Your Holy Family

The Feast of the Holy Family

Christmas Day has ended, and many of you spent it with family. Your own nuclear families and often extended family and those close friends we consider to be part of our families. I see many of them here tonight. The media often portray families this season as clean, happy, affluent, laughing and smiling around the tree or the table. And why not? That’s what we all long for, isn’t it? But families are messy, they are broken, and imperfect. They are often far from holy. 

Jesus’ family was also messy. Not his nuclear family but his extended family. On Christmas Eve we heard the beginning of Matthew’s gospel rolling out the genealogy of Jesus, and it was far from perfect. Liars and cheats, murderers and adulterers, faithful and unfaithful kings. And a crazy cousin running around the desert yelling at people. But if we go through the scriptures and read about the lives of the people in that family tree, we find that the one thing that is constant is that even in the midst of their sinfulness and lack of faith in God, even at their worst, God was always faithful to them.

The ultimate sign of that faithfulness is that at the end of that long genealogy is Jesus. God incarnate on the earth in order to reconcile the world to himself. And God chose to begin that reconciliation within a family. It is through the family that we have the best chance for eternal life.

Our families exist to help us get to heaven. We are shown the way to do so in the first two readings today. Sirach lays out God’s plan for the structure of the family, with each person having their proper role. And while there is a hierarchy, there is no power struggle. Sirach uses words like honor, reverence, kindness, prayer, justice and comfort. It is in the home that these virtues are first and best nurtured and lived. And it is from the family that these virtues spread out into the world first through the extended family, then to the community.

 Paul speaks tonight about how the community of faith is to live. He adds to Sirach’s list of virtues heartfelt compassion, humility, gentleness and patience, gratitude, and above all forgiveness. We are to put on love, which is the bond of perfection that holds all relationships together. We are to submit to one another out of love, because that’s what love is – diminishing ourselves for the benefit of others. The Church is called to serve, and not to be served. If we do these things, the peace of Christ will dwell in our hearts, and we will bring that peace to the world.

Wouldn’t it be wonderful if each of our families lived by these virtues and experienced that peace? What would the world be like if every family strived to live this way? But in reality we are often the most unforgiving, cruel and judgmental to those closest to us. Many of us have experienced unhealthy, even violent relationships in our families, and it is sometimes difficult to relate to the images of father, mother and child we hear today. That might be the ideal, but reality is different.

In the Holy Family we get a glimpse of what it would be like if we lived a holy life together. Just because they were holy doesn’t mean they lived in a warm little bubble, unaffected by the world. On the contrary. Mary still heard the snickers of her neighbors behind her back, gossiping about the dubious circumstances of her son’s conception. Joseph had to deal with keeping Jesus safe from a king who wanted to kill him. And Jesus, well, his neighbors even tried to throw him off a cliff when he preached the gospel to them.

Just because Jesus, Mary and Joseph were holy does not mean they were not affected by sin and death. Their faithfulness to God did not preclude the threat of death against them. Mary was conceived without original sin, but her soul was still pierced by the sword of sorrow. And Jesus, God himself, was tortured and killed. To be holy is to be like God, and if God allowed these things to happen to himself, why would things be different for us?

What each member of the holy family had was a choice. Just like us, they were given the choice to remain faithful to the promise God had made to them. Mary had the choice to accept her role as the angel had told her. Joseph had the choice to believe the dreams he had and accept his role, even though of the three he probably understood it the least. And Jesus himself had a choice to submit his will to that of his Father’s. Father, if it is possible let this cup pass me by, but not my will but yours be done.

And they each had the choice either to let the struggles and evil in the world destroy them and make them bitter, or to accept the peace of the Lord that living those virtues would give them.

In so many ways the Holy Family is just like ours. And just as they were like us, we can become like them. We too have choices to make. We can choose to love or to hate. We can choose bitterness or forgiveness. We can choose discord or reconciliation. We cut deepest those closest to us, and so the best place to begin healing is within the family.

But it goes beyond just our own families. On the cross, we all became part of the holy family. We are the beloved disciple to whom Jesus gave his mother. Jesus described his relationship with his Church as that of a bridegroom and his bride, the foundation of the family. Jesus is the head of our family of faith, and it is within that family that we are saved. We are the holy family when we live as church. We are the holy family when we treat each other with compassion, forgiveness, honor and respect. And we are truly church when we extend those virtues to the way we interact in the world, outside these walls.

Emmanuel, God With Us, they called him. God was truly and literally with the Holy Family, and his presence allowed them to withstand the onslaught of the forces of hell itself. Is God present in your family? Is He the center of your lives? Do you pray to Him around your dinner table, at bedtime and throughout the day? That is what Mary and Joseph did. How could they not? Jesus was right there, a constant reminder of the promise God had given them. That’s the real choice you have to make. Will you allow Jesus to be that close to you, be that intimate a part of your family?

It is wonderful that tonight we will be witnessing the baptism of baby Blake. Thomas and Emily have chosen to give their child the greatest gift a parent can give, the promise of eternal life. They understand that their greatest responsibility as parents is to give their child all he needs to get to heaven. Baptism is the necessary first step on that journey. They will be the first teachers of their children in the ways of faith, just as Mary and Joseph were. They know that it takes a Church to raise a child in the faith, and that’s why they are here tonight, with us in community. As the shepherds gathered around the baby in the manger that Christmas night and rejoiced with the angels, so we gather around a little child and his family tonight and rejoice with them as they see the hope of eternal life shine on him. We will continue to support and nurture this family as church so that together we will all share one day in the gift of eternal life.

Gaudete!

3^rd Sunday of Advent

Gaudate Sunday

Cycle A

I woke up this morning in the middle of a Hallmark Channel movie. I live in a small town away from the hustle and bustle of the city. A gentle snow was falling, the house was warm and quiet and decorated for Christmas. There was a tree and ornaments and stockings hung on the fireplace. There was hot coffee and warm blankets, a beautiful woman at my side (although she’s not a blonde) and a dog at my feet. It was like I was living in a snow globe.

That’s what we have come to expect from Christmastime. And that’s how I categorize it. The secular season I call Christmastime. The religious observation is Advent. And every once in a while the two seasons connect, but oftentimes not.

Advent is different from Christmastime. Both are all about anticipation, but what we are anticipating in each is very different. Both set expectations, but one will never fully satisfy. One is looking forward to a day, a single day, and the anticipation is mostly around what we are going to receive. Christmastime is about an experience, one that will soon end. Advent is looking forward to what that first Christmas day put into motion. The incarnation of the Lord paved the way for eternity. The first coming of the Lord set in motion the second coming.  The birth of Jesus was the beginning of something that will never end.

Christmastime as the world now celebrates it is empty. It is never really like we image it should be. My house will never be a beautiful as in a Hallmark movie. The problems in my life will never be neatly wrapped up and resolved in the same way they are in an hour and a half on TV. And we never seem to be satisfied. It’s like the anticipation of little children. They are not excited about the day as much as about what they will receive that day. Have you ever seen it? They are so excited with this present in their hands, but as soon as they open this one they are looking to the next, and the next, and the next. They tear into their presents to see what they are and then push them aside so they can get the next one. And two weeks later, many of the toys will be forgotten, meaningless, nothing special. It seems to be a metaphor for life in the US in general. Disposable joy.

And Christmastime ends abruptly once Christmas day is over. You see it driving down the street the day after Christmas, with all the Christmas trees lying on the side of the road or, here in Park City, piled up at various empty lots around town. We must set aside this holiday to prepare for the next. On to New Year’s Eve! Break out the Valentine’s candy!

For those who understand the season of Advent, Christmas day is not the end but the beginning. If we celebrated it correctly, we would wait to put up our decorations until Christmas Eve, then keep them up until January 12 for the Feast of the Baptism of the Lord. That is the true liturgical Christmas season. But we start preparing for Christmas sometime around Halloween – that’s when the stores start putting everything out – and very rarely do we see or hear any reference to Jesus and the incarnation. It’s all Santa Claus and Elf on a Shelf. You can now go the entire season and never hear a Christmas carol that mentions the Christ child.

But today is different. Today is Gaudete Sunday, the Sunday of rejoicing. We have been preparing our hearts and minds for the true meaning of Christmas, and now the end is in sight. We have been observing Advent, not Christmastime, and it’s time to stop and contemplate the wonderfulness of the gift we are about to receive. It is now time to rejoice because the finish line is in sight. Not presents and festivities but the greatest gift of all – eternal life with Jesus in heaven. We look forward to our salvation, when Jesus Christ returns in his glory and all creation is made new again.

The readings today speak of justice, of setting things right again. When sin entered the world the result was suffering, pain, and brokenness. When the Son of Man returns in his glory everything will be made whole again, as the creator has always intended it to be. It is good and necessary that we stop today and focus on the prize, because it is difficult to see the summit sometimes when we’re down in the weeds.

We speak of peace on earth, goodwill towards all, and we know deep down that that is what we truly crave. The peace of the Lord is different from the peace of the earth. We long for a time when there is no strife or war or suffering or broken relationships, because we feel the anxiety and pain that those things cause us. We seek relief from our suffering. The peace of Jesus Christ is deeper than that and is not dependent on any outside influences. The peace of the earth is the absence of something. The peace of Jesus Christ is the restoration of everything. It is the peace of Adam and Eve in the garden, who had their every need and desire provided, and had the contentment of children, walking hand in hand with their father in paradise.

In fact, Adam and Eve had no wants and desires, because they lacked nothing. They didn’t even know what a desire was, because they had never experienced want. That’s what heaven will be like. That’s what Jesus promised would be restored to all of creation. There will be no regrets of the past and no worries for the future. There will be no blindness nor deafness nor feebleness nor fear. Everything will just be as it intended to be. That is true peace.

Jesus began the work of restoration in his earthly ministry. It was not an accident that he was a healer. He was not just alleviating his children’s suffering as a loving father would, he was restoring them to their intended state. He was reconciling the world to himself. Just as infirmity entered the world through sin, the natural outcome of the messiah’s reconciliation would be the alleviation of suffering. John the Baptist understood the scriptures, and that is why Jesus answered him the way he did. Jesus wasn’t just offering his works as proof that he was the messiah, he was telling John that the prophecies of hope were true, and he was the fulfillment of them.

The peace of Jesus Christ can be present in your life even as you are experiencing earthly sufferings. It is a paradox that your sufferings can actually bring you that peace. Many of us know people who have that peace in the midst of suffering. I think it is because they have completely surrendered themselves to the Lord, as Jesus did. Jesus submitted to the will of his father and had no attachments to worldly things. He never thought about his own needs because he trusted that his father would provide everything he needed. That trust extended to the cross itself, and the resurrection was vindication of that trust. And Jesus was glorified because of it.

That is our future, if we are persistent in our anticipation. We focus on these things for these four weeks of Advent every year, but we are called by Jesus to live that anticipation every day. We have been given the great promise of hope, and we must live as people of hope. We start by holding that hope in our own hearts. If we do, that hope will naturally extend out from us to our families, our friends, our community. That hope will renew the face of the earth. That hope is cause for great rejoicing.

Gaudete!

Keep the Faith

29^th Sunday in Ordinary Time

Cycle C

But when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on the earth?

I wonder…was Jesus just musing, or was he exasperated? Was he frustrated that his disciples just didn’t get it? Was he feeling that he was wasting his time, that people just weren’t getting the message or were willing to make the necessary effort? I can imagine how he felt. I’ve raised teenagers.

This passage in Luke’s gospel falls at the end of one of Jesus’ discourses about the end of the world, when the Son of Man will come again in his glory. He says that many who think they will be saved will not be and many that the righteous think are unworthy will be saved. Narrow is the door, and many will not enter it.

It’s easy to think the same thing in our world today. We can look around at the state of our culture and the trends in the churches and ask if we are facing a dwindling of faith. It seems that every few weeks this poll or that comes out with more depressing news. The Pew Research Center released their annual survey of the religious affiliations in the US this past week and it showed that the number of American adults who identify as Christian continues to drop, from 65% to 60% in the past decade, and the Catholic population has fallen from 23% to 20%. Those “nones” continue to grow, which means that when people leave they are not jumping to another denomination or religion, they are just ceasing to believe in any religion at all. We see these statistics and it’s easy to get frustrated or discouraged.

And I bet that practically all those people who leave still believe in God and still believe they will go to heaven. Because all good people go to heaven, don’t they? And most people, if not all, are good, basically, aren’t they? Narrow is the door, and many will seek to enter it, but it will be closed to them.

The danger today is not the enemy without, it is the enemy within. And the enemy is not persecution as much as complacency.

When Jesus told the disciples how difficult it is to enter the Kingdom of Heaven, they threw up their hands in frustration and asked, “Then can anyone be saved?” Jesus gives us the key today. Be persistent in your prayer to the point of annoyance. Pray always and everywhere, pray constantly, make your entire life a prayer, never stop asking your Father for what you need, never stop praising him, never stop asking for forgiveness, never stop thanking him for his mercy.

And if you tire, get your friends to help you. Like Moses in the first reading, when you just can’t keep doing it, when the battle seems lost, when there is no hope, surround yourself with people who will hold up your hands for you. Stay faithful together around the common goal of your salvation, and help each other get to heaven. That’s what religion is all about. Religion is people helping each other be faithful. Every person is given faith to some degree or other; religion is only what we do with that faith. And faith cannot be experienced or lived outside of a community of believers. One person is not an army. You cannot be saved alone.


And, you know, things are not as bleak as they may seem, both in Jesus’ day and in ours. Yes, most of his friends abandoned him, but eleven didn’t. And look what they ended up doing. And yes, Catholics are only 20% of the population, but that’s still over 66 million people in the US alone. Did you know that the Catholic population of Africa has grown 7000% since 1975? For centuries Christian missionaries have been going to Africa to try to spread the gospel for their salvation. Now, and it seems all of a sudden, African missionaries are coming here and spreading their enthusiasm for the Lord and His church with us. 

And then there’s the amazing growth of the church in South Korea, Vietnam, and even China. In communist China, with an atheistic population and such a repressive government, the population of Christians continues to rise. In the most recent internal surveys, Christians make up only 2.3% of China’s population, which translates to over 31 million people. It’s a small percentage but it’s still 31 million people. The church continues to live out the mission given to it, by loving God and our neighbor. We lift up the poor, feed the hungry, clothe the naked, and spread the hope of the risen Jesus, both collectively as church and in our own daily lives.

Jesus left us with the great commission to go and make disciples of all the nations, and we have. Christians inhabit every nation on earth, and millions are being added to the church every year. The problem is the lack of faith in the West. The place where Christianity began and flourished for over two thousand years is where the faith is dwindling the fastest. We have abandoned the very foundation of our civilization, and what have we replaced it with? We have nowhere to look but to ourselves. We have placed our faith not in God but in ourselves, in the very people who have proven themselves to be the most unfaithful to one another.

When the Son of Man comes, will he find faith in the United States of America? More specifically, will he find his church here?

God calls each-and-every human being ever created to Him. He reaches into the heart of every man, woman and child and draws them to himself. He has placed a hunger for Him in each human soul that cannot be satisfied with anything else. We can try to drown that hunger with all the world has to offer, but it will not be enough. Jesus promised that he would not leave his church -us- orphan. He would send His Spirit to strengthen and guide us through his church. He promised that the gates of hell will not prevail against us. And they won’t.

The question is not God’s faithfulness to us, it is our faithfulness to him.

Jesus never forces anyone to follow him. He never imposes, he proposes. He calls each-and-every one of us, but it’s ultimately up to each-and-every one of us, individually, to answer that call. We are called to love our neighbor, but we cannot force him or her to love. You will be judged on your answer to the call. When it all comes down to it, it’s really just about you and your faithfulness. How you run the race. How you live your commission as a disciple, the commission given to you at your baptism.

When the son of man comes again will he find any faith…in me?

So, I charge you in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus,
who will judge the living and the dead,
and by his appearing and his kingly power:
proclaim the word;
be persistent whether it is convenient or inconvenient;
convince, reprimand, encourage through all patience and teaching.

Amen.

Hard Words

23^rd Sunday in Ordinary Time

Cycle C

Hate is such a strong word.

It seems that sometimes Jesus puts a lot of hard requirements on discipleship. At first glance they seem unreasonable or even impossible to do. Today he uses some really tough language, almost issuing an ultimatum, on what it takes to be his disciple.

“If anyone comes to me without hating his father and mother,
wife and children, brothers and sisters,
and even his own life,
he cannot be my disciple”

What was your reaction when you heard Jesus say this this morning? Two people this week asked me what the readings were that I would be preaching on, and when I told them, both of them practically shouted out, “I don’t like that! I don’t agree with that! That’s not what a loving God would say!”

I think it’s the word Hate that is the problem. What is hatred? It took me a while to even wrap my mind around it, because I honestly cannot think of a single person I truly have hated in my life. When we hate someone we get this visceral feeling in our gut. The very thought or sight of that person makes our emotions rise. We say our blood boils, and we either want to remove ourselves from that person or even go so far as to hurt them. It causes us pain to even think of them or be in their presence.

Is that really the way we are supposed to feel about our mother and father, our family, those people closest to us? And what about hating our very selves? What about that commandment about loving our neighbor as ourselves? How can we do that if we hate ourselves?

Is this even possible for us poor humans? If you’re like me, for years, every time I would read or hear this passage and others like it, I sort of just dismissed them. “Oh, he’s just using hyperbole to make his point.” I would not really give it much thought. Of course he doesn’t mean I have to hate my family. That would be against the fourth commandment. How can I honor my father and mother and hate them at the same time? And he really doesn’t mean I have to sell everything and follow him. Does he? I mean, what if everybody did that? There would be no food or clothing or anything else produced and the economy and society would come to a screeching halt and we’d all freeze and starve. After a while there’d be nobody to buy what you sell or take what you give. And who would give to you? Absurd.

And doesn’t our loving God want good things for us? Why else would He give us His creation to use and the imagination and creativity to create such wonderful things to make people’s lives better. Why would God put us in the world if we aren’t supposed to use and enjoy it?

I think part of the problem is that in English we have only one word to describe hatred. We use the same word to say I hate a person as we do when we say we hate brussel sprouts. We have lots of synonyms for hate; we can loathe a vegetable or have distain or contempt for a person or a position, but those words are not as strong as hate. It’s the same as the word love. I love pizza and I love my spouse. The words we use do not describe the degree to which we love or hate, nor the context. We all use the words but don’t often stop and think what we really mean by them. And we throw them around so casually, don’t we?

There are some translations of this gospel passage that don’t use the word hatred but rather, “turn your back on your mother and father”. But I think the stronger word is probably correct, because it jolts us out of our complacency and focuses our attention better.

All strong emotions, especially love and hatred, tend to become the center of our thoughts and attention. They are two realities that go beyond being mere emotions. They can consume us, to the detriment of all other things. They can drive us to do extreme things, such as being overbearing or over protective, or resort to violence. Hatred is always destructive, but there are even some types of love that are not healthy, mainly because they are not truly love but a form of selfishness.

To hate something is to not be attached to it. All things of this world are temporary, even our earthly relationships. God is eternal, and we are created for eternity. We can only attain that by making God the center of our lives. Jesus was always urging his disciples to leave behind anything that would keep them from being fully engaged and involved with him. That is what a true disciple does. That is what the Kingdom of God is all about, recognizing the primacy of God in our very existence. Giving up control of our own will and subjecting our will to the will of the Father. Just like Jesus did.

Jesus wasn’t asking us to do anything he wasn’t willing to do himself. He had no attachments to worldly things. He said he had no place to lay his head, he relied totally on the hospitality of others, and he told his disciples to go out into the world not worrying about what to eat and drink, what to wear, or even to bring a second tunic or a pair of sandals on their journey.

Jesus wasn’t saying that these things are evil in and of themselves. He was saying the attachment to them can keep us from focusing on what, on who, is really important. Anything that could keep us from a single-minded focus on Jesus is to be avoided. And then there is our responsibility to others. How does our attachment and focus on selfish, worldly things, affect our duty to them as disciples?

Archbishop Wester said that his spiritual director once told him that if he has two of something, one of them belongs to the poor. And so he went into his closet and took an inventory. He had two sweaters and couldn’t remember when he last wore one, so it got donated. And how many pair of dress shoes does a bishop really need anyway? And then he started thinking about all the other ways he spent his money, the restaurants he went to, the car he drove, he house he lived in. Could he make different choices in his life that would allow him to spend his money more wisely for the benefit of others?

Does that mean that sweaters and shoes and houses and cars are bad? Of course not. But if our love of these things is based on vanity and selfishness, that is keeping us from God. Do any of your possessions consume your thoughts? Is there anything you think you absolutely cannot live without? Loving something to the extreme pushes love for other things out. It’s not about our possessions at all, it’s about the importance those possessions hold in our lives and in our thoughts, to the exclusion of what truly matters. Could you say that sometimes what you love causes you to hate something else? To love is to be inclusive, to hate is to exclude?

And I hate to say it, but there are some people in our lives who we love very much but who are keeping us from God. Are some of your relationships causing you to sin? Are some of your closest friends and relatives causing you to doubt your faith? Are they taking you down the wrong road? Are there some people who you do need to turn your back on and follow Jesus? Lots of hard words today. Lots of hard choices to make every day.

Jesus tells us once again today to pick up our cross and follow him.

In picking up his cross, Jesus gave up his own will and surrendered to the will of the Father. He in a sense hated his own life and left behind his mother and his family in order to live, and die, the way his Father wanted. We hear the phrase, “pick up your cross daily” and think that means we are to submit to the bad things that happen to us peacefully. We focus on the suffering of Jesus on the way of the cross and try to link our suffering to that of Jesus. We try to make sense out of and give value to our suffering by comparing it to Jesus’ suffering. But his way of the cross and ours is simply our own journey to God. We all have one. Jesus’ cross is more than just suffering. It is about submitting to the will of God.

It's really just a different take on the two greatest commandments. Love God and love your neighbor. Love God is first. If we love God first then we can really love our neighbor and ourselves. While love for non-God things is exclusionary, eventually pushing out God himself, loving God first allows us to love all the other important things better. Jesus isn’t saying to love God alone. He is saying to love God first, and if you do, loving all the other important things in your life will be easier and more real and fulfilling. Because God is love, and if we start there then all our loving relationships will be real and true and holy. It’s that “Seek first the Kingdom of God, and its holiness, and all other things will be given to you.” True love must have God at the center. All other love is born of that one true love and radiates out from it.

A paradox is that if, in this sense we hate our mother and father and family we will actually be loving them more, with a holy love that is an extension of God’s love for us. But Jesus is all about paradoxes, isn’t he? By dying he gave us everlasting life, by diminishing himself he was raised to highest glory, and by loving him with all our hearts, all our minds, and all our souls we will only then be able to fully love our neighbor as ourselves.

It's About Time

19^th Sunday in Ordinary Time

Cycle C

What is the most important thing to you? Think about it a moment. What is the one thing most precious to you, the one thing upon which all other things depend?

Is it your family? Your health? Success in your career? Your possessions? How about your life itself?

Isn’t it really time? All those other things exist in time, and time is the one thing we have no control over. It rolls over and over like a great river, and we are carried away with it from the moment of our conception to the instant of our death. We exist in time, and it is the one thing we can never get more of. All those other things are servants of time.

How are you spending your time?

Last week we heard the parable of the rich man who planned to tear down his barns to build bigger ones so he could store up all his riches and live a life of leisure, only to find out that he had run out of time and would die that very night. Jesus is always calling us to be watchful because the Son of Man will come when we least expect him. I think these parables are not so much a condemnation of earthly riches as they are about the proper use of our time. For time is the greatest treasure we have.

For where your treasure is, there also will your heart be.

Show me your calendar and I will know where your treasure is. If you’re like me, most of your calendar is filled with all the stuff I need to do. Appointments and meetings and tasks to complete. The bulk of my waking hours is spent on work and career. It’s probably the same with you.

Most of my calendar is taken up with work things, but there are many other appointments scattered throughout that deal with relationships, with people. It may be dinner with some friends or helping one of my kids work on their homes. It may be spending 20 minutes bringing communion to a shut in or counseling someone who’s going through a rough patch in their marriage. Those are things I do as a deacon, but you have similar things on your calendar, without the title or the role. Those are the things that make a difference. Those are the things that you will and should be remembered for.

How will you be remembered? I was in San Clemente last weekend and Nancy and I were walking down by the beach, and they had a bunch of concrete benches set up facing the sea. There were about a half dozen of them, and each of them had a little plaque on it with someone’s name. I guess those people used to love spending time sitting there looking at the ocean, and so their names are memorialized on a bench. And I thought to myself, “Is that how I want to be remembered, with a plaque on a bench somewhere? Is that how people will remember how I used my time?” I don’t want to be remembered for what made me happy but for how I made other people happy. I want to make a difference in the world, and I think you do, too.

You learn a lot about what was important to someone at their funerals, when people tell stories about the deceased and the experiences they had shared with them. The pictures the family puts out at the funeral tell a lot also. Here in Park City there are a lot of skiing and outdoor pictures. He was such an avid skier, she loved to hike in the mountains, and the stories to me often seem empty and a bit sad. Is that what you want people to say about you at your funeral? That you loved the outdoors? That’s a great part of life, and we all enjoy it, but is that all there is?

You know, Jesus spent a lot of time outdoors. He isn’t remembered for that, obviously. The stories we read and hear about him are about his singular focus on other people. His teachings are not about nature or science but about relationships. He healed and taught and died not for things but for people. His people. His friends. Us. He spent such a short amount of time here on Earth, but has anyone in history accomplished so much in a lifetime?

At your funeral, your friends will come not because you were such a good skier but because of the memories they have of the time they spent with you. They will come to honor how you affected their lives and made them better. I don’t want to be remembered for all the things I liked to do. No one will care what I liked to do, they care about how I made them feel, how made their lives a little bit better. I want to be remembered by how I spent my time with people, bringing them to Christ.

I think there is something in every human being that draws us to others, to give of ourselves to others. If God is love, every time we do a loving act we are the image of God to the other. It doesn’t matter if you even believe in God or not, by definition if we love, God is there. That’s how we are wired and that is how God chooses to interact with the human race. Through the love we have for one another. And the greatest sign of our love for each other, the greatest gift we can give one another is our time. It’s not about the amount of time you have been given, it’s about what you do with it.

For we Christians, it goes even deeper, it goes to life itself. We spend our time with others not just because of the enjoyment it brings, we do it because we want to draw others to Christ. Sometimes we spend our time here, at Mass and celebrating the sacraments, but each and every interaction with other people should have the effect of showing the love of Jesus to them. I don’t mean we go around proselytizing and preaching and making a nuisance of ourselves. If we live as true disciples, it will just be part of who we are. It will actually be who we are. As St. Augustine said, “Love God, then do as you will.”

If we just tried to look at people and our relationships with them as Jesus did when interacting with his apostles and those he met along the way, they will want to know what we know and have what we have. They will see hope. And as we heard today in the letter to the Hebrews, faith is based on hope. Faith is the realization of hope. Hope is outside of time because we have hope for eternal life.

And the interesting thing, maybe even the most ironic thing is, it is by using our time wisely for the glory of God here that we will enter into timelessness with God in heaven.

Only One Thing is Required

16^th Sunday in Ordinary Time

Cycle C

We are so anxious and worried about so many things. Only one thing is required.

Summertime is a time for barbecues and weddings and such. There are so many events going on here, so many things to prepare for, so many visitors in town and in our homes. Many of us travel to see family and friends and welcome them as they visit us. Summer is the time for vacations. Summer is a time for connections. Summer is a time of hospitality. And oftentimes summer is a time for worry and anxiety over so many things to do, so many things to get ready for, so many details to attend to.

Have you ever gotten back from vacation and felt you needed a vacation from the vacation? You did and saw a lot of things but never truly relaxed? It took you a couple days to unplug from work, you had a couple days of real vacationing, then the last couple days you were thinking about getting ready to go back to work again? We never really vacate, do we? We never really leave our jobs and homes behind in our minds. Vacations are supposed to help us recharge, to step out of the pressures of our lives for a while so that we can return to them refreshed, stronger, and with new perspectives. For many of us that is rarely the case.

There are some people who have chosen to spend their entire lives or careers studying the scriptures and serving God. They seem to be singularly focused on Jesus. Nothing else is as important as learning all they can from and about him. And Jesus says today that that is the better portion. Did Jesus mean we are to ignore everything except that type of singular focus?

Most of us have not chosen the studious or professed religious or contemplative life. Most of us are living and working in the world. We have families and careers and mortgages. We take our relationships very seriously, especially our relationship with Jesus. We invite him into our lives, just as Martha invited Jesus into hers. We strive to keep Jesus the center of our lives, even as busy as we are.

It is important, no, vital, that we all study and listen and internalize the Word of God if we are to be his disciples. For he has the words of eternal life. But we must do that in the midst of the hustle and bustle of our everyday lives.

Martha wasn’t doing anything wrong. She was doing what custom said she was supposed to do. She was being the good hostess. She was the good servant.

There is grace in hospitality. Martha was serving, but Mary was being fed.

Martha was focused on serving Jesus in a worldly way, worried about the traditions and requirements of hospitality. Mary was focused on the servant himself. Martha was making things complicated; Mary was keeping it simple. Martha was concerned with getting it just right; Mary was concerned with her relationship with Jesus.

And I think that is really what Jesus was getting at. He wasn’t telling Martha that what she was doing wasn’t necessary or important. Somebody had to make dinner. Martha’s problem was that she wasn’t serving with joy. She was resenting her sister and begrudging her tasks. What was important was that Jesus was in their midst. He was there right in front of them, and that was where they should focus. There would always be time to cook and clean and attend to the details of living. But when Jesus is present in our midst we should not worry about all those things and just be in his presence.

There are a lot of preparations that must be made for our liturgies to be sacred times. It takes the efforts of over 80 people to celebrate our weekend Masses alone. But when Jesus is in our midst that is where we should focus. It’s tough sometimes to get everything set up, get all the people in their places, handle all the little mishaps that inevitably spring up, and still be able to let it all go and experience the living Jesus in our midst.

It is hard to get up early on a Sunday morning, get the kids washed, dressed and fed, herd everyone into the pew, clean up the spilled Cheerios, fuss with a crying baby, and still be able to experience the living Jesus in our midst. It’s hard to turn off the world for a few moments to be in the presence of Christ. We come here to experience a bit of peace in our week. We come here to enter into the transcendent, to enter into the mystery. Our everyday lives can be so worrisome and complicated. Here things should be simpler. Here it should be all about Jesus.

But liturgy is messy. People are messy. There are many times I think that we come here hoping to find peace and be fed, but distractions in the church and worries about our problems do not allow us to just sit at the feet of Jesus and be in his presence. We can’t just flip a switch and the world goes away. And Jesus knows that. I think we can still find joy in the midst of our distractions and worries. Joy is a decision. We acknowledge our problems but we do not let them wear us down. We don’t come here to escape the world, but to make the world holy. Our presence here is as important to Jesus as his presence here is to us.

St. John says that the same Martha who was so worried about getting it right was the one who declared Jesus to be the Messiah when her brother Lazarus died. It was Martha who came out to meet Jesus before he even came into the village. She had been waiting for him and looking for him. Mary stayed at home. Mary the student did not go out in search of the Master that day. Martha the servant did.

The person who was so concerned with convention and doing everything just right is the one who found Jesus in the end. It was the servant who recognized the savior. It seems that Martha had taken Jesus’ admonition to heart.

So don’t worry about it. Seek first the kingdom of God, and its righteousness, and all other things will be given to you. Keep your focus on what is truly important, on who is truly important, and all the other things will work out. Serve one another with joy, and I think you’ll find Jesus there, too.

We can find holiness in the ordinary. We are here in the 16^th week of ordinary time, and while technically all ordinary time means in the liturgical year is that we are not celebrating any of the great feast seasons such as Advent, Lent and Easter, the fact that there are far many more weeks in Ordinary Time than in the other seasons is a sign that most of the time we are living our ordinary lives, doing all the everyday things that can seem so routine and cause us so much stress. And in the middle of all of that Jesus is there, making the ordinary extraordinary.

I think it is important that we take time out of the busyness of our lives to recharge with Jesus. Sit at his feet and just spend time with him. Take a half hour a week and pray in quiet here before the Blessed Sacrament. Go on retreat every once in a while. Come to the Way of Christ talk and meal on Thursday nights here at St. Mary’s. Simply create a habit of prayer every day to build your relationship with God. It’s those little connection points with Jesus that make all the difference. They keep us focused, help us live worry-free, and give us hope.

Tell Them the Truth

5^th Sunday of Easter

Cycle C

Acts 14:21-27

Rev 21:1-5a

Jn 13:31-33a, 34-35

 “This is how all will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.” How are we doing with that?

I like to read Catholic blogs. There are so many really good ones out there, and since I am called upon very often to defend and explain the faith, I am always looking for another insight on how to do so. Some blogs are very deep and profound. Others are funny and show common sense. But what I find about most of them is that they are respectful, forthright, and charitable in the way they explain the truths of the Catholic faith. They show no hatred or intolerance towards those who hold differing opinions. However, the same cannot be said of the people who comment on these blogs.

And it’s not just the comments that oppose the position of the blogger. It’s the people who comment on the comments. That’s where you see the divisions amongst the people in the pews. That’s where you see the ignorance and intolerance and name calling and sometimes pure venom. Usually, when someone cannot articulate a good argument they resort to name calling and ad hominem attacks.

The issues of the day have polarized us all. If we disagree with someone, we don’t have civil discourse, we attack them personally. The advent of social media means we can call people all sorts of names anonymously with no threat of reprisal. We post statements that make sweeping condemnations of entire groups of people, not thinking that we may be calling some of our closest friends bigots or racists or worse by association. So many friendships have been lost this way.

All the time we are fighting amongst ourselves we fail to address the tidal wave that is approaching us from outside. We are all worried about how our religious freedom is being whittled away day by day, and we see all the attacks on the Church and its members around the world, but do you blame them? How can the world see the Church as a loving presence in the world when we cannot even show love for one another?

If we ourselves are attacking one another, how can we expect the world to treat us any differently than we treat ourselves? If all we show the world is our own self hatred, how can we expect them to see anything in the Church to emulate and admire?

Gandhi once said, “I like your Christ. I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ.”

In the time of the apostles, the most attractive thing about Christianity was that its adherents didn’t just believe differently, the acted differently. They seemed to care about one another. They took care of the widows and orphans, gave to the poor and healed the sick. Their worship was not based upon individuals fulfilling a prescribed set of rituals in this temple or that, with the hope of appeasing this or that god. Instead, they gathered as one community to worship a different kind of a god. Their god was humble and gentle and loving, not stern and demanding of obedience and sacrifice. He actually gave his life for his disciples, to free the entire world of sin.

These Christians were peaceful. They didn’t join the army, they weren’t vengeful, and they tried to love their neighbors as they loved themselves. They welcomed the people on the margins of society; slaves, women, the poor. There were no class distinctions among them. Everyone was welcome and everyone had the same hope of salvation and eternal life. That was a very attractive lifestyle, and I think that is one of the main reasons why the early church grew so quickly. It is also one of the reasons why it weathered so many periods of severe persecution. Jesus told them to love one another because he knew that that love would be the thing that held them together during those persecutions.

It will be the same today. The attacks on our discipleship from without are getting stronger and louder every day. Our love for one another will be what gets us through this time of trial.

But I think many of us have forgotten Jesus’ admonition to love one another. We have had it pretty easy as disciples. There have really not been very many challenges to our faith here in the U.S. in our lifetime, until now. Catholicism has been the majority religion in this country for as long as we can remember, and the potshots that have been taken at it have mostly either bounced off because of our numbers and influence, or worse, have been absorbed into our beliefs and made us more worldly rather than the other way around.

When I was growing up back East, Catholics were still the minority, and Italian-Americans were still looked down on, and so we tended to gather together as a group for support. Whenever a group is discriminated against they tend to circle the wagons. Christianity is no longer a radical way of living and believing, it has been watered down. We haven’t needed to defend ourselves until the past 50 years or so, and we have become complacent and may have forgotten where we come from and what we’re really all about.

I think we need to get back to the basics of what made Christianity such an attractive way of life. It is all based upon love, and love needs to start at home. Jesus said our mission is to go and make disciples of the entire world. But first we must be disciples ourselves. Tramping around foreign countries as missionaries isn’t in the cards for most of us, but why can’t we simply love? It starts small. First, we must see that we ourselves are loved beyond measure, just because we are. We are celebrating the great manifestation of that love these fifty days of Easter.

You notice I didn’t say, “First you must love yourself”. The danger of self-love is that it has limits and oftentimes our love just stops there. Self-love is inner directed while true love is directed outwards. Our love can fail; God’s love cannot, so build your foundation on that unchanging truth.

You know, Jesus didn’t say, “This is how all will know you are my disciples, if you love everyone in the world.” Instead, as usual, he focused on what was right in front of him. He knew that if only his small group of close friends could learn to love one another, then that would be an attractive example to the rest of the world. He said, first, love one another. Then go and make more disciples who love one another, and after a while the whole world would be disciples who love one another. And that is how he would renew the face of the earth.

Just strive to love those closest to you. Jesus didn’t say, “Love one another as I have loved all the crowds I’ve been preaching to and healing these past three years.” He said, “Love one another as I have loved…you”. He loved his friends. Jesus didn’t show his love to the crowds, he showed it to those right in front of him who were hurting. He taught the crowds; he had compassion for and healed individuals. It is sometimes easier for us to be kind to a stranger in need than it is for us to be kind to the people in our families. Why not start there?

And when there is need for correction, do so with love. St. Paul said we are to admonish one another out of love. Pope Saint John Paul II used to say that the best way to love someone was to tell them the truth:  To teach the truth with love. Get it right, know what you’re talking about, and then offer correction with compassion and charity. But do you know the truth? Do you believe the truth? Do you live the truth? Do you testify to and defend the truth? This can be hard when the truth is the exact opposite of the conventional wisdom. The truth can lose friendships, the truth can alienate your children, the truth can get you fired or even physically attacked. "It is necessary for us to undergo many hardships to enter the Kingdom of God." 

A disciple is more than someone who just learns from the master; a disciple becomes like the master. A disciple patterns his or her entire life on the master’s, and then calls others to do the same. What did Jesus do? He gave his entire life for the people he loved. He laid done his life for those he loved.

If we truly showed that kind of love for our families, we wouldn’t have to worry about them eroding. If we showed that kind of love for our spouses, we wouldn’t have to worry about the institution of marriage. If we showed that kind of love for our children, there would be no abortion or abuse of any kind. If our families are truly images of Jesus, society would be transformed in just a few generations.

So be kind to one another. Pray for one another. Admonish one another to live moral lives. Give material and spiritual support to those closest to you in need. Lift each other up. That’s how we show our love for one another. Start there and maybe, just maybe, other people we see that love and be attracted to that love and want a part of that love in their lives, too.

And when they ask you about it, tell them. Tell them why you love and who you follow. Tell them the truth.

Blind Man's Bluff

4^th Sunday of Lent (Scrutiny)

Are you a sinner or are you someone who sins?

One of our catechists asked that question of our RCIA class a couple weeks ago. It was one of those questions that caused everyone to pause a second, think about it, and then say “Hmmm”. It wasn’t as simple as it sounded. What was she getting at? Of course we’re all sinners, right? Isn’t that a core Christian belief?

But this question stopped us in our tracks. Most of the class answered at first that we are sinners. Isn’t that what original sin is all about? But then the whole mercy thing kicked in, and they started waffling. Being a sinner is a definition of who we are. Being someone who sins seems more like something outside of ourselves. It is something I do, not who I am. I think it gets to the core of what you think sin is and how you view yourself. No, it’s really about how God views you.

What is your image of how you were created? Were you created bad and in need of saving, or were you created good but you make bad decisions and are in need of forgiveness? The first image is sort of fatalistic. You’re condemned before you’re even born. You were created in sin, and you are basically evil. Martin Luther wrote, “Conceived in sorrow and corruption, the child sins in his mother’s womb”, and he described the human soul as a pile of dung that is covered by a blanket of snow. On the outside we may look pure, but deep inside we’re really…well, you know.

The Catholic view of humanity is that while we are fallen, we are not worthless excrement. Rather, we have great value. Our God values us so much he died to conquer our sinfulness. As St. Paul wrote in the letter to the Romans,

“Just as through one man’s disobedience

all became sinners,

so through one man’s obedience

all shall become just.”

God doesn’t create anything evil, but because he has given us free will we sin. It may seem like a subtle distinction, but I think it means a lot. One image I think is a positive, hopeful view of human nature and the other is a negative, destructive image of human nature, one that has caused great suffering in the world. We see both images at play in today’s gospel.

The Pharisees believed, as did all Jews at the time, that prosperity, good health and good fortune were signs that a person was righteous. Conversely, if you were sick or poor or suffered misfortune it was because you were a sinner. This was especially true if you had some serious disease like leprosy or a major disability like blindness or deafness. And in the case of someone born disabled, the thinking was that since a baby really couldn’t be held responsible for their affliction, it must have been because of the sins of the parents. And if the child continued in their affliction, the sins of the parents lived on in them.

The blind man could not enter the temple. Everybody said he shouldn’t be there, and he himself thought he shouldn’t be there. He also thought he was unworthy to be in the presence of God, because he was a sinner. He was reduced to begging at the door. The people who passed him every day saw him as unworthy, beneath them, worthless to God and man. And so he saw himself as unworthy and worthless. How could he ever become worthy? How could he ever come in out of the darkness and be included among the seeing?

And the self-righteous people, the good church going folks who had it all together shunned and avoided the unrighteous. Publicly. Just like today.

What is sin today? Do we even see it anymore? It is topsy turvy. Many actions that are sinful are socially acceptable and to be lauded and what does not conform to the conventional wisdom is considered sin. The modern day Pharisees are the self-righteous who condemn people because of the groups they do or don’t belong to. Just as the Pharisees condemned the blind man as a sinner because of his affliction, so today we condemn people because of their affiliation. We shun the “sinners” who are not the same color as us, who don’t have as much money as we do, who don’t share our religious or political views. We paint entire groups of people as evil because they’re different from us, and we do it in the most humiliating and vicious and public ways imaginable. If you disagree with me, you are not just mistaken, you are evil. All you have to do is check out the comment boxes on social media to see that this is true.

Non-conformity has become sinful, and real sin is misunderstood or ignored.

Sin is a reality. We must recognize and acknowledge that sin is real, that it affects all of us, even the sins we do not commit ourselves. Then we must acknowledge that we ourselves sin. This may seem a silly thing to say, but I believe that there are millions of people in the world today who do not believe in sin, that right and wrong depend on what the individual person thinks is or isn’t wrong. There are no moral absolutes, no objective evil, just the individual will.

And on the other side, there are many people who feel so guilty when they sin that they actually believe they are unforgivable. Their sense of their sinfulness has become a crushing burden. We can be both blind to our sin and blind to the mercy of God that frees us from sin.

We must have a balanced sense of sin, both in our individual lives and in society. If we refuse to believe we sin, we will be destroyed. If we allow ourselves to be overwhelmed by our sinfulness, we will be destroyed. We must not be so blind to our own sinfulness that we think everything we do is ok and yet not be so discouraged by our sin that we feel worthless, helpless, and lose hope in God’s mercy.

We must always live in the hope of our redemption. We sin, yet we are still very much valued and loved by God. We need to focus not on our failures, but on God’s mercy. The hopeless have no desire to change. We must confront our sinfulness with the resolve to be better than we sometimes are.

Jesus did not see the man born blind as someone steeped in sin from his birth and therefore without hope of salvation. He saw his very purpose in being born to be for the glory of God. And he physically cured the man without even addressing his sinfulness. He actually turned the beliefs of the Pharisees against them by removing the very thing that they thought made the man a sinner. He cured his blindness. The Pharisees could no longer claim that the man was a sinner because he had been made whole. And the blind man began to see himself differently, too. Jesus exploded their entire world view and reversed their situations. The blind could see and the seeing remained blind.

Jesus has the power to cure the body and the soul. Physical afflictions do not make us sinners. Our own choices do that. But Jesus forgives us our sins. He does not see us as inherently bad people; he sees us as good with infinite potential but in need of forgiveness because we choose to sin. He saw the goodness in the blind man as a son of God. He showed him great mercy. He sees the same in us and offers us the same mercy.

This morning we will be celebrating the second scrutiny with our elect and candidates preparing for the sacraments of initiation at the Easter Vigil. It is good that we all scrutinize our lives along with them, to acknowledge that we have sinned and accept the forgiving love of God that continually calls us all to conversion. I now call forward our elect and candidates along with their godparents and sponsors to the foot of the altar.

Fallling in Love

3^rd Sunday of Lent (Scrutiny)

Falling in love with Jesus

This is a love story.

This is the story of all of us, but in particular, it is the story of our catechumens with us today who have been searching, praying, and drawing closer to Jesus these past several months. And that is why we have read these readings today, because we have our catechumens present. At all the other Masses today we will hear different readings, but the Church says we must read these readings today, for them to hear, because they are nearing the completion of this stage of their faith journey, to enter fully into the life and love of Jesus in his Church through baptism, confirmation and first eucharist at the Easter Vigil.

Many people think that the RCIA program is all about knowledge, all about learning about the Catholic Church, and partly it is. But mostly, it is about falling in love. There are lots of people who have knowledge of the Church and its teachings, but not a lot of us are actually in love with it. There are lots of people who have a rudimentary knowledge of Jesus, but not a lot of us are actually in love with Him. Because knowledge is not enough.

Unless we move beyond just knowledge to love, our faith will never be fulfilled. It is through reason that we understand with the head. It is through prayer and contemplation and worship that we understand with the heart. If all you have is book learning then your faith has no motivation. If all you have is emotion, your faith has no roots. It is like the person Jesus said builds his house on sand. When trials and tribulations blow there is no conviction there to keep it from being torn down.

This fact is being borne out today. According to newly released General Social Survey data, the percentage of Americans who don’t affiliate with any specific religious tradition is now roughly the same as those who identify as evangelical or Catholic. About 23% of Americans claim to be Catholic, and Americans claiming “no religion” now represent about 23.1 percent of the population, up from 21.6 percent in 2016. The key finding is that these people are leaving not to join another church community, but to leave and profess nothing. And the losses are coming from the mainline Christian churches, of which the Catholic Church is the largest.

People don’t leave what they love.

Just like there are stages of grief, there are stages of love. And the woman at the well goes through all of them. This seems almost like a sparring match, sort of like an old Doris Day/Rock Hudson movie. There’s a chemistry between Jesus and the woman, a reaching out, a pushing back, and gradually the woman comes closer to Jesus who is calling her to conversion.

First there is a connection. Sometimes it’s a strong attraction and sometimes it’s tentative. This is followed by a mutual give and take where both people reveal things about themselves over time. This either leads to a stronger attraction and more revelation that leads to knowledge of the other, and a growing sense of trust. Only after trust is established can love truly happen.

The woman at the well came to love Jesus only after he “told me everything I have ever done”. But that was not what turned her heart. Everyone in her village knew her past. It was the fact that even though he had such intimate knowledge of her and her life, he did not judge her for it like her neighbors did. Instead, he offered her eternal life. How liberating that must have felt for someone who felt so ostracized and worthless that she had to go to the well in the middle of the hot day, when no other people were expected to be there! Jesus gave her back her dignity. He spoke to her when he wasn’t supposed to. He conversed with her as an equal, without looking down on her. And he offered her himself, the life-giving water that would change her life forever.

And like anyone who has fallen in love, she ran and told everyone about it. She told her neighbors who had totally ostracized her that she had found the messiah, and she was compelled to bring them to him. How much courage that must have taken! But people in love do great acts of courage without thought sometimes, without considering the consequences.

We are all the woman at the well. We all have a past that includes things we aren’t particularly proud of. We all have sinned and have felt the worthlessness sin can bring. And we have all encountered Jesus in some way or other. Some of us have moved our relationship with him to another level, to the level of trust. Some of us have gone all the way to love. We have fallen in love with Jesus. And 23 percent of us have not and say we have no belief.

This morning we are celebrating the first scrutiny for our catechumens. 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.

We will share with them the statement of our beliefs. We will profess once again the truths that have been revealed to us by God himself, the truths that make us Christian, the truths that bind us together, the truths that lead us to love of God and of one another, the truths that lead us to eternal life.

The woman at the well was faithful to her understanding of her beliefs, but that alone would not ensure her salvation. It was not until she had a conversation with her God, one to one, face to face, did she begin to understand. And that conversation was brutal and honest. It brought into the light what had been going on in the darkness. We are all called by Jesus to that conversation. Our catechumens even more so. But that conversation should not be something to fear; it is necessary to remove the barriers we have set up to loving God. Just as we must move from knowledge to trust to love of God, we need to confront our own selves with all our imperfections, if we can allow ourselves to trust, if we can allow ourselves to be loved.