Friday, December 24, 2010

Family Ties

The Vigil of Christmas


What a God we have!


We have been anticipating the coming of Christ into our lives these past four weeks. Tonight we hear the promise fulfilled. Emmanuel. God is with us. But what kind of a God do we have who felt it necessary to come as he did, or to even come at all? And what kind of people are we that we are so very loved?


Every year at this vigil Mass we hear the long genealogy of Jesus in Matthew’s gospel. Matthew chose to begin his gospel with this genealogy to show his listeners that Jesus is the promised messiah, the Son of David who has come to set Israel free. Matthew wanted to show the royal lineage of Jesus, but he also wanted his listeners to see the humanity of Jesus, to relate to him as a man. Because Jesus is just like us, and we are just like him. He is a king, but he is also a beggar. He is exalted on high, but still has all the baggage of the past we all seem to carry around with us.


God has chosen to get right down with us in the dirt. He chose the method of salvation for the human race from the very moment human nature failed. He chose his people, and he chose a specific family line to be born into. God chose to be so very close to us that he shared our very human lives with us. God has chosen to insert himself into our everyday lives, just where we are. God chose to share in our humanity, with all its ups and downs, love and violence, joy and pain. He could have inserted himself in history at any point in that long genealogy. He could have been born a prince in any one of those royal households. But he chose instead to be born of a very poor young girl in a very poor village in a backwater province in a forgotten country. In a stable. In the dirt, where most people spend their time.


You can’t pick your family, but Jesus did. And the family he picked is just like any other family. In it are some of the greatest figures in Jewish history, and also some of the most reviled. There are kings and adulterers, wise men and murderers, heroes and harlots. They lived in times of plenty and times of want, times of peace and times of war. For the most part life was a great turmoil for them, and they struggled to keep sight of the hand of God guiding their lives. Just like us. We have all sorts of folk in our families. Both saints and sinners. And they’re all coming for Christmas dinner. We may or may not like them very much, but they’re our family, and we’re all in this together.


We all go through times of joy and times of turmoil. We are buffeted by the events of our days, and we sometimes wonder if God is really there for us. Is there at all. At times of struggle we sometimes think that God has distanced himself from us. We look hard but cannot find him. Sometimes we hide him ourselves, covering up his presence in a mountain of inconsequential stuff. The routine of our lives, the quest for more and more material goods, our own personal pain and suffering. But if you look at Matthew’s genealogy, look at the lives of the people in Jesus’ history, it is at the times of greatest peril that God has been most strongly present. He has always been there when we needed him most. It is out of our most challenging times that our greatest saints emerge.


What a God we have, who came to save his people from their sins. He came to offer us a glimpse of heaven. He came to show us that no matter what we’re going through, there is always hope. There is always forgiveness. There is always a light at the end of the tunnel. Because no matter what unsavory characters were among Jesus’ ancestors, no matter what horrible wars and exile and famine and death they had to endure, at the end there’s Jesus. In the end there’s always Jesus.


Well I hope you can see that the first Christmas was anything but idyllic, anything but perfect, anything but comfortable. I do not deny that there is a place for sentimentality but, truth be told, our sentimentality often sets us up for disappointment. We want Christmas to be Hallmark perfect. And then Uncle Joe shows up at Christmas dinner drunk, and son Ben is away in Iraq, Mom died last June, and instead of snow, it is warm. But guess what. Jesus wasn’t found in a perfect Christmas either. If you’re looking for a perfect Christmas, Jesus is not there. He is in the imperfect one. He’s in your actual Christmas not your imagined Christmas.


Find him there.

Sunday, December 12, 2010

Hope

3rd Sunday of Advent
Cycle A
Is 35:1-6a,10
Ps 146:6-7,8-9,9-10
Jas 5:7-10
Mt 11:2-11


Last Thursday we celebrated the feast of St. Juan Diego, canonized by Pope John Paul II in 2002. Juan Diego had been declared Venerable in 1987. Under normal circumstances, for someone to be beatified there must be a miracle that has been thoroughly studied and approved by the Congregation for Causes and Saints and accepted by the Holy Father. In the case of Juan Diego, John Paul II decided to beatify him without the approved miracle. There was a miracle for his canonization, however. And it is quite a story.

Juan Jose Barragan Silva, of Mexico City, had been a drug addict since he was a teenager. He and his mother had been abandoned by his father when Juan Jose was young. On May 3rd, 1990 Juan Jose got drunk and high on marijuana with a friend, then went home and started to cut himself on the head with a knife. His mother, Esperanza, tried to get the knife away but failed. She implored him to stop abusing himself and give up the alcohol and pot. He shouted that he didn’t want to live any more. Juan Jose threw himself off the balcony of their third floor apartment.

In that moment, Esperanza had a “flash”. Knowing that Pope John Paul was to be in Mexico for the beatification of Juan Diego, she called on Juan Diego to intercede for her son. The hope of a mother springs eternal.

Juan Jose fell about 30 feet and landed on his head on the concrete pavement. He was bleeding heavily from the mouth, nose and ears. They covered him, thinking he was dead. He suddenly sat up, rose and went to the stairs leading to his apartment. On meeting his mother coming down the stairs he asked for her forgiveness. They embraced and remained that way for another ten minutes or so before the ambulance came.

The prognosis was very pessimistic. The doctor later explained that it was incomprehensible that he was still alive. They did tests and found that he had fractured his skull, had a large hemotoma that extended from the front of his skull to the back of his neck, lacerations of the neck muscles, intracranial bleeding and air in his cranial cavity. He was given the last rites. Yet he continued to live.

The first four days he was sedated. On the fifth, doctors found that his pupils were no longer fixed and that he could move his arms and legs. On the sixth day he was released from the ICU to a regular ward. On the seventh day his feeding tube was removed. He was released on the tenth day after the fall. Subsequent tests by neurologists and other specialists showed a total recovery. Juan Jose also gave up his drug habit and started school.

It seems that his change of condition came on 6 May at the very time John Paul II was beatifying Juan Diego. The decree concerning this miracle was promulgated on 20 December 2001. Pope John Paul II canonized St. Juan Diego on July 31, 2002.

If we do not believe in miracles, we do not ask for them. If we do not ask for them, they will not be granted. Juan Jose’s mother never gave up hope for him. Even through his substance abuse and attempted suicide, she never gave up hope for her son. Her name was Esperanza, the Spanish word for hope.

Most of us never have to live through such a dramatic situation as Esperanza. Most of us don’t have to deal with such despair. But many of us do. When we find ourselves in desperate situations in life, we have a choice to make. Either we can cling to hope, however feeble it may be, or we can give into despair. There’re really no other choices. We can either turn our trust to God, or we can abandon him and abandon hope.

The ancient Israelites had their share of hopeless situations. The prophet Isaiah, who we hear from in today’s first reading, was writing to a people who were about to be besieged and wiped out by the Assyrian army. The king, Hezekiah, put his trust in an alliance with the Egyptians. Isaiah enjoined him to trust in the Lord and be strong instead. He writes today:

Strengthen the hands that are feeble,
make firm the knees that are weak,
say to those whose hearts are frightened:
Be strong, fear not!
Here is your God,
he comes with vindication;
with divine recompense
he comes to save you.

Hezekiah didn’t listen. And the northern kingdom of Israel was destroyed. The Israelites had a way of ignoring God’s prophets and putting themselves in hopeless situations. But the prophets always gave them a message of hope. Isaiah’s message of hope was fulfilled in today’s gospel. Jesus doesn’t come right out and tell John the Baptist that he is the Messiah. Instead he points to Isaiah’s promise of hope made seven hundred years earlier. He gave John proof of God’s faithfulness by his actions, not just with words.

We celebrate another story of hope today, the Feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe.
The opening of the New World by the Spanish brought with it both fortune-seekers and preachers wanting to convert the native populations to the Christian faith, by force, if necessary. Many of the natives were treated very cruelly by their conquerors. On December 12, 1531, Our Lady of Guadalupe appeared and spoke tenderly to another one of her sons, Juan Diego:

“Hear and let it penetrate into your heart, my dear little son. Let nothing discourage you, nothing depress you. Let nothing alter your heart or your countenance. Also do not fear any illness or vexation, anxiety or pain. Am I not here who am your mother? Are you not under my shadow and protection? Am I not your fountain of life? Are you not in the folds of my mantle, in the crossing of my arms? Is there anything else that you need?”

One would be hard pressed to find more comforting words to someone in despair; they are positively riveting given their intimate connection with the miraculous image of Mary imprinted on Juan Diego’s tilma, the same image that hangs on the wall of this church.

The power of Mary’s reassuring words is magnified by the fact that they came the day after Juan Diego did not follow through with his promise to meet Mary again at the appointed time and place. He had spent that day tending to his gravely sick uncle. Knowing that he just blew off the Queen of Heaven, though, he decided to take a shortcut to his destination the next day in order to avoid her. Haven’t we all, knowing our own shortcomings, or facing the hardships and demands that come with faith in Christ, taken shortcuts in one form or another? He was nonetheless greeted by Our Lady and heard these soothing words – even after she had explicitly told him earlier: “Do not forget me.”

The Blessed Mother understands our humanity and stands ready to shower us with her maternal love. Our Lady said she came to give all her love and protection to the people, to hear their weeping, and “alleviate all their multiple sufferings.” There could scarcely be a more inviting and urgent message for an anxious, secular age – particularly one that has forgotten what matters most.

So let us rejoice on this Gaudete Sunday as we light the rose colored candle of hope. For no matter how unfaithful we are to God, God will always be faithful to us.

Wednesday, December 1, 2010

Burglar Alarm

1st Sunday of Advent
Cycle A

We have a burglar alarm at our house. It came with the house. We pay a monthly fee to have it. It’s a real fancy one that not only has a siren but has someone sitting at a computer screen a thousand miles away monitoring it so that if it goes off they call the cops or the fire department. And we never turn it on. I wouldn’t know how to if I wanted to. The little green light on the control panel by the door is always on, but I don’t know how to program it and if it goes off I don’t know how to turn it off.

We figured it would come in handy because of all the expensive tools I’ve got in the shop. And we did turn it on the first month or two after we moved in. It has hundreds of cool functions, but all we learned to do was turn it on and off. And it soon became a hassle remembering to activate it and deactivate it, and besides, we live in Oakley, where it’s quiet and peaceful and all the neighbors look out for each other. I’ve got all the right tools to be prepared for a break-in, but they’re really useless because I don’t know how to use them. And if I did, I probably wouldn’t anyway. We’ve fallen into a false sense of security because we have never been broken into.

It’s the first Sunday of Advent. New Years Day for us Catholics. Today we begin the new liturgical year, and as you can see, the colors have changed to purple from green, we have our Advent wreath all set up and lit, and the gospel readings are from Matthew rather than from Luke. The word Advent means coming, as in the coming of an event that has been anticipated.

We celebrate Advent when we do because we are anticipating the coming of a wonderful event at the same time we are remembering another wonderful event. We look forward to the time when Jesus comes again in his glory, and we celebrate his birth at Christmas, his first coming 2000 years ago. It is fitting that we link the two, because together they tell the story of the promise Jesus made to us that we will see him again just as he was seen so long ago.

But Advent is all about burglar alarms.

Jesus tells us throughout Advent to be prepared. Be ready, because you never know when he will come again. He gave us a heads-up about what is to happen. Jesus left us all the tools. We have the Church to back us up. We have tradition and scripture. He gave us the burglar alarm; he showed us how it works and how to turn it on. It’s got hundreds of cool functions, like the sacraments and devotions and saints and stuff. But we don’t use them, do we? We just turn it on and off sometimes, when we need it. We’re good people. We don’t need to worry, do we? Nothing bad’s going to happen. We have fallen into a false sense of security because it’s been so long since he left and we’ve grown weary of waiting.

We talk a lot about Jesus’ first coming, and every Sunday we hear stories about that time in the gospels. At every Mass our prayers speak of the hope we have in his coming again. What lies beneath the surface of both of these events is Jesus’ third coming, where he enters into our lives, or tries to, every day. Are we prepared to welcome Jesus when he knocks at our door today? Are we really ready?

Have you ever thought about what you’d do if you met Jesus face to face? Have you ever heard the song I Can Only Imagine by the group Mercyme? The refrain goes:

Surrounded by Your glory, what will my heart feel
Will I dance for you Jesus or in honor of you be still
Will I stand in your presence or to my knees will I fall
Will I sing hallelujah, will I be able to speak at all
I can only imagine

We spend a lot of time thinking of the afterlife, of what it will be like in heaven. But I think we often forget that Jesus is here acting in our lives every day. That third coming is the only thing we can control. It’s the only coming we can experience now.

Let’s change the lyrics of that song a bit.

Surrounded by Your glory, O what my heart feels
I dance for you Jesus and in honor of you be still
I stand in your presence and to my knees I fall
I sing hallelujah, and am unable to speak at all
I don’t have to imagine

If you knew you were to have Jesus over to dinner tomorrow night, how would you prepare? Not just all the details about the decorations and the menu. How would you prepare yourself mentally and spiritually? How would you dress? Who would you tell? Would you invite your friends to join you or would you want Jesus all to yourself? Would you think yourself worthy or unworthy? Would you go to confession first? Would you be nervous or would you be comfortable welcoming a close friend?

Well, here we are. Jesus has come to dinner.

Sunday, October 24, 2010

Mercy Me

30th Sunday in Ordinary Time
Cycle C
Sir 35: 12-14,16-18
2 Tim 4:6-8, 16-18
Lk 18:9-14

This week we complete St. Luke’s trilogy of stories on prayer. Two weeks ago we heard the story of the ten lepers who were cured by Jesus. Only one returned to give thanks to God. We learned that it is necessary to offer prayers of thanksgiving for all the gifts God has given us. Last week we heard the parable of the corrupt judge, and learned that we must be persistent when we ask God to give us what we need. Today we learn about probably the most important form of prayer of all, praying for forgiveness. Praying for forgiveness is most important because unless we receive forgiveness, we really can’t ask God for what we need and cannot thank him for his gifts to us. Because it is through God’s mercy that he gives us the ability to ask and the ability to offer thanks.

It’s a lot like with our own relationships. If you are on the outs with a friend or relative, you shut down communication with them. You avoid being with them. You begin to think bitter thoughts about them, and you erect barriers between you. You wouldn’t dream of asking them for anything or thanking them for anything, because the relationship is broken. In order for the relationship to be healed there must be mercy. You must show mercy to them and vice versa. Only when that step is made can the barriers come down and you can resume a healthy, happy relationship.

Think of how that tax collector must have felt. His chosen profession and lifestyle had cut him off from his countrymen and from God. Everyone thought of him as a sinner and a traitor because he collaborated with the Romans in cheating people. He must have been torn in two. On the one hand he enjoyed all the things he had because of his ill-gotten wealth. But on the other hand he must have hated himself for betraying his people and his own conscience. That is why he crept into the temple area quietly and couldn’t even raise his eyes to heaven in prayer. But he knew his real situation and his true problem. He didn’t try to justify himself to God. All he did was throw himself on God’s mercy. Who knows, maybe he left there with a change of heart. He had taken that first step of conversion. His prayer left the door open for change.

The Pharisee, on the other hand, thought he had it all figured out. He couldn’t see how he was cutting himself off from those around him just as much as the tax collector was. He was building barriers to others and to God just as much as the tax collector was. The Pharisee did try to justify himself, and in doing so was deceiving himself. We can guess that he left the temple not open to conversion but more firmly fixed in his arrogance. He asked for no mercy because he didn’t recognize his need for it, and so he received none. He was not praying to God, he was praying to himself. His prayer had no value because it had no power to change him.

Why do we pray? Why do we feel the need to communicate with God? God doesn’t need our words or thoughts to know what’s in our hearts. God knows who we are and what we need even before we do. But I think that God likes to hear us say it. Why do we feel the need to tell those we love that we love them? And why do we like to hear them tell us they love us? We know they do, but we still like to hear it. We need reassurance that we are loved.

We pray to God because we need to say it and we need to believe that he likes to hear it. When we love someone it’s natural to communicate with them. We need to know that we’re ok with God. We need to know that we have ultimate value, that we are accepted by our creator, even though we don’t really deserve it. We need to have that hope and know that there’s a purpose to life, with all its joys and sufferings. It is through our prayer that we keep our relationship with God in focus.

But does God answer prayers? Ah, the great question. When we ask it we are usually referring to prayers of petition. We ask God for something and then sit back and wait to see if we get it. Sometimes we do get what we ask for, but rarely does God answer us boldly and loudly, so we can easily recognize it. Rarely do we get that miracle we’ve been hoping for. But then, we never got that pony we asked our parents for for Christmas, did we? And I think we oftentimes make excuses for not getting what we asked for. “God knows best, and I guess I really didn’t need it. So I guess I’ll try to word it a bit differently next time.” Or, we look back and try hard to see how God really did answer our prayers. “Yeah, that was it, right there. It really did work out ok in the end, even if it wasn’t the way I expected it or planned it.” We desperately need to believe that God hears us.

But what about those prayers of hopelessness when we are enveloped in deep suffering and poverty of body and spirit? When we are not asking for things but just for an end to our pain? What about the millions of people who go to bed hungry every night, who aren’t asking for a better job or a new car but just to survive? Sometimes their prayers are never answered with the alleviation of their suffering. Does that mean they weren’t answered? Does that mean that God has abandoned them?

St. Paul experienced this. Many times he prayed that he be relieved of an unknown physical ailment, only to get the answer that sorry, he had to put up with it. He came to the conclusion that it was only when he was weak and had to rely totally on God that he was actually stronger. But that still didn’t make him feel any better. And today we heard that even after an entire career of bringing the Good News to people the world over, he was still alone and abandoned by them in his time of need. Just like Jesus. But even when he looked back on his life’s race and saw all the times he’d stumbled and fell, he still kept his eyes on the finish line. He never lost hope.

God does not guarantee that when we ask for things from Him we will necessarily get what we request. He only guarantees that we will receive His mercy and through that mercy, hope. Prayer is always answered with mercy.

And mercy is all about hope. Can you imagine what the world would be like if God were not merciful towards us? What if he left us to our own devices in our evil and sinfulness? Without God’s mercy there would be no good on the earth. Because we sin we need to ask for and receive forgiveness. If God in his mercy does not forgive us we are doomed to destroy ourselves. Without the possibility of forgiveness we would go insane. Without God’s mercy we would have no hope. Because the opposite of mercy is despair.

But what is mercy? True mercy is not a dominance and submission thing, where a superior is judging us and cuts us a break out of the goodness of his heart. Mercy is treating people as they should be treated just because of who they are, children of God. Mercy is acknowledging the inherent dignity of every human person, and then giving everyone what they need to live as true persons.

True mercy actually requires the one giving it to humble himself or herself. It is when another lowers himself to our level and accepts us as equals. Think of the greatest act of mercy in all history. God himself humbled himself to become one of us, and to die for us out of mercy for us.

And true mercy also requires the one who receives it to accept it with humility. Not in humiliation, but with an understanding that even though our actions require forgiveness, we still have great value. Mercy is accepting our true place in the scheme of things and knowing what our true relationship is with our creator. Have mercy on us sinners. We need to accept that we are only the creatures, and we don’t have all the answers. Sometimes it all makes sense and oftentimes it doesn’t. But that doesn’t mean we give up in frustration.

Because we wait with joyful hope for the coming of our savior, Jesus Christ.

Sunday, September 26, 2010

Righteous Men

26th Sunday in Ordinary Time
Cycle C
Am 6:1a,4-7
1 Tim 6:11-16
Lk 16:19-31

Here we are, in the middle of Ordinary Time, those dog days of the liturgical year when nothing special is happening. The 26th Sunday in Ordinary Time. I guess the only thing noteworthy about today is that this is one of those rare occasions when the 26th Sunday in Ordinary time falls on the 26th of the month. No big whoop.

But for me, the 26th Sunday in Ordinary Time has special significance, and is a bittersweet remembrance of two of my closest friends. For me, the 26th Sunday in Ordinary Time is time to reflect on that reading from first Timothy we heard just now, and how two very special men of God lived out St. Paul’s admonition to Timothy, and how I often fall so very short of that charge.

On the 26th Sunday in Ordinary Time in 2004, Deacon Gerry Shea taught a Sunday school lesson, served at two Masses at St. Thomas More parish in Sandy, preaching on these very readings we heard today, performed a baptism after Mass, and then fell dead of a deep tissue thrombosis as he was getting ready to go to the Octoberfest at Snowbird. Gerry had been a deacon for eight months.

On the 26th Sunday in Ordinary Time the following year, Deacon Aniceto Armendariz served at the 7 pm Spanish Mass here in this beautiful church, surrounded by the people he loved so very much. Afterwards, on his way home to Heber with his wife, Alma, he was gunned down in a senseless murder just outside of the Jordanelle reservoir. He was 44 years old.

The 26th Sunday in Ordinary Time is far from ordinary, because of these two extraordinary gentlemen. Their lives of service to God’s people are perfect examples of the devotion, faith, love, patience and gentleness in the pursuit of righteousness that St. Paul urges upon Timothy. And it’s not just because they were deacons. Both Gerry and Aniceto lived righteous lives long before they were ordained. Their ordinations simply gave a structure to their commitment. In many ways they were just like the rest of us, because we are all called to be righteous men and women of God. We are all called to be heroes.

Gerry Shea was a military man. Air Force. He was a lawyer, a JAG. He served many years in Central America during the 80s and then came home to Utah to work with his wife in the financial services field. Gerry was an unassuming man, sort of ordinary looking. Quiet and thoughtful. His wife was the outgoing one, and Gerry had no problem with that. We often wondered why he thought he was being called to be a deacon. During formation he sat in the last row and rarely participated, except to mutter smart aleck comments under his breath. He was also the only single candidate, since his wife had died of cancer a few years before. It was hard on Gerry to go through formation by himself, without the support of his wife alongside him.

The practical stuff of the diaconate was hard for Gerry. He rarely got the liturgies right when he presided. He never could find his way around the prayer books. He was a wonderful poet but just an ok preacher, and he never seemed very comfortable in the role. He was a wonderful teacher. For two years he drove up from Sandy every week so that he could teach in our RCIA program. He prepared for hours for every class, and had every word he wanted to say figured out ahead of time, as if he were preparing a brief for court. But he could be absent minded. One time he read the wrong gospel during Mass. Another time his cell phone rang while he was preaching. Gerry was the accidental deacon.

What Gerry loved most was working with teens. He was very involved in confirmation preparation and the ACTS program in the diocese, and he would often spend hours counseling kids. He even brought one young man into his home when he had been thrown out by his parents. That teenager gave an amazing testimony to Gerry at his funeral. Gerry worked very hard to be a deacon.

Aniceto, on the other hand, was a natural. A charismatic figure, he was a born leader. Aniceto came to this country from his native Chihuahua while still a teenager, working in the oil fields of Brownsville, Texas. He moved to the Park City area with his family ten years ago, and began work as an electrician. He may have helped build your home. In his native Mexico he had been active in his parish, especially in a program called Evangelization, where he helped identify and train leaders from the local community. It was natural that he took that same experience and applied it in Park City. He quickly became a very strong leader in the Hispanic community, both inside and outside the church.

Aniceto undertook all this even though he knew very little English. He had to work twice as hard to understand the complex concepts that go with Catholic theology and teaching. As a deacon at St. Mary’s Aniceto did a variety of sacramental work. He baptized babies, prepared couples for marriage and then presided at their weddings, he preached powerfully on Sundays, and presided at funerals. He basically ran the Hispanic ministry. When he arrived there were perhaps 10 to 15 Hispanic families at Sunday Mass. Today there are between 500 to 600 families.

Aniceto was one of those unique individuals who could effectively bridge the differences among cultures. He assisted immigrants in finding their way through the daunting government red tape we natives take for granted. He was one of the founding workers of the People’s Health Center. He founded the Santa Cruz Driving School and an after school program for local kids. He helped local law enforcement and officials in their dealings with the Hispanic community. He did all this not for the rewards, which were few, but because he truly loved people. Everyone seemed to know him. He was simply “Aniceto”.

Aniceto was a very gentle, patient man. In eleven years I never saw him angry. He was a wonderful father and husband. He worked hard, paid his taxes, built and owned two homes, sent his three sons to college and planned to send his daughter. In short, he was like all of us.

Two very different men from very different backgrounds and with very different gifts, from both ends of the spectrum, but both just as committed to God’s people. It’s funny how God carries out his plan for us, and who he chooses to lead us. Just as Ordinary Time is far from ordinary, what made Gerry and Aniceto extraordinary was that in so many ways they were so very ordinary. Their story is the story of hundreds of people like them who live here in Utah. Perhaps their greatest legacy will be that they helped so many people to be like them. And that can only make our community stronger. Maybe we’ll fill the hole they’ve left us with the people they’ve left behind. Maybe we’ll fill it with ourselves.

Saturday, August 28, 2010

Humble Pie

22nd Sunday in Ordinary Time
Cycle C
Sir 3:17-18,20, 28-29
Heb 12:18-19,22-24a
Lk 14:1,7-14

“Ever since you became a deacon, you’ve been a pompous jerk! I’ve had it with you and I’ve had it with St. Mary’s!” Actually, the language used was a bit saltier, but you get the idea. And that was the nicest thing he said.

Wow, I was stunned. All I could do was sit there and stare at the phone after he hung up on me. This was from one of my oldest and closest friends, and I was completely blindsided. Months and months of anger had just come rushing out. I became indignant. “I’m the jerk? I’m the jerk? All I’ve ever been is a good friend to you. Where do you get off talking to me like that? You’ve blown everything out of proportion. It’s you who’s out of line.” Then, after I’d cooled down a bit, I was magnanimous and understanding. “He’s been having a hard time lately. He’s probably having a bad day. I’ll give him a bit of time and then he’ll call back and apologize.” Then, as the conversation played itself over and over again in my mind, I figured, “You know, he may be right.” A lot of times I do act arrogantly. A lot of times I do think that being a deacon is special, that I know everything, and I’m sure that attitude comes out. And that is not what being a deacon is all about. It’s not what being a friend is all about. It’s not what being a Christian is all about. Finally, I was struck by shame and guilt, and saw things through his eyes. And I was sorry; very, very sorry.

It’s hard to be humble. It’s not how most of us were raised, and it’s not how we are taught to act by society. The meek shall inherit the earth. Right. Tell that to the shy kid on the playground who everyone picks on. Or tell that to the woman who just got passed over for promotion because a coworker was more aggressive. We’re taught to be self-sufficient, self-reliant, proud of our accomplishments. Some people just seem to have it, though. We can’t pin it down exactly, but we know it when we see it, just as we recognize arrogance and pride when we see it. We often pass it off as shyness or insecurity, and sometimes it is, but true humility is a sign of great strength.

Humility is not what you do, it’s what you are. It’s not a character trait that you can cultivate, it’s the attitude you have based upon how you view yourself in relation to other people. Humility is all about relationships. How we view ourselves in relation with others. Including God. Who’s in charge? Who’s the master and who’s the servant?

In a competitive society it’s especially hard to be humble. And we’re taught from an early age to “love ourselves”. There’s even a song about that. And most times we don’t act on it consciously. We don’t ever want to be seen as arrogant, and we can work hard at being humble, but if our attitude towards other people is one of superiority, if we don’t see ourselves as being servants of others rather than masters, that will come out in how we treat other people. It’s all about how we see ourselves and other people. And everyone can sense it, for good or for evil.

Every now and then we get a smackdown, right between the eyes, usually from those closest to us. Most of the time we don’t even realize that we’re hurting others by the little things we say, or by our indifference to other people’s situations, but they remember every slight and dig, real or imagined. And sometimes it all blows up in your face and you lose a friend. When that happens you have a choice to make: you can get all worked up yourself and blame it all on the other person, or you can calmly take stock of your life and humbly try to see if maybe they have a point. Those smackdowns can have great value if they shock us into seeing ourselves as we truly are and lead us to do something to change our attitudes.

The greatest act of humility is repentance. You cannot be the master and ask someone for forgiveness. You cannot be arrogantly sorry. In order to ask for forgiveness you must subjugate yourself and your ego to the other. You have to dig deep within yourself and be truly honest in your assessment of your behavior. That’s what it means to be sincere. And once you see how you have hurt the other, you have to swallow your pride and ask for forgiveness, knowing full well that you may be rejected.


When we ask for forgiveness we are completely vulnerable. We are literally putting our heart in the other person’s hand, hoping that it won’t be stomped on, hoping we won’t be rejected. And sometimes we are. And even though we might think, “Well, God has forgiven me”, it still hurts, sometimes for years, sometimes for a lifetime.

Jesus told Peter that we must forgive our brother seventy times seven. What we must also do is repent seventy times seven. Just as we are called to forgive, we are also called to ask for forgiveness. I tell young parents that the most important thing they can do for their children is to forgive them. From the very beginning, forgive them. If only once do they come to you and say they’re sorry and you hesitate, or you offer some condition, or say, “I forgive you…but”, you have lost their trust. They need to trust that no matter what they do, you will accept them back. They must trust if they are to repent. They must trust in your forgiveness if they are to ever have hope. If they can’t trust in your forgiveness, how can they trust in their future spouse’s or even God’s? We all want to trust that we will be forgiven. Why wouldn’t you want people to trust in your forgiveness?

We act with humility when we forgive, just as it takes an act of humility to ask for forgiveness. Have you ever thought about how Jesus practiced humility? How could the all powerful God himself be humble? He did it by forgiving. He called everyone to repentance and then when they came to him he forgave them. Unconditionally. People trusted Jesus because he forgave. And he did more than that, he gave them proof that God forgives also. And he told us to do the same.

And so, for all the times I have acted arrogantly towards you, I am sorry.

For all the times I have acted flippantly and indifferently towards you and your situation, I am sorry.

For all the times I have used inappropriate language and jokes around you, I am sorry.

For all the times I have spoken without thinking, I am sorry.

For all the times I have not taken you seriously, I am sorry.

For all the times I have not truly listened to you, I am sorry.

For all the times I have failed to see your point of view, I am sorry.

For all the times I have thrown my authority around, I am sorry.

For all the times I have gotten on my soapbox and been holier-than-thou, I am sorry.

For all the times I have not returned your phone calls right away, I am sorry.

For all the times I’ve avoided you, I am sorry.

For all the times I have not been truthful with you, I am sorry.

For all the times I have not loved you as I should, I am sorry.

Ok, now it’s your turn.

Saturday, July 31, 2010

Vanity, Thy Name Is...Me

18th Sunday in Ordinary Time
Cycle C

Most of us who are middle aged are sooner or later confronted with the reality of our parents’ dying. Oftentimes it is a long, slow, painful process, and we struggle to retain their, and our, dignity amongst all the medications and equipment and medical personnel and dirty linens and family squabbles and tears of joy and pain. But most of all we are forced to view our parents, the towering heroes of our youth, as fragile and weak and helpless. And we feel useless and the whole process seems to be in vain as we wrestle with our conflicting feelings. We wonder if it is all worth it, and we are humbled by the sight of what our loved ones have been reduced to.

But in the middle of the night, when we sit in vigil around the bedside, we are confronted by our thoughts and get ourselves focused on what is truly important in our lives, and it’s not all the things we thought were important before. All the peripheral stuff does seem to be vanity. It is our relationships that last. It is our relationships that give our lives meaning.

But I don’t agree with Qoheleth; all things in life are not vanity, and all things we possess are not empty and worthless. The treasures we store up most of all are our memories of those people and events that have formed us, both positively and negatively. Because it is through those experiences and the memories we have of them that we become the people we are today. That is how we grow in wisdom, because wisdom comes from learning from life’s experiences. We become wise when we use those experiences to improve on the way we treat other people. Wisdom helps us become better in our relationships and our relationships make us wise.

We all have possessions. The thing is not what we possess, but what possesses us. We know that it is so easy to receive the gifts but not the hand that offers them. I was visiting one of my little ladies at the nursing home the other day, and we were discussing how much things had changed for her since she had fallen and broken her hip. She no longer could do things for herself but needed help with even the simplest tasks. It was forcing her daughter to spend more and more time with her, and she felt guilty that she was taking her away from her family so much.

I asked her to think of when her children were little, of all she and her husband had sacrificed for them. I asked her to remember all the long nights sitting with them when they were scared or sick. I told her to recall all the times it was difficult to be parents, of all the joy and pain her children had given her. Was she ever resentful of those times? Did she love her children less because of them or did her sacrifice actually strengthen her love? Did she ever regret any time she was there to pick them up when they needed help? Of course not. Those times are often the ones she cherished the most. Why should she deny her daughter the same experience now?

Now her sacrifice for her children is to accept their help. The ultimate sacrifice we make is to submit to the fact that we need other people. We will all need to rely on our relationships at some time or other, when we are stripped of all the trappings of life and all we have is ourselves and those who love us. And we need to accept their help with humility and grace. Because they also have the need to help us. It’s not payback for all the times we helped them. No one’s keeping score. But we all have the deep seated need to sacrifice for those we love. Because we love them. We need to give and we need to receive with the same grace.

Someday it will be us in that bed and our families will be gathered around us in vigil. How we react to that situation will determine how well we die. In that way the gift and the reception of the gift are sacrament, and our death bed an altar.

I just read a book, Evidence of the Afterlife, written by Jeffrey Long, a medical doctor who claims to be an atheist. While in medical school he was struck by the fact that there had been no formal research done on near death experiences, and so he performed a ten year study on over six thousand people of all nations, races, ages and cultures who claimed to have had near death experiences and out-of-body experiences. One of his findings stood out to me. Virtually all the people who had what were considered true dying experiences, you know the white light, the tunnel, etc., also had an experience of a “judgment”. What they all had in common was that they saw their entire lives flash before their eyes in an instant, and what they saw was how all their actions and their inactions had affected other people. Even people who they didn’t really know very well were affected positively or negatively by what they themselves had done. It stunned many of them to see just how important other people were in their lives and how important they were in the lives of others.

We will be judged on our relationships. How we have treated other people, not on what we have accomplished nor on the legacies we have left behind. Jesus said so. It is not all in vain. Jesus said so. We all touch other people in ways we never even realize. We are all building storage facilities for the stuff that really matters, whether we are aware of it or not. Those storage facilities are the hearts of those we touch.

I was just in Las Vegas a week ago. The epitome of materialism. Just like the rich man in today’s parable, Vegas doesn’t remodel, they dramatically blow up the old and build something bigger and bolder in its place.

What is in your storehouses? Are they filled with pretty baubles and toys, thinking that’s what will be your legacy? If so, maybe you need to tear them down every once in a while and start over. Fill them with all those little things that affect others. The gentle smiles, the small hugs, the thoughtful cards, the simple kindnesses we do along with the great sacrifices we make that we may not realize mean the world to others.

It would be a shame for us to live our lives without ever storing up the things that build up relationships. But it would also be a shame for us to never stop and realize that we are doing it. We need to step back and take the time to examine our lives every once in awhile to acknowledge the good we have done and see the deficiencies. And see the hope in our lives.

It may be easier to give up like the fatalist Qoheleth, to see everything as shallow vanity. To live just for the moment’s pleasure. Or to see no purpose to life or death. I choose not to. Because you see, even though I said goodbye to my mother for the last time yesterday, I was godfather an hour ago to a beautiful baby boy and tomorrow I will baptize another. As long as that continues to happen, life will never be in vain.

Saturday, July 10, 2010

Get Off Your Donkey!

15th Sunday in Ordinary Time
Cycle C
Dt 30:10-14
Col 1:15-20
Lk 10:25-37

There were two men, Harry and Charlie, who were great friends and avid golfers. Every Tuesday for twenty years they had a regular tee time at a local course, and they rarely missed it. One morning, just as they were finishing the 4th hole, Charlie grabbed his chest and fell down dead of a massive heart attack. When Harry arrived home he told his wife about the harrowing ordeal. "Oh, that must have been terrible," she said. “Yes, it was one of the hardest things I’ve had to endure in my entire life, he said. “All day long it was, hit the ball, drag Charlie, hit the ball, drag Charlie.”

I think many times in our lives it’s “Hit the ball, drag Jesus. Hit the ball, drag Jesus.” We say we love him with our whole hearts, but sometimes our hearts are more into our jobs or our entertainments. And so we drag Jesus. We say we love him with our whole being, but sometimes our being is more centered on ourselves. And so we drag Jesus. We say we love him with all our strength, but usually we rely more on our own abilities than on trusting completely in God. And so we drag Jesus. We say we love him with all our mind, but we’ve got so much to think about that we forget about God sometimes. And so we drag Jesus.

You know, it’s hard work to drag Jesus. It’s hard work to rationalize inaction. We really have to think about it. Like the lawyer in today’s gospel we try to justify ourselves when confronted with moral truth. The man was a lawyer, and it was a lawyer’s job to study stuff. He knew in his head what he needed to do, and he knew all the right things to say, but he was looking for a rationalization for not doing it. I know what it says in the book, but…There’s always a but in there somewhere.

We know what to do but we fight it. As Moses said, it is very near to us, already in our mouths and in our hearts; we have only to carry it out. We talk the talk but don’t walk the walk. We look for ways to avoid doing what we know is right because it’s inconvenient or hard for us to do.

When’s the last time you had to rationalize doing something good?

The natural thing to do is to act with compassion, because that’s how God made us. Like him. Jesus didn’t have to think about it when he healed someone. He just did it. Do you think the priest or the Levite would have hesitated to help if the victim had been one of their own children? If we spent as much time acting with compassion as we do in trying to figure ways to avoid it, how much easier our lives would be. What a waste of energy.

This parable is not a warm and fuzzy, lovey dovey one. It’s all about action. The priest was of the ruling class, a politician, and he knew that if word got out that he had helped a foreigner he would have big political problems. He might even lose his position and status. So he rationalized that his politics were more important than mercy - and he moved on. The Levite was one who served in the temple, and if he touched the Samaritan it would make him impure. He would have to go through an elaborate cleansing ritual before he could serve in the temple again, so he rationalized that his religion was more important than mercy - and he moved on. The Samaritan was the only one who got off his…donkey and did something about it. Without thinking of the consequences. He did what came naturally and both he and the victim were saved.

Jesus didn’t say “the neighbor to the man was the one who studied the Talmud more or who prayed for the victim”. He said the neighbor was the one who actually did something about his situation. Studying and praying are what we do to lay the foundation for our action. Jesus spent a lot of time praying and studying and preparing for his ministry, but he acted upon that preparation. You may be the most pius, prayerful person in the world, but if you don’t act on it with compassion you’re a fraud.

“You shall love the Lord, your God,
With all your heart,
With all your being
With all your strength,
And with all your mind,
And your neighbor as yourself.”

Why does God want us to love him like this? Because that’s the way he loves us. Switch it around a bit: The Lord, your God loves you, his creature, with all his heart, with all his being, with all his strength and with all his mind, and all he asks in return is that you treat other people in the same way.

How do we know that God loves like this? Because Jesus loves like this. We have proof of his love in the Gospels. Jesus is the Good Samaritan. He loved everyone with his whole heart, being, strength and mind, and he loved his neighbor more than he loved himself. He loved us so much that he died for us. That’s how we know.

Moses tells the people today that it’s not all that complicated. The law of love we are to live by isn’t something that’s written in the stars or is in need of someone to come and explain it to us. The lawyer knew the answer to his question before he asked it, just as we all know deep down how we are supposed to act and feel towards God and our neighbor. If we are created in the image of God we have that knowledge put in our consciences at our conception. All we do with our religion is to deepen our understanding of it and carry it out in our lives.

And it is a simple thing to do. If we have our focus on God, we don’t have to worry about having our focus on our neighbor. If we love our neighbor we don’t have to worry about loving God. They’re both the same thing. You can’t love God and not love your neighbor and you can’t love your neighbor without loving God. Love is one, just as God is one. Anytime we love we are in God and God is in us.

But we’ve got to get off our donkeys and do something with it.

Sunday, June 27, 2010

Freedom's Just Another Word for Nothing Left to Lose

13th Sunday in Ordinary Time
Cycle C
1 Kngs 19:16b;19-21
Gal 5:1, 13-18
Lk 9:51-62

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights; that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. Next weekend we will celebrate the 234th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence. Every year at this time we stop and think about freedom and what it means to us as a nation and as individuals. The Declaration is the defining statement about what we believe it means to be free.

Thomas Jefferson used the Declaration to set forth not only a list of grievances against what the colonists considered to be the actions of a tyrannical British government, he also set the foundation for how we Americans would view ourselves and our inherent rights as human beings, superseding even our rights as citizens. The founders saw freedom as an extension of natural law and acknowledged that it is God who ultimately gives us our freedom.

We have come a long way since those words were written. And we have wandered far from their original meaning. We no longer hold life as an unalienable right for all people, especially when it’s inconvenient for us to do so. Liberty? What exactly is that? We talk about it once a year but I don’t think many of us truly know what it means. We talk about our rights all the time but not about the responsibilities that go with them. But the pursuit of happiness? Ahh, that’s the one we understand, and hold as our most basic right, surpassing all others. For us, freedom has become the unfettered ability to pursue happiness. I should be able to do whatever I like, as long as it makes me happy. You do your thing and I’ll do mine. And we both determine what’s right and wrong for each of us. Freedom is the ability to do whatever we want whenever we want. For Americans today, freedom is something we take for ourselves, not something that is given us by our creator.

George Orwell said that if you control the language you control the people. We use words that all people agree refer to a great good, such as freedom and choice, and we use them to describe things that are actually sinful. We’ve muddied the waters to the point that we have lost sight of what freedom really is. Orwell also said that “doublethink means the power of holding two contradictory beliefs in one's mind simultaneously, and accepting both of them.” We have heard and spoken these words and their twisted meanings so often that we have come to believe in their contradictions. We have descended into doublethink.

What is freedom to God? Has God created us to be truly free, or does He just set up a lot of rules for us to follow? Are we truly free agents or just servants? Actually, it’s both. We are free agents when we are servants. Freedom is not the ability to do whatever we want. That is license. Freedom is not live and let live. It is not license for individuals to act whichever way they want. Freedom is truly the ability to live as we were originally intended to live. As our creator made us.

Freedom to us is really freedom from sin. Because God didn’t make us to be sinful.
He hard wired us for himself, to be like him, and we can only be truly free when we live and act as he wills. It’s not about us and yet it’s all about us.

The Declaration of Independence wasn’t the first declaration of freedom. For that we look to St. Paul. He declared long ago that we have been made free by the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross. Jesus of Nazareth is the example of what it means to be truly human and truly free. Jesus had the power to act any way he chose. He had the ultimate license to do what he pleased. And he was all about the pursuit of happiness. But it was our happiness he sought. He wielded his freedom in the way it was intended to be; by submitting his entire life to the Father’s will. Freedom to Jesus was not living according to his own will but to that of his Father’s.

And he said that he longer considered us to be slaves; we are now called his friends.

We were not created slaves, we were created free persons. In the beginning, humanity was created without the slavery of sin and death. All our needs were supplied by God and we had such a close relationship with our creator that it says in Genesis that God actually walked in the garden with Adam and Eve. As friends. It was through sin that we became enslaved and lost our way. When humanity chose to define freedom as doing our own will in opposition to that of the Father’s, suffering and death came into the world.

We can try and try to fill that hole within us with as much stuff as we can. We can think that we’re the ultimate arbitrators of our own destiny. We can assert our own wills day in and day out, and we will never be happy. Because our pursuit will never end in happiness until we surrender our will to the Father. And that’s hard. Because everything in our culture is pulling us in the opposite direction. Society says that we only have value when we assert our independence. We only have value when we can keep score of our accomplishments. Of our possessions. Of our status. Of our own inner strength. In order to live as we are intended to live we have to fight every day of our lives to keep our perspective clear. We have to declare our independence from the flesh each and every day. That means surrender. Another seeming contradiction. We triumph when we surrender. And it never gets easier, this war against contradiction.

What, did you think that now that you have declared your independence there wouldn’t be a war?

Sunday, May 23, 2010

Out of Sight Out of Mind

Feast of the Ascension
Cycle C


The apostles were all screwed up. They didn’t know what to think. One minute their master was dead, then he just shows up every once in awhile when they least expect it. First he’s here, then he’s there, then he’s over there. What an amazing roller coaster of emotions they must have been on. Was he really not dead? Was he really going to stay this time?

The apostles had been overcome by their grief at Jesus’ death. And it was so hard for them to believe and accept that he had risen. They didn’t even believe their own eyes. Their grief turned to rejoicing, because he was there again. But Jesus knew they couldn’t take it if he left them again like he had before. They thought he was gone forever when they sealed him up in that tomb. But then he appeared again to them, and they had hope. Can you imagine what they would have felt if he simply disappeared from their lives again?

Luke says that he was taken from their sight, hidden in the clouds. Not that he was gone, just hidden from their sight. For now. If he had not ascended, if he had not just been taken from their sight, they would have been crushed forever. If he had just stopped appearing to them they would not have had the hope that he was going to come again, and stay this time.

Their belief in the imminence of the second coming came from his ascension. They believed him when he said he was coming back soon, because he had come back once before. He didn’t seem lost to them anymore. He was not dead to them any more.

It’s like when someone we love goes on a trip. They are taken from our sight by that airplane, but we know they are not gone forever. They will return, and we anticipate their return. We miss them, but we take solace in our hope. My daughter, Kimberly, just got back last night from a two week tour of Ireland with her college choir. Her plane landed at about 10 o’clock, and Nancy and I drove down to pick her up and take her to her apartment, even though her boyfriend lives in Salt Lake and could have done it. Instead, we drove an hour each way down there just to pick her up. On the way down, Nancy commented that we were driving two hours to see Kimi for ten minutes. All I could say was, “But I miss her”. Even though we had talked and texted practically every day she was gone, I still needed to see her. I couldn’t wait another day.

If someone we love dies we do not have that same anticipation. We miss them, but the solace of the resurrection is not the same as if we knew we’d see them next Tuesday. We know that we’ll be reunited in heaven, but that seems so far away.
And so we grieve and call it a loss.

Sometimes we lose Jesus. Jesus is hidden from us all the time. Sometimes he chooses to seem far away in order to force us to do things for ourselves, like he did with the apostles. Other times he is right next to us and we cannot recognize him, as he was with the two disciples on the road to Emmaus on Easter evening. But most of the time we push him from our sight. He is hidden from us by our own sinfulness and unwillingness to bend our will to his. We hide him away in his room, like a crazy uncle, because what he has to say can be offensive to the world. His message is crazy to the world. We’re embarrassed to bring him out into the open, because we’re afraid of what others will say about us. And most of all we’re afraid. We’re afraid that maybe he has left us here on our own. Maybe he’s not coming back. Like the apostles, we’ve been hurt and have felt very alone many many times. It’s hard to trust. So we keep him here, in this church, and we come to see him every once in awhile. Because it’s safe in here.

How many of you remember the movie “Michael” with John Travolta? Remember at the end of the movie, Michael the Archangel dies and is taken up into heaven, after spending a couple weeks carousing here on earth. The two main characters, who had fallen in love, had a falling out and weren’t speaking to each other. One night, the man is walking in downtown Chicago, and he thinks he catches sight of Michael turning a corner, but he isn’t sure. All he sees is a quick glimpse of his back as he hurries through the streets. He pursues the angel, or what he thinks is the angel, until he runs around a corner and bumps right into his lover’s arms. She too had seen glimpses of the angel, and was running after him to catch him. What they found was not the angel but love love. And they lived happily ever after.

Maybe that’s how Jesus likes it. How often do we run after Jesus, only catching glimpses of him, running and running after him until we run smack dab into each other’s arms. We find him in each other.

The apostles did the same thing. They found Jesus in each other. After the ascension they didn’t split up and return to their old ways of life. They didn’t go off by themselves into the hills or take up their old professions. They stuck together, as a community. They did all things in community, shared all things in common. They worked and prayed and hoped in common. They told stories of Jesus to each other. They broke bread together. They lived and died together. It seemed the natural thing to do.

Because it is. And that’s why we also follow Jesus in community. Because we’re all in this together. It is natural for us to get together each week and share Jesus stories, to break bread together. To pray and to hope together. To live and die together. That’s the way Jesus intended it to be, because that’s the way we know he is still with us. Here. Today. Now.

Wednesday, April 28, 2010

A Hollywood Love Story

3rd Sunday of Lent – Scrutiny
Ex 17:3-7
Rm 5:1-2,5-8
Jn 4:5-42

This is a love story right out of a Hollywood movie.

Boy meets girl from the other side of the tracks. Girl is suspicious of boy. Boy offers outrageous promise. Girl is skeptical. They talk politics and religion. Boy’s friends think he’s crazy for getting involved with girl. Boy wins over girl. Girl takes boy to meet the family. Everyone lives happily ever after.

This story seems familiar to us because it is so common. We see our own relationships mirrored in the relationship between Jesus and the woman. We never know her name. Maybe because she’s a metaphor for us all. We rarely, if ever, fall head over heels in love with another at first sight. It takes time to get over our skepticism and our differences. We need to delve deeper into the other person’s heart before we can trust. And true love can only be built upon trust.

Jesus strips all the pretences away immediately. He gets right to the point.

One sows, another reaps. Sometimes that sowing isn’t a positive thing. The woman had had five bad relationships. Each one left scars on her that needed to be healed. Why did Jesus bring up her husbands? Was it because her failed relationships were what were causing her the most pain in her life? Did she feel a failure? Was she being ostracized by the townsfolk because of her reputation? Is that what was keeping her from taking the life giving waters?

Jesus wasn’t saying “gotcha”. He knew what was in her heart just as he knows all of us. There is no way we can hide from God. But he had to expose the scars before the woman could be open to receiving his healing waters.

We all come to the well with scars. All of our buckets have holes in them. We often feel unworthy to approach the well. We do it in secret, when no one else is around.

What do we do when we come to the well and find Jesus is already there waiting for us? Are we as skeptical as the Samaritan woman?

This morning we are celebrating the first scrutiny for our elect and candidates. There will be two more in the weeks to come. They’re not here to bare their souls to anyone, and we’re not here to scrutinize them. They have been scrutinizing themselves for a long time, and today we’re here to accept them as they are, just as Jesus accepts them for who they are. Just as he accepted the woman at the well.
This entire gospel is a metaphor for the journey of our elect and candidates. In fact, at all the other Masses this weekend we will be reading completely different readings. Because we have our Elect and candidates here this morning for the Scrutiny we must read these particular readings, from the Gospel of John, because these stories are their stories.

Most of us came to the well first when we were infants. We oftentimes fail to appreciate what that water has done for us, continues to do for us. These catechumens are coming to the well of their own free will as adults. And teenagers. What are they looking for? What scars do they need to have healed?

These folks are also living their own love stories with Jesus. Some stories are very passionate. Others are more calm and methodical. Some started out skeptical of the guy at the well. Others were more sure of themselves. But all have scars. All have history. And Jesus chooses to insert himself into their histories just as he physically inserted himself into the history of mankind 2000 years ago. As he continues to insert himself into our histories today.

Jesus didn’t have to speak to the woman that day. He could have waited for the disciples to return with food and drink and been on his way. But he crossed over the woman’s personal boundary and forced her to take a look at him and at herself. He forced her to scrutinize herself and her life. He asked her to see herself as he saw her. And then he offered a way for her to heal her scars.

Our own personal love stories are far different from Hollywood’s romantic comedies. Oftentimes they’re more like Shakespearean tragedies. But no matter how bad they are from time to time, we keep coming back. We are drawn to love. That’s human nature. We keep on coming back to the well because we thirst for that something we can’t seem to put our finger on. But God knows what we need. Because God is love. He knows what we thirst for because he put that thirst in us.

Have you met Jesus at your well? Are you suspicious of his outrageous promise? Has he won you over yet? Has he healed your scars? Have you introduced him to your friends and family? Do you believe he is the savior of the world?

Will you live happily ever after?

Sunday, April 11, 2010

Doubting Thomas

2nd Sunday of Easter
Cycle C
Acts 5: 12-16
Rev 1:9-11a, 12-13, 17-19
Jn 20:19-31

Faith is such a fragile thing.

Thomas and all the apostles were suffering greatly. They had just witnessed the torture and death of someone they loved deeply. They had pinned all their hopes and dreams on Jesus’ promise, and now he was gone. That promise would not be fulfilled.

Thomas was not unique because he wanted hard evidence before he would believe. All of the gospel accounts of the resurrection say that the apostles did not believe that Jesus had risen from the dead, even though they had seen the empty tomb, seen the angels announcing that he had risen, and heard the witness of Mary Magdalene and the other women that they had actually seen and touched the risen Lord. None of the men believed. So, what was so different about Thomas?

Thomas believed deeply in Jesus. In John’s gospel, just prior to Jesus entering into Jerusalem that last time, Thomas said to his fellow apostles, “Let us go with him, to die with him, if necessary.” Like Simon Peter, Thomas’ faith in Jesus was so strong that he declared he would lay down his life for him. I can imagine all the apostles boasting the same thing at one time or another.

And, like Simon Peter, and like all the other apostles who supposedly had such a strong faith in Jesus, he denied him. All the apostles denied Jesus. They all ran away. Peter just denied Jesus publicly, and dramatically, but they all denied they knew him when they abandoned him. All that big talk about laying down their lives for Jesus was just that; talk. When it came down to their own personal safety they took to their heels. And they were still hiding days later when the women, who were the only ones with the courage to go outside, gave witness to the resurrection.
But wait a minute. There was someone else who had gone outside. Thomas. Where had he gone? Why wasn’t he with the others groveling behind locked doors?

Perhaps he had to get away from them, who most likely were arguing amongst themselves, as usual. Maybe he wanted to go to the tomb to see for himself the destruction of all his dreams. Maybe he was ashamed that he hadn’t had the guts to stand up with Jesus and defend him. Maybe he was running away and came back out of shame.

And he didn’t want to simply see Jesus, he didn’t want to embrace him and hold him. Just seeing his wounds wasn’t enough. Thomas wanted to actually put his hand into his wounds. He didn’t want to see a man. He wanted to see what that man had done for him. It was the wounds, the wounds that counted. On Friday Thomas saw Jesus as a holy man. On Sunday he acknowledged him as the Son of God. Because of the wounds. Thomas wanted to actually enter into Jesus’ suffering. Because he himself was suffering.

Maybe what Thomas doubted was himself.

He wouldn’t be fooled again. Jesus had let him down. He hadn’t called forth armies to overthrow the Romans. He hadn’t come down from that cross and shown them all who he had claimed to be. He hadn’t even defended himself. No, he wouldn’t fall for it again; he had to have solid proof.

But when he did have that proof, when he actually did see the risen Lord, he was the first to worship him as God. “My Lord and my God.” Entering into the wounds of Christ had given him a clarity the other apostles didn’t experience.

Thomas’ story is a lot like ours. We believe we are disciples of Christ, and have been following him for a long time. We sometimes are boastful in our faith. We have all the answers. We go to church on Sunday and we pray…occasionally. And when we read about persecutions of Christians in other parts of the country and the world, we think, “I wouldn’t run away and deny that I’m a Christian if it were me.” But when confronted by a co-worker who tells you that your Catholic faith is false you mumble something and walk away. When the church leaders that we have put so much faith in prove to be a disappointment; we go into hiding. When they are attacked unfairly we don’t rise to their defense. Even worse, we join in the melee. And when our faith in Jesus is inconvenient, or politically incorrect, or infringes too much on our own selfish lifestyles, we fade away into the darkness.

Like Thomas, maybe we doubt ourselves.

We read and pray that we should put all our trust in the Lord, that God wants the best for us, always. We shouldn’t worry about what to eat or what to wear, but then we’re still unemployed after a year. We have lost our home and our self-respect. Our dreams are fading away, and we feel betrayed. Or we hear Jesus say, “Let the little children come to me.” And then we read of the senseless murder of little innocents, or worse yet, we suffer the loss of one of our own children, and all those nice paintings we’ve seen of Jesus with little ones on his lap seem like a lie.

So, like the apostles, we run away and put up walls of skepticism to Jesus. It isn’t supposed to happen this way, so the promises can’t be true. We have to get out of the upper room and clear our heads. All that bold talk about faith seems to be just that when it’s tested so severely. We want proof that our suffering has a purpose. We’ll believe in Jesus when we can actually touch his wounds. We want to enter into Jesus’ suffering to make sense of our own.

And once we do, like Thomas we feel all the pain and bitterness and our own denial fall away and we can clearly declare, “My Lord and my God.” What little faith we have is enough. It will always be enough, because it will never be enough. We can’t do it on our own. We need to touch the risen Lord and see what he has done for us. We need to draw strength from his wounds. The wounds he endured for us. For you.

Sunday, February 14, 2010

Faithfully Yours

6th Sunday in Ordinary Time
Cycle C
Jer 17:5-8
1 Cor 15: 12, 16-20
Lk 6:17, 20-26

Today we hear blessings and curses. Perfect readings for Valentine’s Day!

Wait a minute! Valentine’s Day is all about love. Warm fuzzy, gushy, slobbering, flowers and chocolates, diamonds and hearts and cupids flying about…love. Not a lot of that stuff to be found in today’s readings, so how are they all about Valentine’s Day? Because love isn’t about all those things. Love isn’t always warm and fuzzy, is it? Love isn’t about romance. Love is all about trust.

In our first reading we hear: "Cursed is the one who trusts in human beings..." And, "Blessed is the one who trusts in the Lord." Jeremiah is not bringing curses and blessings down upon us. He is simply stating the truth. If you trust in human beings alone you will find curses. If you trust in God you will find blessings. Why? Well, we have to look at what trust is, first. What does it mean to trust somebody or something? When you say you trust someone, what are you assuming about them? You are assuming that they will do what they say they’ll do. You expect them not to betray you. You expect them to be faithful to you and to their promises.

Trust is all about fidelity, and fidelity is all about love, so love is all about trust.

We’re entering the wedding season here in the mountains. Just as Valentine’s Day isn’t about the candy and flowers and jewelry, a wedding isn’t about the dress or the flowers or the music or the reception. A wedding is about the vows the man and woman give to each other. And they’re really quite simple. The bride and groom simply say to each other, “I promise to be true to you in good times and in bad, in sickness and in health, to love and honor you all the days of my life”. The symbol of marriage is the wedding ring. When the couple exchange rings, each says to the other, “Take this ring as a sign of my love and fidelity. In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.” We don’t promise that we’ll give each other a big house, or fancy cars, or fine jewelry. We don’t promise that we’ll always be happy and like each other. We don’t even promise to squeeze the toothpaste tube from the end. We only promise to be faithful to each other. And we do it in the name of the triune God who is the greatest, perfect example of faithfulness.

Fidelity has no strings attached. No matter what the future brings, we pledge ourselves to be faithful. Blessed are you who are poor. Because at some time you will be poor. Even if your portfolio is great, you will be lacking something you need. Love, security, fulfillment. Blessed are you when you are hungry. Well you will be hungry sometime in your life. Hungry for food, hungry for God, hungry for companionship. Blessed are you who mourn. And you will mourn. The loss of a parent, or a spouse, or a friend, or a job, or an opportunity. Blessed are you when people hate you, or exclude you or insult or denounce you. Because if you are living your Christian commitment they will. During these times we need to be faithful to each other, but most of all, we need to know that, even though we will fail in our fidelity, our God is always faithful to us, no matter what.

I'd like to tell you about a man who had a beautiful trust in God. It is Valentine story because it's about how he found his wife. It happened back in 1920, long before on-line dating services. What the man did was place an ad in a newspaper. This is what the ad said:

"Middle-ranking civil servant, single, Catholic, 43, immaculate past, from the country, is looking for a good Catholic, pure girl who can cook well, tackle all household chores, with a talent for sewing and homemaking, with a view to marriage as soon as possible. Fortune desirable but not a precondition."

A woman named Maria Peintner answered the ad. She was 36 years old, a trained cook and the illegitimate daughter of a baker. She did not have a fortune, but even so, they married four months later. In spite of their somewhat advanced years they had three children - two boys and a girl. The youngest child received the same name as his father: Joseph Ratzinger. He is better known today as Pope Benedict XVI.


After his election, someone dug up the "wife-wanted" ad and showed it to the new pope. The pope, of course, smiled. He knew that his parents gave a beautiful testimony to married love. Pope Benedict would speak often about that love. In fact, his first encyclical is entitled, "God is Love," and it describes marriage as the pre-eminent image and example of God's love for us.

God is the model for married love, and a marriage is the perfect model for God’s love. God is relationship; Father, Son and Spirit, therefore, love cannot exist by itself. It must occur in relationship, and it cannot be fulfilled unless it is given away. Jesus himself described his love for the church as that of a bridegroom for his bride. The ancient Hebrews often spoke of God’s love in terms of romantic love. God’s love for us is that personal, that romantic, that devoted. Each time we speak to each other in words like this we are also describing God’s love for us.

If a person gets up into their mid-thirties (or forties) and they have not found that special someone, they can feel life has passed them by, maybe even that God has forgotten them. That was not the case with Joseph and Maria Ratzinger. From all we know, they were people of deep faith in God. Joseph placed that ad trusting that God would send his life partner his way. And Maria answered that ad trusting that she would not be rejected because of her background and circumstances. Because of their trust in God, they had an admirable marriage and deeply united family.

The important point here is trust in the Lord. In a few days we are going to begin a holy season that emphasizes trust in the Lord. The Church encourages us to sacrifice some of things that are most important to us: food, time and money. We sacrifice food by some form of voluntary fasting, for example, giving up deserts. We sacrifice time by giving a greater portion of our day to prayer. We sacrifice money by almsgiving - by orderings our finances to God's glory and the needs of the poor. You will hear more about this on Wednesday - and next Sunday, the First Sunday of Lent. All of our Lenten practices have one purpose - to increase our trust in the Lord. We force ourselves to give up what we think we need in order to focus ourselves on that trust.


None of us know what the future will bring. We know there will be hunger and plenty, sorrow and laughter, hatred and acceptance. We don’t know when or in what quantity. But we know one thing for sure. That God hungers and feasts with us, laughs and cries with us, feels our humiliation and accepts us for who we are. He knows this because he chose to share in our humanity. He took our weaknesses upon himself and gives us his glory in return.

And he always will. Faithfully.