live the faith we profess in Jesus. The image some people have of Jesus is too easy. Religion can be hard.

You cannot separate Jesus from the Church. You cannot separate the Church from Jesus. Last Wednesday we celebrated the Feast of the Conversion of St. Paul. You may remember the story. Saul was on his way to Damascus to arrest the Christians there and drag them back to Jerusalem for trial. On the way he was startled by a bright light that knocked him to the ground and blinded him. He heard a voice saying, “Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me?” “Who are you, sir? Saul asked. “I am Jesus, who you are persecuting.” Jesus didn’t say, “I am Jesus, whose followers you are persecuting.” He said, “you are persecuting me.” Jesus also told Simon Peter, “You are Peter, and upon this Rock I will build my church.” He said, “I will not leave you orphans”, and “I will be with you until the end of the age”.

He promised to send the Holy Spirit upon his church so that the gates of hell will never prevail against it. He lives on in his church. We are Jesus to the world today. You cannot be a disciple of Jesus by yourself. He left a group of people behind to spread his good news, not individuals. Saying you love Jesus outside the community is very self-centered, not God-centered. It is exactly within religion that we are able to know and love Jesus. How else could we learn about him? By ourselves? Without it you get some really weird ideas and post them on You Tube.

St. Mark says today, “The people were astonished at his teaching, for he taught them as one having authority and not as the scribes. A new teaching with authority.” What were the scribes teaching? The Law of Moses, which had been handed down to them through the centuries. Moses was a great prophet, but he was not the author of his teachings. In Deuteronomy today God tells Moses that he will send another prophet in his place, one with authority. Jesus was that prophet. Jesus is the author of the teaching, and so of course he had the authority to preach it. Author and authority have the same root.

Say you wanted to take a college course on a subject. Would you just go into the classroom and be handed a textbook to read, or would it better to have someone teach it to you, too? And would it be even better if the professor had actually written the textbook? Of course it would. Then why do people think they can simply sit down with the Bible and learn about how to live as a disciple? Why not go to someone with authority, someone who actually wrote the book? Jesus said he would be present in his church for all time. We don’t make this stuff up on our own. We believe that when we hand on the teachings of the apostles accurately we cannot make a mistake. Our teaching has authority, because we are guided by the Holy Spirit.

Sounds conceited? Actually, it’s the opposite. We remove ourselves from the equation. We don’t make changes here or there on a whim. We humbly follow the apostolic teachings without deviation because we know that we are not the author.

We don’t like authority. It smacks of rules and regulations. We don’t like to be told what to do. But that’s not how Jesus taught. His authority was not about sticking to the law. He did not simply repeat what Moses said and demand that his disciples stick to the letter of the law. He had certainty and confidence in the truth of what he was saying because he is that truth. We can all claim authority in our own areas of expertise. We are Jesus’ area of expertise. He knows the subject of us so intimately because he authored us. And so of course he would teach with authority. That’s the authority he endowed his apostles with. That’s the authority the Church has taught with for two thousand years. That is the authority he has endowed us with today.

The Christmas Truce

Christmas

Mass at Night

For a child is born to us, a son is given us;
upon his shoulder dominion rests.
They name him Wonder-Counselor, God-Hero,
Father-Forever, Prince of Peace.
His dominion is vast
and forever peaceful,
from David’s throne, and over his kingdom,
which he confirms and sustains
by judgment and justice,
both now and forever.

Night is upon us, the stores are closed, the shopping is over. The crowds have gone home, and we are at peace.

It was the same for Mary and Joseph. They had endured the long, several days journey from Nazareth to Bethlehem, struggled through the crowds looking for shelter, then finally settled down in the stable. For that short span of time, they had some peace. Now for a short span of time, we can have some peace. Silent night, holy night.

We have been given a great gift.

The gift Jesus brings is always peace. On the night of his birth the angels proclaimed peace to people upon whom God’s favor rests. Jesus’ career here on earth began with peace. It also ended with peace. His first words to his disciples in the upper room that Easter evening were “Peace be with you”.

What happened in between wasn’t so peaceful, was it?

It reminds me of the story of the Christmas Truce. On Christmas day in 1914, the first world war had been raging for several months, and the combatants had settled into a terrible trench warfare, with thousands dying daily under tremendous bombardment and withering machine gun fire. Their trenches were barely yards apart from one another, so close they could hear each other’s conversations. They would even call out to one another across no man’s land.

The story goes that sometime during the night on Christmas Eve men in trenches all along the front line began singing carols. The Germans even put up Christmas trees in their trenches and hung lanterns on them. Since they were so close to one another both sides could hear each other singing, and they could see the trees lit up. It would have been so easy to fire upon the voices and the lights, but that didn’t happen. In fact, the following day men from both sides spontaneously climbed up out of their trenches and met each other in no man’s land. They chatted, exchanged gifts of food and cigarettes, and even played a bit of soccer. None of this had been authorized by the high command, and the officers in the trenches turned a blind eye to what was happening. The unofficial truce lasted all that day and in some places along the line there was a cease fire for a couple of weeks. For a span of time, there was peace.

A great analogy for life, isn’t it? In the midst of all our squabbling and fighting and hatred and murder and injustice, there are moments that arise in which we put it all aside and reach out to those we hurt and hate and realize the peace of Jesus. And it is no accident that this sort of thing usually happens around the feasts of Jesus.

The message of Christianity has always been one of peace. If you delve into the true history of the Church and actually understand our doctrines and our teachings, it is always a spirit of peace that emerges. As human beings, we haven’t always lived that spirit, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t there and isn’t true and valuable.

And perhaps that is why we are usually at odds with the world, because the world is not about peace. The message of Jesus has always been met with violence. The small innocent child that was born in Bethlehem became the greatest threat ever to the status quo. So much so that he was eventually tortured and killed. But his message endures just as he endures. It is telling that the first thing he assures his disciples of after his resurrection is that nothing has changed. He is still all about peace. Yes he has suffered. Yes they killed him. But he still brings peace. And he wishes to bestow that peace upon all mankind.

Life here on earth is not peaceful. Like Jesus, we suffer, we are attacked, we are misunderstood and maligned, and we die. But God is still all about peace. We wander far from our intended path but God is always calling us back. We have holidays, holy days, that remind us of that call from time to time, and for a time we experience a taste of His peace, until we go back to our old ways. Just like during the Christmas Truce of 1914.

Just because we know we’ll fall back doesn’t mean we should stop our celebrations. It’s good that we have these few short periods of peace amidst the chaos of our lives. We need these touch points to keep us on track. Could you imagine the world without the promise of Christmas? Even the watered down, commercialized Christmas message of the secular world is based upon peace on earth, good will towards all. Christmas fills a basic human need.You can take the God label off it, but it is still God behind it. Because that need is for our salvation.

“Glory to God in the highest and on earth peace to those on whom his favor rests.” The two things go together. If you give glory to God you will have peace. If you have peace you will be giving glory to God.

Tonight we do both.

Great Expectations

4^th Sunday of Advent

Cycle B

Welcome to the season of Great Expectations. It is one week until Christmas and the anticipation of next Sunday is ramping up, especially amongst our littlest ones. These expectations have been raised and stoked by our images of what Christmas should be. We expect to receive gifts in great quantity. We expect our families to be around us and at peace with one another. We expect our Christmas dinner to have all the necessary ingredients and be done to perfection. We expect peace. We expect snow.

Have you seen the YouTube video put out by Jimmy Kimmel where he asked parents to give their kids the worst Christmas gifts ever and then send videotape of them opening their presents in to the show? One kid opened the wrapping to find an empty, dirty juice bottle. Another got a half eaten sandwich. One young man received a pair of Hello Kitty pajamas. Their reactions to these gifts is hilarious, and indicative of what Christmas has been reduced to for our children. The kid who got the bottle said it was “the worst present ever” and flung it across the room. The boy who got the pajamas began crying and ranting and raving that his parents were the worst ever and he hated them. The girl who got the sandwich was more puzzled than anything. It was completely out of her realm of possibility, and she didn’t understand. But her older brother was great. He told her to appreciate what she got and if she didn’t want to eat it he would.

We build our expectations based upon what we think we want to receive. We make our lists of what we want out of life and then think that just because we want it we should get it. Just because we want life to be a certain way we expect it to be that way. We hope it will be that way.

We have set up Christmas as an ideal, not as a reality. We have set life up as an ideal, not as a reality.

Christopher Hitchens died this week. He has been described as a “Ferocious Intellect”, one of the great commentators and authors of the past twenty years. He was also one of the greatest atheists of the modern era. He was especially hateful of the Catholic Church and wrote some horrible things about Mother Teresa. He often sparred with Fr. George Rutler , who finally told him that “he would die either a Roman Catholic or a madman”. To which Hitchens replied, “What’s the difference?”

When he announced he had esophageal cancer eighteen months ago people immediately began saying that now that he was being confronted by his own imminent death he would recant his atheism and have a deathbed conversion of some sort. There was even a worldwide day of prayer for his conversion last September. But Hitchens had no expectations of an afterlife, and he fought the idea of God until the bitter end. I expect that since he expected nothing that’s exactly what he got.

On the other hand, we have Mary. She knew of the promise God had given to her kinsman, David, a thousand years earlier, and like her countrymen she expected the promised messiah to be a king of great earthly power who would restore Israel’s glory. She was puzzled when the angel announced to her that not only would the messiah not be an earthly king, she was to be his mother. Mary had a very simple expectation after her encounter with the angel. Her cousin Elizabeth said it so very well when she greets Mary. “Blessed are you who believed that what was spoken to you by the Lord would be fulfilled.”

God doesn’t think as we do. His will most often does not meet with our expectations. Like the children in the Jimmy Kimmel video, when we see what God has actually given us we react with anger, puzzlement, and hurt. David expected God to want a beautiful house in which to dwell, when what God really wanted was to offer humanity the chance at salvation by building an everlasting heritage for David. Mary expected a king, she got a baby instead.

We all want the world to be what we want it to be. We all want life to turn out a certain way for us. We all have expectations, both big and small, about all areas of our lives. We expect our families to be just so. We expect our children to grow up to have better lives than ours. We expect that we will find fulfillment in our careers. We expect our marriages to remain as full of promise as they were on our wedding days. We expect to be able to feel safe and secure in our homes and in our country. We expect the economy to always trend upwards. We expect that we will have all our hearts desire. We expect to have peaceful deaths. We expect to go to heaven when we die.

But many times what we expect and what God gives us are not the same. Our lives are full of struggle. Our families are dysfunctional. Our marriages fall apart. We hate our jobs. We come down with cancer. People we love suffer terribly and we look on helplessly. We live our lives full of hope only to see those hopes and dreams smashed on the rocks of reality.

God knows about all this. He knows that sin causes great suffering, and that’s not what he has intended for us. He knows our expectations, and their emptiness, and he knows that the only thing that will fill our emptiness is himself. The last thing we would expect is that God himself would choose to become a human being like ourselves. He would become like us so that we could be like him.

The mighty King David was not permitted to provide a home for the Lord. But his descendent, the poor and simple Virgin Mary was chosen instead. She was not to build a temple for God but to be the Temple of God.

So God's promise comes down to that - a child. Jesus began his human existence like you and me. God fulfills his promise not by politics, not by military power - but by the birth of child: in the city of David, Bethlehem. God uses what seems insignificant to accomplish mighty deeds.

How does it happen? I can only respond with the words of today's Gospel, the words of Elizabeth, words Christians have known for two thousand years: Nothing will be impossible for God. Even Christopher Hitchens is not impossible for God.

In the end we rarely get what we expect. We get much, much more.