Past Homilies 2008
“Third Sunday of Lent”
February 24, 2008 “Are You Thirsty?”
The Text: Exodus 17:3-7; John 4:5-42
Beginning today, this third Sunday of Lent, we hear the first of the three stories from John’s Gospel that tell us something powerful about the gift given us in our Lord. The sheer volume of verses read in each of these stories is more than normal Gospel lessons. All three stories speak to the great need for life that is both deeply meaningful and transforming. In each of these stories, we meet a person whose experience is like a mirror in which we see ourselves. All three stories tell us what we most need to hear and they call us to what we most need to become.
The first of these stories takes place outside a small village in Samaria, some 15 miles north of Jerusalem. Jesus and his disciples are traveling from the Holy City, on their way back to Galilee. Having descended from the heights of Jerusalem to the hot, dry region of Samaria, he and his friends come to a well that the patriarch Jacob dug some 2,000 years earlier. Hungry and tired, the disciples leave Jesus at the well where he can rest while they go into the village to buy food. Some time passes when a woman, carrying a large, terra cotta jar, comes to the well to draw water for her household. It is here, in that space and time between our Lord and this unnamed woman, that we meet ourselves, clothed in the rough cotton garb of a first century stranger. Without introduction, Jesus asks her for a drink. Because Jews and Samaritans had chilly relations with each other and because he, a man was asking a woman who was both Samaritan and a stranger for a drink, we tune in to the conversation, curious to know more.
What follows is a conversation about thirst and water, custom and worship, confusion and discovery. Yes, Jesus talks with her about her present and her past, curious himself why this woman was coming to the well at high noon knowing that women came to draw water at dawn and dusk. As they talk, our Lord gently but powerfully moves into her spiritual and emotional space until she realizes what we already know. He is the messiah, the One promised long ago, who is the Savior of the world.
I wonder: What if the well in this story is a metaphor, a symbol for God’s renewing, thirst-quenching grace. If you please, this lengthy, detailed narrative could be a well of cool, spiritual water with so many opportunities to lower our bucket for a drink. And if we would, we would take a few minutes right now to rest our weary bones on the warm stones of this well, we might find water that is life in all its God-kissed wonder.
Are you thirsty? What if we lowered our empty, terra cotta vessel of failure into this well of God’s grace? The woman in the story did not need Jesus or anyone else to tell her how broken and crocked her life had become. In her rearview mirror were five husbands who had used, perhaps abused, and discarded her like so much crumpled paper. Now, she lived with a sixth man who was not her husband, no doubt she was once again being used as a convenient way to satisfy this man’s desires. For years, she had lowered her life many times into many wells, over and over again, thirsty to the point of death, only to bring up time after time the brutal pain of failure.
Are you thirsty? This Samaritan woman’s spiritual DNA is in all of us. To be human is to experience no small amount of failure throughout life’s journey. We try and fail at all kinds of things: hobbies, learning, relationships, friendships, business ventures, and yes, religious devotions. The story tells us clearly that the greater sin is not the failure at any of these things; failure, like success, is part of the human experience.
No, the greater sin is how we respond when failure comes, as surely as it will. When one of life’s many experiences bruises, wounds, even crushes us, will we choose to lower our failed lives into the renewing water of God’s grace? Or, do we, like this woman, simply bounce from experience to experience, plagued by guilt, infected with regret, all the while wondering where we are and where God might be.
Are you thirsty? Do you want a drink that satisfies?
Others of us may need to lower the leaky pot of what could best be described as religious “notions” into this well gurgling with God’s grace. Listen to the conversation between this woman and our Lord and you will overhear so many of our own confusions about faith, worship, and devotion. Rather than drink deeply from our Lord’s nourishing grace, this woman would have interrupted the conversation, turning it into a theological debate. Don’t be too hard on her. We too, when God’s Spirit tugs at our hearts, can re-focus the conversation from our deepest needs to some sterile, academic debate about the Trinity, the liturgy, some political issue, or what we believe to be the proper expression of faith. We all have opinions and notions, but often they are nothing more than leaky and cracked pots that rob us of God’s thirst-quenching grace.
So where does this leave us on this third Sunday of Lent? What are we to do with the imposters of human failure and shallow notions? The story gives us good and faithful options. For one, we would be wise to let our Lord lead us in life’s journey, rather than us attempting to lead him. Simply put, Lent is God’s open invitation for us to, to once again, follow Jesus. If we so choose, we must let him lead us from our self-centered agendas to his cross of sacrifice and life. The woman in the story – whose DNA is in all of us – tries to re-frame the conversation to engage Jesus in a debate over religion, worship, and politics. Not until she relents, gives in, concedes to his loving presence does she realize all her words are but empty syllables.
What do we do? We simply bring every broken, dry, and useless vessel to Jesus, asking him to make them new in the nourishing, renewing waters of his grace. We dare lower our old, tried but failed lives into God’s well of grace by following Jesus wherever he may lead us. And when we do, we, like the woman long ago, may hear within, as deep as an old well, these thirst-quenching words: those who drink of the water that I will give them will never be thirsty.”
Are you thirsty? Who isn’t! In the gift of God we find the promise of living water without end. Who knows, maybe during these Lenten days, we may come to this well of unending grace and there meet the One who alone can transform our lives and make them new. Are you thirsty? Come and drink of His grace. Amen.
Past Homilies 2007
October 28, 2007
“Lord Teach Us How to Pray”
In the gospel we have heard again that Jesus was a teacher, and we know that the only thing his students ever asked him to teach them was how to pray. Jesus taught them, and us, his beloved prayer the Our Father which we will recite later in today’s Mass. Jesus also knew that as well as words his disciples needed to learn the attitude of prayer. Prayer is not for show. Prayer is not a gimmick. God is not an automatic dispenser of grace, good weather, good health, or whatever we think we want. You may remember that last week Jesus taught us to be persistent in our prayer so that God can help us see through our wants to our needs. This week Jesus goes to the heart of the matter in teaching us about the attitude of prayer.
Perhaps we can use the field of sports to illustrate attitude. One of the sports commentators was quoted as saying something like this: “If you’re worried about what you look like, you’re not really playing the game.” Imagine Michael Jordan, flying toward the basketball hoop with his tongue flapping in the wind. This unique approach led to many unflattering news photos yet it resulted in thousands of baskets. I think Jesus is giving us some similar advice about prayer today. If you’re worried about what you look like, you’re not really praying.
Most people pray. We acknowledge God and want God to listen to us and help us. We want to form a relationship with God that fosters an abiding love and a mutual transparency, or clear window into our hearts, so that God can see our sincerity and forgive our weaknesses.
Judging from the number of books written on the subject we obviously need a lot of help when it comes to prayer. If prayer is talking with God, why is it so complicated? Do we think we need to get God’s attention? E.g. Hey God listen up! Let us observe closely Jesus the master teacher, the one whom we hear praying to the Father throughout Scripture, and the one who listens to our prayer.
Jesus was a great storyteller. We know this because his audience remembered so many of his stories years after he died. His first audience was very familiar with the rabbi/story technique. They loved his stories because they were sure they recognized the “hero” in each one and could figure out what should be the expected outcome. But they were wrong! Jesus’ parables were always surprising, turning the world upside down. Let us enter into the gospel story of the Pharisee, and Tax Collector, going to the Temple to pray.
In Jesus’ time Jews prayed daily and many of them often came to pray in Jerusalem’s Temple, which was a symbol of God’s continued presence with the chosen people. The Pharisees were very meticulous about following the law, and even went beyond the minimum requirements. Jesus’ listeners concluded therefore, that they had found the hero of the story. Unlike the Pharisees tax collectors were despised as collaborator with the Roman oppressors and as those who gained riches from paying themselves from the excess taxes that they collected with Roman power. The Pharisees were quick to judge the tax collectors actions. No one expected anything good to come from his prayer. It was surprising to find out he prayed at all and surely God would not be listening to him with his unclean hands and heart.
Let us observe the Pharisee’s attitude. He stands in the front of the Temple. He raises his hands to God and “prays this prayer to himself.” Basically he says: ‘God, I’m great. I pray; I fast; I tithe, more than you require. In fact, I’m much better than almost everyone else, sinners all. I’m especially glad that I’m not like this Tax Collector.’ If we could talk to the Pharisee on his way out of the Temple, he would tell us that his prayer went very well. Everyone could see him praying and he certainly made a few good points in his prayer. Jesus’ conclusion however, was that the Pharisee did not leave “justified,” i.e. in right relationship with God. The Pharisee did good things but did not become a good person. He didn’t invite God into his heart and didn’t notice that God was not walking with him. He felt justified in despising everyone else.
At first glance, St. Paul, in the second reading, might sound a little like the Pharisee when he claims to have competed well and kept the faith. Notice however that he gives the ultimate credit to God who was first faithful to him. He knows that God has stood by him. He expects that God will rescue him and bring him safe to his eternal reward. Paul was also a Pharisee with the same fervor and high principles as our Pharisee. But Paul always let God in and his journeys with God brought him to accept even Gentiles as believers, the new chosen people.
Now let us observe our Tax Collector. He knows he’s not very popular but still he comes to a public place, the Temple, to pray. He knows his unworthiness before God and stays far off, praying with the gesture of mourning and humility. He doesn’t have much to say, asking God for mercy, admitting that he is a sinner. As he quietly left the Temple, if we had asked him how things went, he might have said … “I cannot pray. I was thinking of asking the Pharisee because he seems to know all about it. I could only say I was a sinner. My past is so dreadful, I cannot imagine myself praying. I am better at stealing.” Jesus tells us that the Tax Collector was justified, connected with God, giving God a chance to work in his heart and perhaps someday with his heavenly balance sheet showing the goodness of his heart.
We, too, are called to pray. Whether we raise our hands or bow our heads, Jesus encourages us to let God in, to let God touch our lives, to become transparent before our God who already knows us so well. Let us not despise the Pharisee, or our own tendencies to think like a Pharisee, and falling into his trap of thinking we are better than everyone else. Who sees the deepest places of the heart and the whole story? Only God. Let us give God room to work in our lives as we hope the Tax Collector eventually did. Who sees the possibilities in each of us? Only God. When we pray … the only eyes that matter are God’s.
Twenty-Fifth Sunday in Ordinary Time
September 23, 2007
"Time is Precious"
This weekend we usher in the Fall season with the leaves starting to change, and our minds drawn to how quickly time passes. Time is precious. The ancient Roman phrase, "tempus fugit" (time flies), sums it up well. Ben Franklin’s Advice to a Young Tradesman purports, "time is money." The Book of Ecclesiastes reminds us, "there is an appointed time for everything, and a time for every affair under the heavens." Our timeless eternal God created us so as to live in a world that measures activity in time.
Try keeping a journal of how you use your time for one week. There are 10,080 minutes in the 168 hours in a given week. It is reasonable to say that the average person works 40 hours and spends another 40-plus hours sleeping. Thus, about half the week is spent between working and sleeping. So this begs the question; How do you spend the rest of the hours in your week?
Consider the time spent in caring for children and family, preparing meals and eating, household chores, driving, shopping, relaxing with hobbies, watching television, recreation, exercise, and things of the like. Some hours are spent in productive work and relaxation; the balance of the hours might be spent on things of a more frivolous nature. And then there are those moments of wasted time when our activity is of no beneficial consequence.
There is a great network of people who earn a living by helping others stay organized and plan their activities. There are financial and investment advisors, retirement planners, education consultant, and money managers to help clients invest wisely for a secure future. There are advisors who help with the proper care of health, medical plans, exercise plans, diet plans, and physical routines. Travel agents are ready to help arrange for a time of enjoyment and relaxation. Life can easily become complex with many expectations competing for our time. If we don’t keep all things in perspective, we can easily become so busy that we go through life like an animal on a running wheel. Meanwhile, valuable time flies by!
We need to remember to include our spiritual life and growth among our priorities in life. In the often hectic pace of life, how much time do we give to God? If we logged the hours in any given week, might we be somewhat surprised at the meager amount of time we spend in meaningful prayer and worship? Count the minutes for prayer and worship in light of the hours of work, sleep, relaxation, and other responsibilities that we embrace.
Jesus addresses just this situation in the Gospel story today. The parable of the industrious servant shows how clever we can be with the worldly concerns of life. On this level, we find it important to invest wisely, make connections with influential and powerful people, and look for the most profitable way to make the most of our time and effort.
On the other hand, when we consider our spiritual side, we might be lucky if prayer gets a few thoughts at the beginning and end of the day. Maybe a meal prayer is part of our daily routine. And how much time is spent in worship of God? Dare we easily excuse a lack of prayer and time for God because we are otherwise too busy? When we fail to pray and worship God, we relinquish the opportunity to experience his love and presence in our lives.
Here are two things to think about. If a financial advisor were to give you guaranteed advice that an investment would make you much richer, you probably would not hesitate to take it. If you were offered the spiritual advice that an investment of additional faith and prayer would make you eternally happy, would you accept it?
The first offer of guaranteed financial success is generally improbable to find. No financial risk guarantees a profit. The risk of losing everything usually haunts the investor.
On the other hand, we have a life-giving guarantee from Jesus for eternal happiness. We need only invest a few minutes of daily prayer and weekly worship along with daily expressions of love and concern for others. These are the qualities of life that give evidence of belief in Jesus our savior. For so little that we can offer to the Almighty, this is a great return: eternal life! That is the ultimate return for giving of our time, love, and devotion to God. Even after we give to God, there is extra time for our other responsibilities, enjoyment, and relaxation. Our time is well managed when we start with God and only then use the balance of our time for other things in life. The "eternal" is deserving of our prime time.
It is wise for us to examine our priorities in life. We need to be as industrious in planning our spiritual welfare as we are with our temporal welfare. We need to be sure to develop a spiritual regimen that includes an exercise plan and visits to the doctor and an investment advisor in order to enhance our spiritual life account. It is the Lord who provides all of the spiritual life account. It is the Lord who provides all of these spiritual opportunities through the church and the sacraments. Let us put our time and energy into enhancing our spiritual growth and development.
Consider what you do with the 10,080 minutes of the 168 hours of your week. Your calculation will illustrate your priorities in life. Our time is most precious when it is given to God.
God does not watch the time or count the minutes; he has no need of arithmetic. He is infinite. He gives himself completely to us every moment of every day. How is it, then, that we can be so calculating in how much time we give back to God?
God does not count or measure the love he metes out to us. God is most deserving of our precious time and devotion in light of all that he extends to us without measure. There is everything to gain for so little that we give back to God.
There is an appointed time for everything, most especially, prayer and devotion to God. There is no time like the present to make or renew your commitment! Your future depends on it.
“Pentecost”
May 27, 2007
“The Energy of Divine Love”
When God created the Earth He filled it with energy. God created fire. This fire is locked away in the center of the Earth and we see it streaming from volcanoes, and recently we saw it in the raging forest fires in Georgia and Florida. This energy awaited the ingenuity of man to use it for good or evil. God created the winds to sweep across the earth, at times bringing rain clouds, and at times bringing disaster. In time, humans learned to use this energy as well. Sailing ships on the seas, windmills on the prairies, and now, even machines that convert the energy of the wind into electricity. And always there has been the powerful energy of the mighty sun and the equally powerful energy of the tiny atom. In time, human creativity would unlock these energies as well.
But there is another kind of energy that has existed alongside these natural sources. It is an energy so powerful as to dwarf all others. An energy that cannot be created or controlled by humans. I mean, of course, the energy of divine love, that uncreated energy flowing into our world through the Holy Spirit. This energy too was present at the dawn of creation, for we read in the first lines of Genesis, when God created all things, “a wind from God swept over the face of the waters” (Gen 1:2 ). The Holy Spirit brings a powerful energy to our world, and only God could release it.
From Genesis on through all of scripture, the activity of the Holy Spirit is hinted at in the history of salvation. In the Book of Job we hear, “The spirit of God has made me, and the breath of the Almighty gives me life” (Job 33:4). And in Isaiah, “The spirit of the Lord shall rest on him, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge and the fear of the Lord” (Isa 11:2). From this scripture passage comes our understanding of the seven gifts of the Holy Spirit. And at the start of our Christian scriptures, we hear of Jesus conceived in the womb of Mary by the Holy Spirit.
The Holy Spirit has always been active in the world, but at Pentecost something unique happens. The Spirit becomes intensely personal, intimate, and close to our hearts. In the Gospel reading, Jesus breathed on the apostles and said, “Receive the Holy Spirit” (Jn 20:22). A very intimate gesture. The author of Acts says the Spirit appeared in the form of tongues of fire: “There appeared to them tongues of fire, which parted and came to rest on them (2.3). Each of them present received the Spirit individually. Each of them received from the Holy Spirit a power, an energy, a fire of love that would transform the world. Our short history as Church shows that this energy is truly more powerful than all others.
The marvelous thing about the outpouring of the Holy Spirit, which began on Pentecost, is that it has never stopped. Like Christ, the Holy Spirit has undergone a kenosis, and emptying out so that those redeemed by Christ might become holy. The Spirit that came upon each of us at baptism and confirmation continues to work in us, even when we are unaware of it, shaping us into the body of Christ. The energy that comes through the Holy Spirit transforms and divinizes each one of us.
The uncreated energy of grace, of divine love, bombards our souls constantly, the way beams of sunlight strike the earth, renewing it and giving it life. When this energy of the Holy Spirit finds a receptive heart, a heart where the fire of love is already burning, something wholly unimaginable can happen. We can become people who are deeply caring, people who will sacrifice time and money for the good of others, people for whom social justice matters more than social standing.
The acts of charity, which the Holy Spirit inspires, make us holy, because charity, or love, contains all other virtues. That is why St. Paul could say in 1 Corinthians that if I have all the virtues, but have not love, I gain nothing. It is love that makes us truly holy. This divine energy affects us all. It is not reserved for great saints. The Holy Spirit sanctifies each one of us, making us holy, by stirring up the fire of charity, enabling us to change, to become more other-directed, less self-centered in our loving.
Today we hear of crisis in the Church. Perhaps we should think of it as an energy crisis. We are told by the Holy Father that the real answer to this crisis is greater holiness. And he is right. It takes energy to live a holy life. The ultimate explanation for these problems is a squandering of the uncreated energy of love that was first given to the Church at Pentecost. Whenever there is a crisis in the Church, we must pray for a new outpouring of the Spirit.
Our history teaches how likely it is that this will happen. After the first Pentecost, the Church grew and expanded in every part of the ancient world. It was a marvelously energetic time in salvation history. The same dynamic activity has occurred repeatedly in the Church. After the scandal of the Protestant Reformation, there came a great renewal of Church life. The Council of Trent was held, reforms were made, new religious orders came into being, a renewed Church was born. The same occurred in our own time at the Second Vatican Council, when the Spirit stirred up the Church to renew itself so as to better evangelize the modern world. Knowing what the Holy Spirit has done in the past gives us hope that once again the Church will be renewed. Pray that the Holy Spirit will once again enkindle a great fire of love in all those who serve the Church.
We depend on many forms of energy in our world. But for real change, we depend on the energy that comes from the Holy Spirit. We can use our natural energy to accomplish much good. But the real energy for change comes from the Holy Spirit. It is the uncreated energy, the grace that we receive freely from the Spirit that produces holy people. In our Eucharist, we give thanks for this most powerful of energies at work in our world: the power of divine love given to us by the Holy Spirit.
Third Sunday of Easter
April 22, 2007
“Take the Plunge”
Have you ever wondered what our world would be like if Simon Peter hadn’t taken the plunge that morning on the Sea of Tiberias? Have you ever wondered what our world would be like if we did not take the plunge in our daily lives?
In many ways the story played out in today’s Gospel is the story of our own lives. It is the story of recognizing Jesus on the shoreline of our lives, plunging into life, and following Jesus wherever he may lead.
If you remember, Peter had had a few bad days, to put it mildly – there were the accusing voices in the courtyard, the three denials, the cock crowing, the horrible death of the one whom he had promised to never deny or desert. And, then, the empty tomb and the awful uncertainty and questioning it had brought.
If you listen carefully to the Gospel, you can almost hear a long sigh of relief just before Peter says to the other disciples, “I am going fishing.” And fish he did, all night in the dark, with his labor helping him to forget for a brief time the voices, the fears, and the doubts. Peter was going back to the ordinary, the familiar part of his life. And can we really blame him? We do the same. After living the spirit of Holy Week, we too are exhausted; we want to turn back to the ordinary things of our lives; perhaps we too would like to go fishing. But then something unexpected happens. We see this figure on the shoreline of our lives and we are reminded of Jesus.
We see Jesus vaguely in our lives, just as Peter and the other disciples saw that strangely familiar figure in the early morning haze, but they did not recognize him immediately. The fact is that Jesus is present in every moment of our lives, every day, but we do not recognize him that easily. He is perhaps most difficult to recognize in the poor, the homeless, the sick, the forgotten, the marginalized, and the victimized who we saw in the news reports this week.
And what if Peter had chosen to stay in the boat? What would our world be like? But Peter did not stay in the boat. He took the plunge and our world was forever changed.
What made the difference? What inspired this man to leap into the waters of the Sea of Tiberias and swim, splash, wade to shore? LOVE!. It was Love that yanked Peter out of the boat that morning. Love calling to Love. Love in the heart of Jesus calling out to Love in the heart of this impetuous man, Simon Peter. The same Love calls out to us in the ordinary circumstances of our lives. And day after day we take the plunge. We take the plunge and our world is different for it.
Our lives follow the same pattern as that of Peter in today’s Gospel. Our Lord calls to us from the shoreline of our lives and we, standing in our unique little boats, exhausted from working on our own in the darkness, respond. We take the plunge. Love calls to Love in our daily lives. Love calls to us from the workplace: It says follow me in everything you do at work today; be patient with that irritating employee or boss; reach out to someone who is alienated. Love calls to Love. And we take the plunge. Love calls to us in the community: It asks us to heal the wounds of division and prejudice. Love calls to Love. And we take the plunge. Love calls out to us in our parish: It is the call to the spirit of stewardship. Love calls to Love. And we take the plunge.
But Love is not satisfied with superficial displays of enthusiasm. Love probes. Love tests those who take the plunge. And so it was with our Lord who cross-examines Peter – he says “Simon, son of John, do you love me more than these?” Scholars differ in their interpretation of what Jesus meant here. Some say he was referring to the other disciples; while others say he meant the boat, the nets, the 153 fish. In other words the reference was to Peter’s former way of life.
I happen to prefer the interpretation that says it was the nets and things representing Peter’s familiar way of life that Jesus meant. I say that because of the unusual statement Jesus makes to Peter at the end of the questioning: He says, “When you were younger, you used to dress yourself and go where you wanted; but when you grow old, you will stretch out your hands, and someone else will dress you and lead you where you do not want to go.”
When Peter first met Jesus he was much younger. He was a boy. Now he had become an adult. And Jesus knew it. We have a saying, “You do not send a boy to do a man’s job.” Peter was no longer a boy and Jesus knew it. Peter had reached the stage of his life where he was willing to give up some of his youthful freedom that comes with following Christ.
When we are young we experience a kind of freedom that we think will never end. It seems life will never end. But as we gradually become adults, we relinquish some of the youthful freedom. Love compels us to do so, to go sometimes where we do not want to go. Life forces us to stretch out our hands and be lead where we may not want to go. Love makes it possible for us to go there. Love enables us to make the sacrifices that adult life demands of each one of us.
Love calls us to open our minds, hearts and souls to see, albeit faintly, Christ standing on the shoreline of our nation, our community, our schools, our personal lives. He is calling us to Himself.
The source of that love is standing always on the shore of our lives. In a few minutes, this altar will become that little charcoal fire by the Sea of Tiberias. Jesus will be standing there with food prepared – i.e. his body and blood. Love calling to Love. Take the plunge today. Take the plunge into the love God offers you.
Fifth Sunday of Lent
March 25, 2007
"How Do You Imagine God? Yourself? Others?”
Have you ever played Twenty Questions? It is the game where someone has an image or story that they invite us to guess by asking questions until we either figure out what they are “hiding” or we hit our limit of twenty questions and then they need to tell us the answer. If we discover the answer without reaching the twenty questions, we win. If not, we lose. So let’s play that game. However, there is one stipulation. I have the answer in mind and I’ll be asking the questions as well as providing the answers. I do this not because I am a poor loser, but to invite all of us to discover an image of God and life that today’s readings have inspired in me.
Let’s begin with the first question. What is your image of God? Some people imagine God to be a being who waits to point out the wrong we do and punish us. I think there is a different view of God in today’s readings. The prophet Isaiah paints a God who opens a way rather than closes one, and wants to do something new to refresh us, - giving water when we are thirsty, and direction when we are lost. Jesus paints a similar picture. When the woman caught in adultery is brought to him to be stoned as the Law prescribed, he begins to write in the sand.
Instead of picking up the stone the leaders expected Jesus to throw, Jesus bends down. He writes in the sand. Jesus does something new or at least different than what was expected. But, when they did not respond to his “new” way of handling their question, he makes a rather strong statement: He says, “Let the one among you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.” Now the message is clear! Everyone is a sinner, and recognizing that fact, they all walk away. Rather than to condemn the women, Jesus frees her in saying “Go, and from now on do not sin anymore.” Jesus does something new – he opens a way to life, when she expected to be stoned to death. Does this fit your image of God?
Let me pose another question: What is your image of yourself? Some people see themselves as either a sinner or a saint, either all bad or worse than others or all good and better than others. The scribes and Pharisees brought the woman caught in adultery to Jesus because they thought they were better. By responding to them and to the woman the way he did, Jesus invited them to a new way of looking at themselves and others. Jesus tells the woman do not sin any more. God desires to heal our sins and reconcile us, whether our sins are great or small, whether we do wrong to another or choose not to do good. God’s forgiveness, mercy, and grace are offered to all. We can accept his gifts or reject them, and, if we do accept, we can then share them. No one threw the first stone because no one was without sin. In other words, we are all on the same playing field, we too are sinners.
That means we can choose to treat others the way Jesus treated the woman caught in adultery – i.e. with mercy and compassion – or we can stand in judgment. How would we really want to be treated? If I’m honest, I want God to refresh me, and renew me, and show me a new way. Don’t I pray for that each time I pray as Jesus taught? “Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.” If we want to experience God’s forgiveness, we need to forgive others the way God forgives us.
Here is another question: How do I imagine myself and others? Today’s readings invite us to see ourselves and others as forgivable. In my experience, when I forgive another and myself, God does something new in me and frees me. When I refuse to forgive another or myself, it is I who suffers.
So I ask, why do you follow Jesus? Some people follow Jesus because they want to be better than others. Other people follow Jesus to be part of his family. In the letter to the Philippians, St. Paul reminds us that we follow Jesus for [quote] “the supreme good of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord…forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead” – in other words, we seek life with Christ.
Will that make us better people? Yes, because following Jesus will help us live more like him, and people will see him in our words, our actions, and our attitudes. Isn’t that what we promise every time we come to Communion and bowing our heads and extending our hands we say “amen” as the body and blood of Christ is offer to us? Amen, yes I believe Jesus is present in this bread and this wine. Amen, I believe Jesus is present in me, or at least can be more visible in my life, and I will live in ways that feed others with that real presence of Christ’s merciful, unconditional, forgiving love.
Will that make us better than others? Not really; because it is the wrong question! We are all good or have the potential for being good in God’s eyes. We’re all sinners and yet we are called to be saints. And, honestly, the minute I begin to think I’m better than anyone, I become aware of my sins and failings again. I’m reminded how much I need the forgiveness of God made visible in Jesus and how real is the mercy and love others show to me. I’m not better than others because I follow Christ. However, by trying to live more like Jesus, God’s newness can take hold in me and you and we can live in ways that show that newness to others: i.e. forgiven rather than condemned. It is then that we begin to forgive rather than condemn others.
This brings to mind another question. So why do we reflect on our lives, both where we follow Jesus and where we sin? Our answer should be, in order to GIVE praise to God who does something new in all of us, and to instill in us the desire to help others come to know God; to know him as someone who opens a way rather than closes one. God wants to do something new and refresh us, giving us water when we are thirsty, and direction when we are lost. Why bring our sinful areas to Jesus, those areas where we are proverbially caught in adultery? We do it to let the light of Jesus’ merciful love invite us to be free from condemnation, and to make amends for the wrong we have done. Is this not what Lent is about?
I think there is one answer to these questions. Coming to the table where a God who does something new reminds us that we are loveable and forgivable – all of us – and that following Jesus frees us to receive that mercy so fully that we can share it more generously.
Seventh Sunday in Ordinary Time
February 18, 2007
“Are You Read to Love?”
You might use the term “The Week That Was” to describe this last week. No, I am not saying this because of the weather event that upset the rhythm of our normal activities, nor the celebration of Valentines Day. These events only served to distract us from other things that happened. I am referring to the multiple shootings on Monday that left people trembling or cringing in fear.
In Philadelphia a man arranged a meeting at a marketing company on the pretense that he was bringing another investor into a real-estate venture. Instead, he was preparing to kill some people that he felt had given him poor investment advice on a venture in which he and some others had lost a substantial amount of money.
The second shooting occurred in Utah at a Salt Lake City shopping mall. An 18-year-old man opened fire on shoppers, killing five and wounding four others. It is unknown what had provoked the young man, but an off-duty police officer courageously cornered the man until other officers arrived.
These horrifying events took place in the course of everyday life, in situations that most of us would consider relatively safe: i.e. a business meeting and a shopping mall. In one case the shooter knew his victims, in the other, it us unlikely that any of them were known to the gunman.
Most of us go about our business everyday pretty much expecting things to go as planned. And for the most part they do. There is a certain rhythm to our daily activities that we count on, and it offers us some security as we live day-to-day. The shootings in Utah and Pennsylvania shattered the safe environment that those affected had lived in. But most of us will not be afraid of Monday’s business meeting, nor will we forego shopping at Great Northern or South Park Malls for the rest of the year. While these two events made national news, the effect for the most part is pretty localized.
How different from the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon in 2001. These events provoked an insecurity that most of us felt for a long time. And we still deal with the fallout from those days. Whether it is taking our shoes off as we proceed through airport security, or debating the war in Iraq, or enduring the heightened response to suspicious packages in Boston, we find ourselves feeling less secure because we live in fear of the enemies that are out there.
There are some very real enemies that we need to be concerned about. (There are also a few imaginary ones that we should let go of.) But this is where it gets difficult. Because in today’s Gospel of St. Luke Jesus makes it clear that we are to love our enemies and do good to those who hate us. This Christianity-thing is hard stuff! How are we to respond when a family member or friend is injured or killed in an act of violence? How can we be expected to love? To forgive? To pray for those who perpetrate such crimes? The words of Jesus in the Gospel don’t offer any easy way out.
Loving someone who causes us injury is one of the hardest parts of the Christian life. Yet that is what is asked of us by Jesus. And it is most difficult when the person who has harmed us is part of our life almost everyday. When the source of our injury is a friend, family member, schoolmate, or co-worker, we are again confronted with the message of Jesus to love those who have mistreated us. It is not easy, but it is what we are called to do.
So how can we live the kind of Christian life that Jesus asks of us? For starters, we can’t do it alone. As Christians, we are part of a community, a group of people who follow Jesus together and support one another on the journey. Being a follower of Christ is too great a task for any of us to think that we can accomplish it by ourselves. We need one another for support and encouragement.
That’s one of the reasons we come together each Sunday to celebrate the Eucharist. We are nourished by Christ’s body and blood, but we are also nourished by the fellowship as we gather around the altar. Sometimes people may ask, “What do I get out of Mass?” when they are considering whether to go or not. But maybe that’s the wrong question. If we’re a community that supports and encourages one another, we may want to ask, “What might someone else get out of Mass if they know that I am there with them?” Sometimes our good example is worth more to someone else, just like the Amish in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania who attended the funeral of the man who killed those five girls in the schoolhouse.
We are just a few days away from the beginning of Lent. This coming Wednesday is Ash Wednesday. We may already be considering what we will do for our Lenten practices: e.g. how we will pray, how we will fast, how we will give to charity. These practices are not our own private devotions. We do Lent as a community of faith, and our actions – our prayer, fasting, and almsgiving are meant to be communal activities.
As we prepare for Lent what greater prayer can we offer and live as a community then to come before the Eucharist during our “Forty Hour Devotion” this weekend? One of the Catechist from our parish mentioned to me yesterday, that the most difficult dogma she teaches is the “Real Presence of Jesus in the Eucharist.” Difficult in that this dogma of faith is beyond our power to comprehend, and it is through prayer that God unfolds this mystery to us on our journey of faith. The exposition of the Blessed Sacrament which began on Friday morning continues through the day and night until the closing prayer on Sunday afternoon.
Our participation in Forty Hours Devotion will not be reported in the media, nor will it give us reason to fear. Rather, it brings us face to face with the Real Presence of the Lord in the quiet and peacefulness of our church. God has called us by name to love those who hate us and forgive them in the deepest depths of our being. As we come before Him today in this Eucharistic celebration and Forty Hours Devotion let us thank him for the sacrifice he has made for our salvation, and to pray for the grace to forgive others as he has forgiven us.
Fourth Sunday in Ordinary Time
January 28, 2007
“Home Is Where the Heart Is”
In his poem, “The Death of the Hired Man,” Robert Frost says, “Home is the place where, when you have to go there, they have to take you in.” Well, apparently the people in the Nazareth synagogue had never heard this. “Those, who at the start of the Gospel had responded so favorable to Jesus, at the end were “filled with fury” and tried to hurl him over a cliff. What happened? Why was the prophet not accepted in his native place of Nazareth?
The scene in the synagogue that Luke records is a preview of what is to come for Jesus, a omen of Calvary, a sign that, if he was to carry out God’s saving plan, Jesus would have to make the difficult transition from prophet to priest. And what happened to Jesus happens to us as well. We too must make this transition many times in our lives as we seek to be faithful followers of Christ.
There were those in Nazareth who would have been quite happy had Jesus just remained a good Jewish boy, taking up the carpenter trade, or maybe the role of a charismatic young rabbi, speaking eloquently in the synagogue, performing a miracle now and then as he had done in Capernaum. But this Gospel shows us that Jesus knew, or was beginning to know, that he could not be placed in such a box. Jesus’ mission went far beyond Nazareth.
Jesus must have said something deeply upsetting to those who had earlier nodded in approval at the gracious words that came from his mouth. It is not clear from the text why those in the synagogue were so upset but, judging from other incidents in the Gospel where Jesus’ words evoked a violent reaction, he must have intimated something about his divinity, something that indicated he was not just another prophet in the tradition of Elijah and Elisha but a prophet and more. He must have spoken the truth to them, not as the prophets of the past had spoken the word of God, but on his own authority as Word of God Incarnate. Then, when they rejected him, he made the biting comment that they were no different from the faithless generations at the time of Elijah