Third Sunday of Advent

Dominica III Adventus C
15 December 2024

 The change of vestment color for this weekend (from the darker purple to rose) and the permission to decorate the sanctuary with flowers serve as a visual reminder that half of Advent is in the past.  The color rose – rose being traditionally associated with joy – and the repeated message of the Scriptures call us to rejoice.  And so, this day has been called in Latin “Gaudete Sunday” or “Rejoice Sunday.”  That thematic title for this Sunday comes from the words of the entrance antiphon, which we chanted at the beginning of this Holy Mass: “Rejoice in the Lord always; again I say, rejoice.”  This weekend the Church calls us to step up our joy because we have completed half of this holy season and are drawing near to the celebration of the source of our joy, the birth of Christ Jesus.

The Gospel passage today is a continuation from last Sunday where we heard of the work of St. John the Baptist.  Last week’s Gospel told us that the word of God came to him in the wilderness and in response he went about “preaching a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins” (Lk. 3:3).  There are a few verses between last Sunday’s and this Sunday’s Gospel that are not read in Mass, but I want to share them now.  John “said to the multitudes that came out to be baptized by him, ‘You brood of vipers!  Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come?  Bear fruits that befit repentance…. Even now the axe is laid to the root of the trees; every tree therefore that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire’.” (Lk. 3:7-8, 9).  You brood of vipers!  I’d like to take a moment to welcome any visitors and newcomers.  We hope you’ll join the parish and get involved here.  What an Advent message!  No, but I think hearing those few verses between the two gospel passages helps establish a better sense of the full context of today’s passage.

 Today we hear a question and answer session between John and the different groups in the multitude who heard him preach repentance and who came to be baptized.  And the burning question from each group is “What should we do?”  Could the lesson between repentance and faith leading to action and a changed life be any more clear?  Again, those unread verses: “Bear fruits that befit repentance…. Even now the axe is laid to the root of the trees; every tree therefore that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire’.” (Lk. 3:7-8, 9).  We have today a lesson for us about faith and action, we might even use the oft misunderstood phrase of faith and works.  God alone saves us by faith in His mercy and generous love.  And necessarily related to that, is that one who receives that free and unmerited gift from God should live in such a way that demonstrates a life claimed for God.  That’s why John could confront those whose repentance was suspect by calling them a brood of vipers.  John the Baptist prepared the way for Jesus Christ.  The message for us is even stronger since Jesus fulfills all of the promises and prophecies about God.  Conversion and repentance is naturally and necessarily followed by a change of behavior, by action, by living the new life we have been freely given.  Faith and action go together!  They must go together or else we are not bearing good fruit.  Faith and action go together in whatever vocation and in whatever profession is yours.  Faith and action go together everywhere we live our life or else… we are not bearing fruit.  Or else, we are like trees ready to be cut down.

 Those unread verses that I shared help us see how the message from last Sunday’s passage is continued today.  At the end of the passage today John references wheat harvesting, but it is an image that speaks of judgment as well.  John points to the One who is coming and he says “His winnowing fan is in his hand to clear his threshing floor and to gather the wheat into his barn, but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire” (Lk. 3:17).  It’s a harvest image to be sure, but its meaning is the same as the previous call to bear fruits that befit repentance.  The One who is coming, who is greater than John, is expecting good wheat; he’s coming ready to gather the harvest.  Be the wheat, in other words.  Don’t be the chaff.  Think about the harvest imagery.  The winnowing fan, also called a winnowing fork, was used to thresh out the wheat grain from the lighter hull, like the wrapper around the wheat grain.  In ancient times the winnowing fork was used to toss grain up into the air.  The heavier wheat grain would fall downward, while the wind and the action of throwing the grain with the fork would cause the chaff to blow away and land elsewhere.

  To repent and to receive baptism in Christ Jesus is a call to also bear fruit, to be good wheat ready for harvest.  Since the fruit of a changed and redeemed life, since the wheat of such a life is heavier, I want to encourage you to… gain weight!  Okay, now you’re talking, some are saying!  This is my kind of religion!  I mean, what could be easier at this time of year, right?!  No, not cookies and holiday treats.  Better said, let’s be heavier or more weighty as Christians.  Let’s bear good fruit as a sign that our lives have been changed.  Let’s be the wheat.  It’s not just an idea.  It is necessary in order to endure the judgment of the Lord when he returns again.  Bearing good fruit and being more weighty is marked by a life lived in such a way that it reflects the meaning of the repentance I declare, and that reflects the baptism I have received.  How do we bear good fruit?  Well, I can’t say everything today about what is means to be a Christian who is living authentically the faith received, but we can stick with some ideas from the Gospel.  How did John respond in the Gospel when asked by the people of his time, “What should we do?”  He basically responded with the idea of almsgiving.  Do you have extra clothing?  Give it to someone who has none.  Do you have enough food?  Then do the same.  John also encouraged justice in our interactions with others when he responded to the tax collectors and soldiers.  Don’t cheat people or take more than you should.  Don’t make false accusations.  And be satisfied with what you have.  Stop seeking more, always more things.  It’s basically from John a call to do what we call the corporal works of mercy.

  Interestingly enough, doing these things, bearing good fruit, connects us back to idea of rejoicing today on Gaudete Sunday.  You know one way to be more weighty as a Christian, one way to demonstrate the authenticity of your Christian life, one way to find joy… is to get out of ourselves and all the things we are wrapped up in and to give to others, to serve others.  This time of year is so hectic and so stressful for so many.  Maybe in part that is due to focusing excessively on our plans, our wants, our desires.  So, in the midst of all that this season is let’s remember to be more weighty as disciples of Jesus.  Let’s remember to be more weighty throughout the whole year.  To be clear, we don’t bear good fruit to make ourselves feel good, or for the purposes of some secular utopia in this world.  No, we seek God and we seek to bear good fruit because it is necessarily connected with the faith we proclaim.  We seek to bear good fruit because it is the right thing to do.  We seek to bear good fruit to draw others into the same call to repent and to believe in the Gospel.  We seek to bear good fruit because it will find us better prepared to stand before our Judge when he returns with his winnowing fan.  We seek to be good wheat ready for harvest, the wheat that, being heavier and having fallen to the ground in death, is ready to rise again to the kingdom of light and rejoicing!

Feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe

Our Lady of Guadalupe
12 December 2024

 Today we observe with great joy the miraculous appearances, by which the Blessed Virgin Mary made herself known as the “ever virgin Mary, Mother of the true God through whom all things live” (cf. Office of Readings, Report by Don Antonio Valeriano).   The appearance of Mary sparked massive numbers of conversions to the true faith in the one Catholic Church established by Jesus.  Her appearance resulted in hundreds of thousands of souls leaving behind the falsehood of pagan worship and false religion.  Her appearance resulted in souls believing in the love of God shown in Jesus Christ, who is the Savior of the world.  To celebrate the Virgin today, and to do so in a way that pleases her and gives to Jesus what he is owed as God, means we must put behind ourselves false idols that get more attention that our soul and more attention than living our Catholic faith.  To celebrate this feast day today in a way that is good means we must stop making excuses for living a weak life as disciples of Jesus.

 Our Lady of Guadalupe has become so closely associated with the history of Mexico that, as one song says, to be Mexican is to be Guadalupan as something essential.  But even beyond Mexico, this appearance of Our Lady has transformed our continent and our world, such that she belongs not only to Mexico and to Mexicans, but is the Empress of All the Americas.  The number of conversions to Catholicism that resulted from her miraculous appearance in Mexico has led her to also be called the Star of the New Evangelization.  This means she is invoked for the new proclamation of the Good News that must be made in our time since so many souls who once were Catholic have fallen into darkness and sin as they leave the Catholic Church, or as so many other souls still have never heard of the true Church where salvation is found.

 To be clear, any time we honor Mary, like we do today on this great feast, it is never enough to stop with Mary.  Mary’s role is to point us to her Son, Jesus the Savior.  If we stop with Mary, or if we focus only on her or exclusively on her, then in fact we are not listening to the whole message of the gift that comes from God when some miraculous appearance takes place.  To say this another way, if we think that the popular song means that it is enough to be Guadalupan, then we are not listening to what Mary wants us to hear.  To be devoted to Mary means we must see that she leads us to Jesus.  To be devoted to Mary must lead us to the One she points to: to Jesus the Son of God.  We might add some words to that popular song and say: To be Mexican is to be Guadalupan, which is to be Catholic as something essential!  If one thinks that it is enough to be Guadalupan, to simply honor Mary without reinforcing and building our life with Jesus, then we are making a catastrophic error that will not lead to our salvation in heaven.  If one thinks that it is enough to be Guadalupan and simply to appear devoted and catholic on December 12, then we are missing the entire message of Our Lady of Guadalupe.  We would be causing the Virgin sadness if we honoring her did not result in living more fully the catholic faith.

 Two simple ideas come to my mind from the story of the appearance of the Virgin to St. Juan Diego.  When Juan Diego first saw Our Lady of Guadalupe she called him “the humblest of my children” and she said that it was her ardent desire that a temple ber built on the hill.”  And so, the two ideas are the virtue of humility and the construction of a temple.

 First, we recognize that everything we have is a gift from God.  And we owe Him everything in return.  Humility, being humble like St. Juan Diego, means that we listen to the ways God speaks to us and comes to find us.  He comes in our humble dedication to prayer.  He comes in our commitment to attend and participate in all Sundays and holy day Masses.  He comes in our moral living and in the way we work to remove sin from our lives.  He comes with His grace in living a proper sacramental life, including following the important practice of marrying according to Christ in his Church.  This humility to live marriage and family life as a sacrament places our entire life and our future on the solid foundation of Christ.  In the humility of service to others, especially the poor, God comes to us with His blessing.

 And God comes to us, His humble children, with a call to engage is some work.  We are called to build a temple.  But perhaps not exactly the same temple we think of on Tepeyac Hill.  By humble living of our faith and the commitment of holy baptism, we are building ourselves into a temple!  In baptism, the Holy Spirit is given to us to take up residence within us.  And so, we should recognize that we are temples of the Holy Spirit.  We are called to be beautiful temples dedicated to Christ.  We honor God and the Virgin Mother when we guard and care for our soul and live as the temples we have been made to be.  How senseless it would be to celebrate the appearance of the Virgin of Guadalupe, how senseless it would be to make visits to shrines (like the shrine in Mexico City or Oklahoma City), how senseless it would be to take the time to come here to church if we do not recognize ourselves as temples of the Holy Spirit.  Therefore, in humility, we seek to guard this temple of the soul and body and we seek to make sure our children do the same.

 May the intercession of the Virgin of Guadalupe encourage each of us to be more fully alive in her Son and to focus our efforts and attention where the Lady points us: to Jesus Christ and to fuller living of the gift of our Catholic faith.

First Sunday of Advent

Dominica I Adventus C
1 December 2024

 Our word “advent” comes from the Latin “adventus,” which is, in turn, a translation from the Greek word “Parousia.”  Parousia and adventus mean “arrival” or “coming.”  Our use of the word “advent” refers not only to the coming of Christ at his Incarnation and birth at Christmas, but it also refers to his second coming as Judge at the end of time.  The Catholic faith believes in these two comings of Christ: the Incarnation and the Second Coming, as we clearly profess each time we state the Creed.  Advent is a time of year that is hectic and exciting in holiday anticipation.  And so, the gospel selection today may sound almost strange to us, as if it is out of place for Advent.  Where is John the Baptist?  Where is the tender story of the virgin with child?  And if we think this gospel passage is out of place for Advent, perhaps that teaches us a critical lesson about how we view life and faith.  What is truly strange?  Is it the Church’s focus and the scriptural selection that is strange and doesn’t fit?  Or is it rather how we tend to live that risks being out of step with Christian preparedness and vigilance for the moment when the Lord comes again?  As we look ahead to celebrate the birth of Christ, which has already happened in time, we must remember that we can never pause our ongoing preparation and looking ahead to that coming of the Lord that we still await: the advent, the Parousia of the Lord, at his Second Coming!

The gospel is from Jesus’ discourse on the Mount of Olives where he speaks of his second coming.  He speaks of dramatic cosmic signs that will accompany his return in glory and he alludes to a prophecy from the Book of Daniel that the Son of Man will come in the clouds.  These signs are disturbing.  People will be in dismay and perplexed.  In fact, “people will die of fright in anticipation of what is coming upon the world.”  Considering this, Jesus’ instruction seems counterintuitive.  He says when you see these things “Stand erect and raise your heads because your redemption is at hand.”  He says that we are to be vigilant in our belief that the coming tribulations are imminent.  We can add to this the lesson from the second reading that we do even more to be ready for the Lord’s return.  St. Paul wrote to the Thessalonians: “Finally, brothers and sisters, we earnestly ask and exhort you in the Lord Jesus that, as you received from us how you should conduct yourselves to please God – and as you are conducting yourselves – you do so even more”.

How are we possibly supposed to face the final advent, the final coming of the Lord?  Jesus tells us that our responsibility is to be prepared.  I want to offer two general categories of how we prepare: (1) Some things not to do; and then, (2) Some things to do.  The things not to do.  Jesus says, “Beware that your hearts do not become drowsy from carousing and drunkenness and the anxieties of daily life.”  Jesus warns us to take care that our hearts not be weighed down by things that will prevent us from being ready to stand erect and to raise our heads.   In particular, we must be on guard not to become drowsy from “carousing”.  Other translations of this passage use the word “dissipation.”  That’s a word commonly used of the younger son in the Parable of the Prodigal Son.  The word in Greek translated as “dissipation” or “carousing” refers to “unbridled indulgence.”  We become drowsy and unprepared when we give in to unbridled indulgence in all the pleasures of the flesh: money, sex, power, food, recreation, sleep, and material goods.  These are the things that we cave to so easily in our fallen nature, making them our focus and, in so doing, becoming weighed down with an earthly, lower focus that obscures our true dignity as God’s children and impedes our ability to be ready to stand up and to raise our heads to meet the Lord when he comes.  To respond to Jesus’ call to be vigilant for his second coming, we have to guard our hearts so that we do not let them fall in love with a disordered and unbridled attachment to lower things that weigh us down and keep us from being prepared.

And then, the things to do.  Jesus tells us that our responsibility is to be prepared.  Jesus says, “Be vigilant at all times and pray.”  This refers to the spiritual advice of staying awake and praying, especially in the night time hours.  This spiritual discipline of vigilance is perhaps less considered than a more familiar spiritual discipline like fasting, but it is just as much part of the Jewish and Christian traditions.  Monks get up while it is still dark, late at night or very early in the morning, to pray.  That time of prayer – not surprisingly – is called “vigils.”  This call to be vigilant, to stay awake and to pray, helps us understand and appreciate key Catholic practices.  Ever wonder why we have a Midnight Mass at Christmas?  To keep vigil, to stay awake and to pray ourselves into the dawning of light on Christmas Day.  We keep vigil on Holy Thursday night after the Mass, praying before the gift of the Lord’s presence in the Blessed Sacrament.  We have an Easter Vigil that is always held in the darkness of Holy Saturday night so that we keep vigil as preparation for the arrival of Easter Sunday.  If you don’t already do so, you might consider whether you can attend those special Masses.  The spiritual practice of vigilance can also be grown in the devotion of Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament.  When we come to an adoration chapel we are coming to be vigilant, to stay awake and to pray before and with the Lord.  Perhaps the message of Jesus on this First Sunday of Advent might drive you to take up this practice, to commit to adoration, and to let the Lord prepare you for his return.  We always need more parishioners to commit to participate by taking time in our chapel, especially in the night time hours.  Let this be a call to you to participate in quiet time with the Lord.  I hope you will learn more about adoration and commit to time in our chapel.  You won’t regret it!  The Lord tells us to be vigilant, to stay awake, and to pray that we may have strength to escape what comes and to stand before him.  Physical strength will do us no good at the Second Coming.  We need spiritual strength.  Train yourself in that spiritual discipline of vigilance that we perhaps unwisely leave only to the most dedicated monks.  Stay awake and pray with the Lord in adoration so that you remind yourself of his Kingdom already present here and now, whose fullness we await in the life to come.  Train yourself in prayer and adoration to desire that Kingdom more than daily anxieties.  And as you pray before the Lord let him help you identify the sins that need confession.  Let him raise your head and cause you to stand secure in his love such that when that day with disturbing signs comes, you may see it not as a day of fear but as the arrival, the advent, of the gift of God’s love and desire for you: “Your redemption is at hand!”

Our Lord Jesus Christ, King of the Universe (Christ the King)

Dominica D.N. Iesu Christi Regis
24 November 2024 

This weekend the Church observes the 34th or last Sunday in Ordinary Time.  This marks the final Sunday of the Church’s current liturgical year.  It is marked by observing the Solemnity of Our Lord Jesus Christ, the King of the Universe.  Now it may be a challenge for us to think deeply about what it means that the Lord identifies himself as a king whose kingdom is not of earthly origin.  “My kingdom does not belong to this world,” Jesus said.  The challenge for us Americans is that “king” and “kingdom” terminology sounds like old time language and foreign concepts at best.  At worst, it sounds like the stuff of fairy tales and legends.  The history of the founding of our country after all involves throwing off the ties of monarchical rule, and the idea of a king is not natural to us in our democratic republic marked by authority coming from the people and exercised by representative government.  Yet, we need to be clear that the Lord identifies himself as a king, as our king.  This speaks to us about his sovereignty over us.  It tells us that we need to think deeply about the Lord’s mastery over us, over every aspect of our lives.  His kingship tells us about the type of obedience he is owed from us.

The first reading from the Prophet Daniel and the second reading from the Book of Revelation share in common that they report to us a vision of the author.  In the Old Testament the phrase “son of man” is typically used to refer to a human being.  Yet, in the vision of Daniel (the first reading) there is an obviously different meaning, because Daniel sees a heavenly vision, he sees a celestial being who appears like a son of man, he writes.  In other words, this particular son of man is divine.  And we know he is not of merely human origin because he does not come in a human procession of fanfare.  Rather, this one comes on the clouds of heaven, and when he comes before the throne of God, the Ancient One, this Son of man is given dominion, glory, and kingship over everything.  The vision of St. John in the Book of Revelation (the second reading) likewise identifies Jesus as the ruler over all earthly rulers and it notes his divine origin and kingship in that he comes, again that phrase, amid the clouds.  As we must think deeply about how the Lord identifies himself as a king, and even as we know that requires obedience from us, we should rejoice because Jesus is the perfect king.  He loves us and knows what is best for us.  He calls us to an obedience that is not about oppression, but rather he knows we will be truly free of external and internal enslavement if we live in accord with his commands.  He is a king who lowers himself to serve us and to save us by his mercy.

Imagine whatever fanfare comes to mind when you think of a king and a kingdom.  Perhaps the coronation of King Charles not that long ago in English gives us some images.  Trumpet blast.  Banners flying.  Armies in formation.  Servants attending.  Colorful attire and various ranks in the king’s court.  All of that pales in comparison to the way the entire universe is arrayed to celebrate the kingship of Jesus whose majesty and glory has him coming on the clouds.  But as captivating as all that pageantry may be, the kingship of Christ hangs on the response that is required from each of us.  And a response is needed from us.  A personal response.  Our response cannot be a corporate response only, just going along with the crowds.  It is corporate and involves the community of the Church certainly, but it cannot be only corporate.  In the end, our response cannot be made for us by someone else.  In a certain sense, apart from external regal fanfare, standing alone before the king shows us whether our response is adequate.  And thinking deeply about this response to the kingship of Jesus is important because one day it will have eternal consequences as we stand alone before the king who will judge our obedience.  That’s what I mean by saying that all the external fanfare of kingship, whatever we imagine about the kingship of Christ, it all hangs on the personal response demanded of each disciple.

 For that reason, almost apart from any words spoken, it is just the setting itself of the Gospel text that most catches my attention today.  The Gospel selection from St. John is the trial and judgment of Jesus leading to his crucifixion.  That trial and judgment scene takes place at the praetorium where Pilate exercises Roman authority.  But more specifically, this section of St. John’s Gospel has scenes standing on the outside of the praetorium with the raucous crowds and more quiet and personal scenes inside the praetorium, away from public notice.  Our selection today is a scene inside the praetorium where apart from the crowds and the spectacle and the public eye, Pilate is alone with Jesus.  Pilate stands alone with Jesus.  And so must we all – right now, today – as a test of our discipleship.  And so we all will – one day – as the test of our judgment.  Jesus is the universal king with a kingship of higher authority than this world.  When we think of the commitment we should have to daily prayer, time spent with the king who loves us, can we imagine ourselves in that personal, private scene inside the praetorium?  There, Pilate seems to be in control but it is really he who is being interrogated, he who is on trial.  Can you see your life and your response to the kingship of Jesus in that scene?  Pilate’s “Are you the King of the Jews?”  becomes our own interrogation about our response to Jesus by asking ourselves, “Are you the king of me?”.  Or, said in more natural English, “Are you my king, Lord?”  The Lord responds with his own question that highlights our own personal responsibility: “Do you say this on your own?”  When we think of the commitment we should have to Sunday and holy day Masses where we give the Lord the worship he is owed, will we let ourselves hear that examination of conscience, “Are you my king, Lord?”  When we think of the call to holiness in our King’s kingdom, when we think of the battle we must undertake to root out sin, when we think of the need to confess sins frequently, what does our personal practice and response say to that question, “Are you my king, Lord?”  When we think of how our lives as disciples should be oriented to generous service, the giving of our time, and talent and treasure, a generous service to the least of our brothers and sisters, “Are you my king, Lord?”  The Lord’s “Do you say this on your own” serves as an examination for that personal response we must all give to the kingship of Christ.  Imagining the private scene inside the praetorium, may we find encouragement that our proclamation of the kingship of Christ is far more than words on the lips, but more about the way we live as disciples who listen and belong to the voice of truth.

Thirty-First Sunday in Ordinary Time

Dominica XXXI per Annum B
3 November 2024

 In the verses before today’s Gospel passage our Lord is in a series of debates with various groups of his time, and the debates are rather contentious.  Pharisees, Herodians, and Sadducees were debating with the Lord and they were seeking to entrap him.  The passage today picks up with a scribe, another group of people in Jesus’ time.  Scribes were biblical scholars of their day.  This scribe notices that Jesus is handling these disputes and answering the questions well.  And so, with a sincerity that the other groups could not muster, this scribe asks the Lord “Which is the first of all the commandments?”  In other words, which is the most important command in the law?

The reason this was a question and was an item of debate in Jesus’ time is due to the vastness of the Torah and its laws for how faithful Jews should live their status as God’s chosen people.  To help us understand the dilemma, consider that later scholars would enumerate some 613 laws.  That’s rather daunting, so finding out what is most important has some merit.  This is what the scribe asks.  It is a very important question.

The Lord’s answer is not surprising.  He quotes the prayer known in Hebrew as the Shema.  That title is taken from the first word of the prayer.  Shema in the Hebrew means “to hear”.  The shema is a prayer that calls Jews to listen and hear that they are to love God with all that they are and all that they have.  For a Jew, knowing the shema would be something equivalent to our knowing the words of the Lord’s Prayer from Scripture, or our knowing the Creed.  It was very familiar, a prayer used daily, and it was no surprise that the Lord highlighted it as his response for the first of all the commandments.  In fact, the words of the shema are found in the Book of Deuteronomy and we heard them in the first reading, “Hear, O Israel!  The Lord is our God, the Lord alone!  Therefore, you shall love the Lord, your God, with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength.”  By naming aspects of human being, like heart, soul, and strength, we should not take that to mean a division of human life carrying with it some erroneous idea that we should love God with only part of ourselves.  Rather, the divisions of human being are actually meant to communicate a totality for they represent the deepest unique aspects of what it means to be a human being, a rational creature with powers of mind, emotion, and physical strength.

But, as the Gospel relates, the Lord did not stop by quoting the shema.  He continued his response and, this part can be said to be more surprising.  Jesus went on to say that after love of God with all that one has, there is a second command that is related to the primacy of that first of all the commands.  And the second is, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.”  In establishing what you and I today call the Great Command (love of God and love of neighbor), the Lord was offering a synthesis of the many laws taught by the Jews.  The Lord is saying that all of them are oriented toward, and ultimately serve, the twofold command to love God first above all things, and to reflect God’s love for others by the love we have for our neighbor as ourself.

This is a lesson and a command that endures and that guides us today.  In fact, the scribe’s response to Jesus shows us still more.  The scribe notes that to observe this twofold command of love of God and love of neighbor is, he says, “worth more than all burnt offerings and sacrifices.”  This claim caught my attention, because the Jewish ritual system of worship is based upon animal sacrifice.  Surely, a faithful, knowledgeable, and serious Jew – as a scribe would be – was not suggesting that temple sacrifice has no value, or that temple sacrifice should be abolished.  Certainly, not.  Rather, Jesus tells the scribe that his answer is good and that he is not far from the kingdom of God, because the scribe highlights what a Jew should understand about temple sacrifice.  The type of offering described here, is not the type of sacrifice by which the person takes or eats a part of the sacrifice, as in the case of the Passover lamb.  The whole burnt offering was the type of sacrifice by which the entire animal was sacrificed and burnt on the altar.  Jesus is pleased with the scribe’s knowledge because the scribe is bringing to the forefront an important lesson for a Jew, a lesson that remains for us too.  Namely, a whole burnt offering is supposed to symbolize to the Jew that his entire life and all that he has, all his heart, all his soul, and all his strength are the actual sacrifice that should be given to God.  The whole sacrificial animal is a substitute in the sacrificial system; but, the individual person of faith must strive to give all of himself in obedience and submission to God and His commands.  In this, such a faithful person is not making empty sacrifice and is not far from the kingdom of God.  In this, the sacrifice has meaning and is pleasing to God.

This critical lesson remains for us.  It remains for us because the challenge and pitfall in the life of faith is as common among Christians as it would have been among Jews.  That challenge and pitfall is as common now as it was in the Lord’s time.  And that challenge and pitfall is the tendency to follow God superficially, to do religious things on the surface, to be religious only here in the church walls, but to keep God and our relationship with Him rather distant and focused on the external matters that can be seen.  Meanwhile, inside we are not directing all that we are and all that we have to God.  The challenge and pitfall is the tendency to permit God only a limited place in our affairs, while keeping Him conveniently out of the affairs of our life that would require more sacrifice, more effort, more conversion.  We learn that our entire being must be oriented toward God and His ways.  It is not enough to give part of oneself or to give less than all to God.  Our offerings are acceptable and valuable when they reflect what is true about ourselves: that we are submitting ourselves to God and His commands.  All of ourselves.  Every aspect of our lives.  If we do not have that interior disposition, then our religious actions and sacrifices, our participation in our worship, like the Holy Mass, would be lacking and may risk being empty.  In the Holy Mass we follow a typical pattern: we listen to God’s Word in the Scriptures because, like a scalpel, it cuts through some of the deception and the delusions that we may have if our faith is kept superficial.  We move from God’s Word to the Word Made Flesh present on our altars and offered in sacrifice for us, because in that total gift of himself, the Lord models how our sacrifice must be.  What sense would it make, in other words, to participate in this sacrifice if I reject that call to give all of myself to God and to love others as I love myself?  What sense would it make to come to receive, to take Holy Communion, the Lord’s total gift of himself, and to say “amen,” to say, I believe but then not give all of myself to the Lord in return.  We are weak and sinful in this regard, in our resolve to avoid being superficial.  And so, thanks be to God, we can repent and be healed in confession.  Charity and service to others stretches us in our tendency to be superficial.  Ultimately, like that Jewish prayer the shema, we are to hear and to listen to the truth that God loves us completely and we are most fully alive and complete when we likewise love Him in return.  May we strive then to do away with being superficial in our religious life and practice so that we may be consoled by those hopeful words of Jesus: “You are not far from the kingdom of God.”

All Edmond Parishes Eucharistic Procession

All Edmond Eucharistic Procession
Stephenson Park Temporary Altar
Sermon: Mark 15:16-20
27 October 2024

 This day – the Lord’s Day – is about Jesus Christ!  This incredible blessing uniting all Catholics from the three parishes in Edmond is about Jesus Christ!  He is the one God who made the universe, all it contains, and who made us, giving us life in His image and likeness.  He is the one God who had a plan to restore the original blessing that He generously bestowed, after man’s original sin brought about the fall.  He is the God who loves you, who loves each of us, such that He comes to save us from our inclination to sin, to save us from the personal sins for which we each bear guilt.  In His divine love, He comes in our very flesh to pay the price for the sin that risks our eternal separation from Him in the condemnation of Hell.  As He approached the horror of the Cross for our salvation, He promised, as the Scriptures record, that he would not leave us orphans (cf. Jn. 14:18).  As the apostles and the first Christians came to accept his promise that he is the bread of life, the bread come down from heaven (cf. Jn. 6), they came to accept that precisely in the Breaking of the Bread, precisely in the smallness of the Sacred Host, our Blessed Lord fulfills his promise to not abandon us and to remain with us to the end of the age (cf. Mt. 28:20).

 As Jesus said, so the Scriptures record, and so we believe these words of our Blessed Lord, “For my flesh is food indeed, and my blood is drink indeed.  He who eats my flesh and drinks my blood abides in me, and I in him” (Jn. 6:55-56).  In this we are filled with hope and we are not alone!  For most of us here we have come to participate today already making an act of faith that with us and before us in the Most Blessed Sacrament of the Altar is Jesus Christ our Savior, just as he said.  But no doubt, that are many doing their own things today, surprised to find themselves caught up with this procession of Catholics, and maybe having no idea what they are witnessing here.  To any other bystanders who are willing to listen: If you believe that Jesus is God and if you believe that the Bible is God’s Word to us then you are already on this procession with us, on this journey that is a call to deeper communion with the Lord in his Church, a journey that leads to salvation in Heaven.  Other bystanders may not yet be Christian or not even a believer, this gathering is a reminder that you are invited to join with us, men and women of good will, to consider the journey you are on, to consider where you are going, and to consider whether you are, and where you are, with God on that journey.  Today, we give witness that we believe that God is actually present with us, in the midst of this world He made to be good.  He is really here!

 Why would we believe such a thing?  Why believe that God is with us and has anything to do, or any care, for this world in which we find ourselves?  First of all, God is involved with this world because He has created it and it is destined to return to Him.  The great event of the Incarnation shows us the nearness of God to this world.  The Son of God so unites Himself to His creation, that He takes on human flesh and takes up residence in this realm, Jesus the Christ.  And, the Gospel gives us a further reason for God’s nearness to the world because it shows us an encounter between the divine and the profane in a civic setting.  In the Gospel, the Lord and the world meet.  In the passage we heard, Jesus is not in a religious setting or location.  He is in the praetorium, which is the headquarters of the Roman authorities, the location of Pilate and the cohort of soldiers who mock Jesus and lead him to death.  By this point in the passage, Pilate has already sentenced the Lord to death and he has been scourged.  He is beaten and bloodied.  For however the vicious Roman scourging may have made his humanity and identity as Jesus unrecognizable, all the more would such a horrendous sight make his identity as God unrecognizable, even unbelievable.  Yet, in that civic setting, in the midst of the profane, despite all protestations to the contrary, despite man’s inability to recognize or accept it… God Himself was present!  Though submitting Himself to the twisted ways of man, our Lord was fully in command of what he was doing as God to suffer and die for our salvation, the salvation of the world and the souls He had made.  And He was doing all this right in the midst of the world and in the midst of the seat of civic authority.

 We experience some of that here today.  Today, also in a civic setting God Himself is present despite any protestations to the contrary, despite man’s inability to recognize it.  God Himself is here asking us to carry Him, just as He has done in various moments of salvation history: whether in the ark of the covenant, whether as a newborn Infant in Mary’s arms, whether being lifted up on the Cross, whether in the smallness of the Sacred Host in the hands of a priest… God Himself is here and He is asking us to carry Him into all the places He intends to go… into our holy places and sanctuaries, into our souls by grace, and, yes, even into our profane spaces, into our civic spaces where so-called “ordinary life” should not be separated from the realities of the kingdom to come.  For the “real world” as we so often call it would be very unreal indeed if separated from its foundation and destiny in God who created it, who cares for it, and calls it back to Himself.  This procession can serve as a reminder that we are called to carry the Lord into all things.  We are called to carry him in faith and how we live that faith, such that we, members of the Body of Christ, give witness to others by our words and actions that Jesus is with us and that he is Lord!  We are called to carry Him about in our moral choices.  We are called to carry him in the words we speak by which we might evangelize others.  We are called to carry Him about in our service to the poor and those about whom the Lord said, “When you did these things to one of the least of my brothers and sisters, you did it to me” (Mt. 25:40).  We are called to carry Him about in how we organize this secular city of man, so that it more greatly reflects the order of the City of God.  We are in a moment now and through election day that gives us a privileged opportunity to exercise our moral duty to vote with our Catholic values in the hopes that we do our part to bring our city, state, and nation into greater conformity to the Kingdom of God.  The timing of this procession is a great witness and reminder that we should carry the Lord into our precints when we vote.  The Gospel passage today tells us in no uncertain terms that the Lord’s kingship belongs also in our civic spaces as he continues to accomplish his work of salvation in the souls of our time and place: the souls of the Pontius Pilates of our time, the souls of the soldiers of our time, the souls of religious authorities of our time, the souls of all the ordinary men and women, boys and girls, of every time and place.  As Catholics we believe that patriotism is a virtue.  Patriotism is a call to devotion and service to the land of our forefathers.  There is no patriotism greater than devotion first of all to the Father of all, the Father and Creator of this land.  As happened in the Gospel, when some meet the Lord in civic spaces the result may be an occasion for sarcasm, mockery, and rejection.  But we who are believers serve as signposts today, pointing our contemporaries to the real presence of God with us.  By prayer and fasting, which I beg of you to take up in these next days, we serve to pray for our nation in this electoral cycle, praying that good and godly candidates be chosen to lead us.  We serve both by the reverence of our bodies and the sincerity of words to truly mean that acclamation: Hail, King of the Jews!  Hail, Christ our King!  We commit ourselves today to carry our Lord into all the activities and places of our lives.  We give the Lord thanks for remaining with us.  And we ask that we may be more docile to his grace so that, unlike the mockery of the soldiers, we may truly reverence him as the king of every aspect of our lives, the king of our parishes, the king of our city, state and nation.

Twenty-Seventh Sunday in Ordinary Time

Dominica XXVII per Annum B
Gen. 2:18-24; Ps. 128; Heb. 2:9-11; Mk. 10:2-12 (shorter form)
6 October 2024

 The Pharisees test Jesus in the Gospel passage by asking about marriage and divorce.  The force of Jesus’ response remains powerful still today in an age marked by many challenges in relationships.  The Pharisees indicate that Moses permitted a “bill” of divorce.  Jesus responds to the Pharisees by himself quoting the Book of Genesis and taking them back to “the beginning.”  It’s like saying, see how far you have strayed… get back to God’s original idea and mind.

As difficult as this divine teaching from Jesus is for our ears in this age, it was likewise difficult for Jesus’ contemporaries in the Gospel scene.  They, like we, live in a culture where divorce is widely known and accepted.  There were different opinions about legitimate grounds for divorce in the Lord’s time, some more permissive, and some more restrictive, but the reason the Pharisees can even ask this question at all is because the legitimacy of divorce is assumed in Jewish society, since Moses had developed a policy for it.  It is probably very difficult for us to comprehend just how shocking Jesus’ answer was.  Moses is a revered authority in Judaism, but the Lord’s response reveals a flawed concession in Moses’ policy.  He tells the Pharisees that, yes, Moses allowed divorce, but he did so because of sin, the hardness of heart that kept God’s People from receiving the very Word of God.  And then, the next shocking move, by reinterpreting Scripture and, specifically the teaching from the Book of Genesis, Jesus says that divorce is not possible and that no human authority can separate what God has joined.  At the very same time, then, and this would shock them, Jesus is indicating that he and his teaching are of a higher authority than that of the revered Moses.  We get another glimpse of just how surprising this must all have been when the next verse tells us that the disciples wait until a bit later, in the privacy of a house, to circle back and ask Jesus again, as if to say, “Earlier, when you said divorce is not part of God’s design for marriage, did we hear you correctly?”  The Lord doubles down and says: The man who divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery; and, the woman who divorces her husband and marries another commits adultery.

The same serious challenge confronts us as we hear this Gospel.  The larger question for us is whether we will listen to God’s Word and accept it as saving teaching to guide us, or whether we will listen more to the hardness of our hearts and our own struggles with sin, looking for concessions around divine teaching.  The context here in the Gospel is about marriage and divorce, but truthfully the implications are much broader.  Will we admit that divine teaching cannot be changed by us and that it makes demands upon us?  Even though our minds and our wills, darkened by the fall of original sin, struggle to grasp and to do what is good and right, will we admit that divine teaching is actually better for us and makes us more fulfilled, despite our challenges with obedience?

As the Lord referred to Genesis in his response about divorce, I also want to turn to that passage, which served as our first reading today.  I think refocusing on Genesis leaves us with the positive teaching that is the foundation of these difficult words in the Gospel.  What we learn in Genesis is that God Himself has designed the relationship of marriage.  By making us male and female, and establishing a unity among man and woman in marriage in the very act of creation, God has made marriage to serve as a sign of Himself and His own unity with and love for us, His creation.  Furthermore, in the New Covenant, endowed by the saving grace issuing forth from the Lord’s Cross and Resurrection, marriage stands as the covenantal sign of Christ and his Church.  Christian marriage is to be marked by the positive goods of unity, indissolubility, and openness to the blessing of children, by which marriage reflects the way God unites Himself to us (unity), the way God draws us to eternal life, never separating Himself from us (indissolubility), and the way God’s love issues forth for us in the new life of grace, especially eternal life in Heaven (fecundity).

This is the positive truth about marriage in our Catholic teaching.  This truth is actually better for us than what the world proposes.  This truth remains unchanged even when our sinfulness and doubts would have us believe things about marriage that are not consistent with God’s mind for marriage.  One final lesson from the Book of Genesis is instructive, I think, for understanding the type of sacrifice required of us to embrace even hard teachings, and this particular teaching on marriage.  When I consider how it is that the suitable partner, Eve, is made for Adam, it involves that well-known image and story of God casting Adam into sleep in order to take a rib from him and fashion the woman.  If we accept that divine teaching is better for us, even as it places demands upon us, then we can learn something from this act of creation that can inspire how we view marriage and, honestly, how we embrace any teaching of faith that strikes us as difficult.  What can we say that Adam learns when God finally makes Eve and he, Adam, first lays eyes upon her?  We can say Adam learns that he is no longer alone and his life has meaning and, in fact, is better when he makes sacrifice and gives of himself.  When he gives up his own flesh and blood, imaged in the rib, he awakes to that nuptial cry of the “finally!”, the cry of “This one, at last!” is the suitable partner.  It is precisely in laying down his life, precisely in giving of himself, even his very flesh and blood, that Adam finds meaning and purpose in his very being and in his living.  Yes, it requires sacrifice, but the nuptial cry of Adam, his “this one at last!”, anticipates the cry of Jesus from the Cross: “It is finished”; and, Adam’s gift of himself anticipates that difficult lesson that each disciple must accept: the way to follow the Lord, the way to be satisfied in this life, the way to lasting peace, the way to eternal life is by embracing God’s teaching, especially when difficult, and rejecting the worldly message that speaks to, and seems to make sense to, a darkened mind and a fallen world.  The lesson of Adam’s sacrifice and self-giving, whereby true meaning and life are found, remains for us, too, no matter how difficult it may be to accept God’s teachings, no matter how challenging it may be for us, no matter how our cultural forces may reject such teaching and make concessions due to hardness of heart.  Yes, we can admit this is difficult, it can bring suffering, it requires us to embrace the cross; but, in so doing we learn what Adam learned in his self-giving that resulted in Eve, and we learn to be like the Lord, the leader of our salvation who was made perfect through suffering (second reading).

Twenty-Fifth Sunday in Ordinary Time

Dominica XXV per Annum B
22 September 2024

 For the second Sunday in a row we hear the Lord teaching and telling the disciples about the prediction of his passion.  This is the second of three passion predictions in St. Mark.  We see hear once again, as we did last Sunday, that the disciples don’t get it.  In fact, it is embarrassing that as the Lord predicts his passion they are busy predicting who might fill the leadership vacuum by arguing who is greatest among them.  In last Sunday’s passage, the Lord had to confront the tendency to think only as human beings do.  Trying to understand the plan of salvation with only human thinking simply will not work and will not result in appreciating the serious call that we must confront the tendency to think as human beings do and we must convert.  We must change.  Following the path of salvation means our sinful ways must be put to death in order that we can rise to a new life, a redeemed life.  Thinking as human beings do by rejecting suffering will meet the sharp rebuke we heard St. Peter receive last Sunday.  In this Sunday’s passage, the Lord confronts the tendency to reject humility, the tendency to think of oneself as greater, to exalt oneself.  This is precisely what was occupying the attention of the disciples as they walked along with Jesus.  These two Sunday passion predictions teach us that the Lord’s way – and therefore, our way to being saved – is through suffering and humility.

 The first reading reinforces the lesson of suffering.  This matches up with last Sunday’s first reading from the Prophet Isaiah.  Last Sunday’s first reading was taken from the section of Isaiah that references the chosen servant of the Lord who will undergo suffering and persecution.  In fact, that section of Isaiah is called the suffering servant section.  That theme continues in today’s first reading, the Book of Wisdom, where the wicked seek to test the just one by revilement, torture, and condemnation to a shameful death.  The second reading from St. James brings into particular focus the need to embrace humility as a virtue for godly life.  When we embrace suffering we do penance for our sins and we are transformed by an opportunity in faith to be like the Lord, the suffering servant.  In such conformity to the Lord we can grow in grace.  Humility is also a way in which we become like the Lord.  We are encouraged to humility when St James writes, “Where jealousy and selfish ambition exist, there is disorder and every foul practice”.  This is the dangerous path the disciples were on even as they seemed so near to the path of the Lord.  They are silenced for shame when, inside the house in today’s gospel passage, Jesus asks them, “What were you arguing about on the way”?  The phrase “the way” became an early reference to Christians and the first roots of the Church.  When the gospel reveals “they had been discussing among themselves on the way who was the greatest” we can look back today and see an irony about the use of that term “the way”.  We learn that we are not members of “the way” if the way we are on is one that rejects humility and suffering.  For as the Lord must suffer in humility, we must also embrace the same path if we are truly united to Christ.

 The virtue of humility is a call to be grounded in the truth.  Authentic humility does not exalt oneself above what is true.  And, on the flip side, authentic humility does not pretend that one is lower than one is.  We all have gifts and talents that we are given to use for others, to build up others and to build up the Church.  We should not exalt ourselves above what is true; but we also should not deny our gifts or refuse to use them out of some false humility.  Rather, we are grounded in what is true.  We are grounded in the truth that we are not god, but His creatures.  We are grounded in reverencing God by using well the gifts we have been given.  If the gospel passage were written today, the disciples would have been arguing about who was the G.O.A.T. (the Greatest Of All Time).  So, the virtue of humility is something needed in our time too.  The image of a child, small, dependent, and without legal rights in the ancient world becomes a symbol of humility.  By humility we are drawn into the very inner life of God, the inner life of the Blessed Trinity.  Though absolute and almighty in power and authority, God pours Himself out in Trinitarian life, He pours Himself out in humility to create and to save us.  In suffering, God freely gives His entire being to pay the price for ours sins and to open before us the way to everlasting life.  We remain on that path when we maintain our unity with Christ our Head as members of His Body.  Where Christ, the humble and suffering servant has gone, we, too, are called to follow.

Twenty-Fourth Sunday in Ordinary Time

Dominica XXIV per Annum B
15 September 2024

 The Gospel passage is St. Mark’s accounting of the first of three predictions of the Lord’s passion.  The Lord wants to know who people say he is.  We can learn a lesson from this passage that it is not sufficient to simply identify Jesus, or to know his Name, or to claim that he is the Christ.  In order to benefit from relationship with the Lord, a disciple must be able to not only identify Jesus and use his title “Christ”; the disciple must also accept the content of how Jesus will be the Christ.  The disciple must also be conformed to the same way of life.

 We learn that there is more than just being able to name Jesus, or call him one’s Lord and the Christ, from how Jesus teaches that he must suffer greatly, be rejected, be killed, and rise again.  That lesson is brought into sharper focus still when the Lord rebukes Peter for rejecting how he will be the Christ.  Peter’s refusal to accept how the Lord will be the Lord is met with those stinging words: “Get behind me, Satan.  You are thinking not as God does, but as human beings do.”  Peter wants to tell the Lord how things should be and how to accomplish his mission.  We have to rebuke that same tendency in ourselves to think as human beings do when we seek to avoid struggle and suffering, meanwhile being very quick to satisfy our every desire with all the things of this life that feel good.  The Lord’s description that he must suffer, die, and rise tells us that the way of suffering is not just a circumstance of his life, it is not just something passive that happens to him.  Rather, he must suffer, die, and rise.  That tells us that this path of suffering is a necessity and the precise manner in which he will fulfill his mission.  And to be clear, the mission is not simply the suffering, but it is always connected to the resurrection.

 We learn still more in this passage.  Namely, we are taught that the disciple must imitate the Lord and must be conformed to his way of life.  That means that the way of suffering is not just a secondary, or a passive circumstance for us either.  We cannot call upon the Lord using his Name and acknowledging his title as “Christ” in any meaningful way if we do not also accept in our own lives that path of suffering leading to resurrection.  It must be a way of life for us too.  That way of suffering is not to be viewed as some fatalistic nihilism where we think of ourselves as worthless.  No, we are beloved children of God.  We must rather grow in trust in God and recognize that, in a fallen nature, we can easily feed every whim and desire we have, we can keep the body feeling satisfied, while being far less dedicated to putting our own sin to death.  In falling to that easy tendency to have everything this life can offer, we end up on the mistaken path of saving our life here, only to lose it in the life to come.  But in conforming ourselves to the suffering Lord as a path we, too, must follow, we are able to lose the temporary values of this life and be saved for the life to come.  In this insistence of Jesus we learn that there are two meanings of “life”.  We see this in other passages of the gospels too.  There is natural life in this earthly realm.  But there is also supernatural life in the world to come.  We are mistaken and lost if we seek only to feed our natural life here and now.  The necessary path to the supernatural life of salvation is to imitate Jesus in his suffering, death, and resurrection.

 Our lives here, then, should be marked by penance and mortifications that help us train ourselves in trust of God and in disciplining the ways we seek to be full of passing goods in this life.  A disciple is not on the path of the Lord if he fills up every natural desire and meanwhile makes his life seem “spiritual” by using Jesus’ Name or calling him the Christ.  What we say with our lips needs to be backed up with its full meaning.  The Lord teaches us today how he will be the Christ and therefore how we must be Christians.  The attempt to have it another way is asking for the same type of rebuke Peter received.  We must avoid the trap of thinking only as human beings do.

 The way of a disciple is not a passive thing by which we simply use the title Christian.  Jesus says, “Whoever wishes to come after me”.  That term “wishes” indicates an active desire to live a saved life.  Being passive as a Christian or wearing the title Christian like a label does not work.  We likewise must train ourselves through the difficulties of life (and we can admit how difficult this work is) to grow in trust of the Lord whatever may come, whatever the struggles and sufferings, whatever the crosses are.  When we practice penance and mortifications – and not only in the season of Lent to be clear! – we are being conformed to the Lord.  When we repent of our sins and the ways we give so much attention to our natural life, to the detriment of supernatural life, we are embracing the cross.  What our lips speak about Jesus being the Lord and master of our life must be backed up by action.  That’s perhaps why the Church chooses the second reading for today from St. James, who writes: “faith of itself, if it does not have works, is dead”.  What our lips speak about Jesus must be backed up by how we commit to Sunday worship.  That we say that Jesus is the Christ is backed up by how we use our treasures and give sacrificially to others.  It is backed up by how we vote our values so that the world is ordered in greater conformity to God’s kingdom.  We profess that Jesus is the Christ, and we truly mean it, when we deal a lethal blow to our sins, and live our vocations in a way pleasing to God.  What we say on our lips is backed up when we stop wasting so much time with frivolity in entertainment and social media, while claiming we don’t have enough time for prayer or the life of the soul.  We are taught that “to think as God does” means that the Son of Man must suffer and then rise again.  Whoever wishes to come after him… must do the same.

Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary

Assumption of the BVM
15 August 2024

Anytime we honor the Blessed Virgin Mary, as we do today in her assumption, the honor is closely tied to the ark of the covenant.  Mary, in fact, is called the New Ark or the Ark of the New Covenant in theological writings and among spiritual authors.  This connection to the ark is no surprise since the Scriptures make this connection.  We saw it in the first reading from the Book of Revelation.  There we have St. John’s vision of the heavens opened up and he sees the ark in the temple.  And immediately, in the next verses it goes on to make the connection, saying a “great sign appeared in the sky, a woman clothed with the sun”.  We see that image of the woman as an image of the Blessed Virgin Mary.

  How do you think the Jews thought of the ark of the Old Covenant?  Let’s consider some things the Scriptures tell us about that ark.  Only the Old Covenant Levitical priests could carry it.  No one else could touch it, under pain of being struck dead (as happened in some passages).  The ark was carried in procession as God’s people journeyed through life in their wanderings toward the Promised Land.  It accompanied them in battle as they faced hostile forces from other peoples.  The ark was the privileged meeting place of God with them.  But, the ark was not God Himself.  It was a powerful sign that God was near and in the midst of His people.  The ark contained signs of God’s presence, but no one thought the receptacle, the box itself, was somehow God.  Now, I want to ask, doesn’t all that sound like utmost respect and honor for the ark?  Do you think anyone among the Jews would have discounted the importance of the ark?  Or do you think anyone would have claimed that honoring the ark might confuse people into thinking the ark itself was God?  No.  And it’s the same with Mary, the ark of the New Covenant.

In addition to my work as a priest, I have other interests and things I am involved in outside of parish work.  Not all of those things are necessarily religious in nature.  Recently I was speaking to the organizer of one group I work with.  It’s not a religious group, but is involved in things in the public square.  The organizer is a sincere bible-believing Protestant.  He said to me, “You do good work for us… with or without the Rosary”.  Now, he wasn’t trying to be disrespectful and I didn’t take it that way.  His comment wasn’t the strongest of criticisms, but it did demonstrate a misunderstanding.  I said to him in response, “Oh, I assure you, any good you think I do is most definitely with the Rosary and with devotion to Mary, the mother of our Savior”.  I share this with you to say, don’t let anyone confuse you into thinking that Marian devotion, or things like the Rosary or litanies or processions, or things we use as part of our devotion to Mary are somehow inappropriate.  Don’t let anyone get away with claiming that honoring her is contrary to Scripture.  No, like the ark of the Old Covenant, she accompanies us on procession in the journey of this life.  She accompanies us as we face difficulties and struggles and must battle against sin to grow in holiness.  She reminds us powerfully that God is near.  How could she do anything other?  It was in her that God came to dwell and from her that He took human flesh in order to unite Himself to us.  And like the ark of old, in all of this honor and devotion, we do not somehow think that she is God.

But we honor Mary for far more important reasons.  Mary is more than just a receptacle, a “container”, where God came to dwell.  We honor her and are devoted to her because she is the premier disciple.  We are devoted to her because her entire life was marked by the mystery of salvation in Jesus Christ.  And we are called to allow the paschal mystery of Jesus, his suffering, death, and resurrection, to mark our lives too.  We see something of this in the second reading from the First Letter of St. Paul to the Corinthians.  St. Paul writes, “Christ has been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep…. For just as in Adam all die, so too in Christ shall all be brought to life, but each one in proper order: Christ the firstfruits; then, at his coming, those who belong to Christ”.  St. Paul teaches us that we bear the mark of Adam in the natural order, meaning that our nature is fallen and we experience disorder, dissolution, and death.  But by spiritual adoption from God, we bear the mark of life in Christ, in the spiritual order.  If we follow this life in Christ as his disciples, we follow that proper order so that we are brought to life.  After Christ, we celebrate that Mary’s entire life was marked by the mystery of salvation.  We celebrate that she followed her son into heavenly life.  And for this reason, she is the model and the sign to us of God’s nearness and our part in being raised to life in Christ.  We honor Mary and celebrate her because through her we have the powerful reminder that God is near and acting in our midst.  Therefore, our hope and encouragement is that our life too can be marked by the same reward of Heaven!

Nineteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time

Dominica XIX per Annum B
11 August 2024

 We are currently in a tour through the sixth chapter of St. John’s Gospel, known as the Bread of Life discourse.  This chapter is a prime location of Jesus’ teaching about the Holy Eucharist, that ordinary bread and wine become his Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity in the Blessed Sacrament of the Altar.  So important is this element of our faith, that it can be said, we are not truly catholic if we do not accept that the bread and wine consecrated at Holy Mass in the Catholic Church are the Lord’s true Body and Blood.  Notice that I did not say: we are not truly catholic if we do not understand how bread and wine become the Body and Blood of Jesus.  No, not understanding is one thing, and it can be improved and perfected.  But not accepting, refusing to accept, makes one not catholic.  Our affirmation of the clear scriptural teaching about bread and wine becoming the true and real Body and Blood of Jesus is something that requires from us an act of faith; faith that Jesus is God and he does what he says.

In this third Sunday installment from John chapter 6, we are getting to the threshold of Jesus’ teaching that his Body and Blood are food for disciples, and that he will give us this food in the Holy Eucharist.  But before we hear that next weekend, the Lord focuses attention on the manna, this bread from heaven, that the Jewish ancestors had received in the desert wanderings.  The Lord is using the manna to reveal two mysteries: the mystery of his divinity and, then, the mystery of the Holy Eucharist.  This weekend I want to focus our attention on only the first mystery, what precedes the teaching on the Holy Eucharist, namely the divinity of Jesus and the pre-requisite that we accept that Jesus is God.

In the Gospel selection today, the Lord uses the manna as a metaphor, as a sign which serves to communicate that he has come down from heaven.  In other words, the foundational lesson before we hear the Lord teach forcefully about the Holy Eucharist, is that just like the manna came down from heaven and was divine in origin, likewise Jesus is divine in origin.  He is the Bread of Life come down from heaven.  This is an important revelation that Jesus is claiming to be God.  And this revelation demands belief.  In fact, to first believe and express faith in the divinity of Jesus, makes it much easier to accept the next step – namely, that he gives himself as food and makes bread and wine become his Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity.  Thus, we can see how important it is that we consider the implications that Jesus is God.  This cannot be only something we say, as words on the lips.  It needs to be something that changes the way we live and the way we prioritize things in life.  Jesus is God.  He has come into our midst in the world.  He loves us.  He saves us.  And He does not abandon us.  He remains with us by the Holy Spirit dwelling within us in the Church.  And a particular gift of His presence is that the Holy Eucharist is his very self.  The manna came down from heaven.  Jesus teaches that he is the true manna.  He has come down from heaven, meaning he is God incarnate.  If we can accept that Jesus is God, how could we fail to accept that he makes bread and wine into his very self?

This teaching in John 6 sort of takes us all back to simpler days in second grade when a young catholic prepares to receive Holy Communion for the first time.  Ask a Catholic in second grade what the Holy Eucharist is and he will say, “It is Jesus”.  Ask the child how that can be, and he might say, “I don’t know.  But Jesus is God and He said so.  He makes it happen.”  And you know what?  That is true, and that is enough to have sufficient catholic faith in the Holy Eucharist!  Now, as we grow we want to have our understanding grow too.  I am not saying our childhood, or teenage, or young adult faith should not grow.  I am not saying we should stay with that second-grade proclamation.  No, we should seek to understand more as we age.  But the bottom line is that Jesus is God and if we believe that, then what he says about his flesh being true food in the Holy Eucharist is easier to accept in fidelity to what he clearly teaches in John 6 (which we will hear next weekend).

The first mystery that is revealed by referencing the manna from the Old Testament is that Jesus is asking his listeners to believe that he is God.  He is asking for faith from them and from us who hear his words today.  The response of the listeners in the Gospel passage reveals that they understand what Jesus is demanding of them.  Several times we hear that his listeners are murmuring about this and casting doubt amongst themselves.  The whole context here is instructive.  What was the chief struggle for God’s people as they wandered the desert for 40 years?  The struggle was to believe in the one true God and that God was with them as they suffered in the harsh atmosphere of the desert.  The struggle was to believe that God had not abandoned them, but that He cared for them, and was providing for them.  In the desert they murmured.  They complained.  And they doubted.  This is similar to what is going on in the gospel.  In today’s passage, we have still more evidence of the refusal to believe in the way the Jews react to Jesus’ claim that he has come down from heaven.  They say, “Is this not… the son of Joseph?  Do we not know his father and mother?  Then how can he say, ‘I have come down from heaven’?”

 I want to challenge us to confront our own murmurings, by which I mean, the ways we do not accept that Jesus is God, or doubt that he is near and working among us.  I want to focus on two ways we might struggle with murmurings.  The first is easy to name, it is the murmuring that rejects wholesale that Jesus is God.  It is a murmuring of apostasy or atheism, the refusal to believe that Jesus is God.  I doubt such murmuring marks many of us here.  But if that type of murmuring does mark you, then you want to confess it and act against it by seeking to build your faith, praying that God give you the gift of faith, and seeking friendship among believers, which can serve to encourage your faith.  The second form of murmuring, can be harder to define, and it may well be something we believers need to confront.  To identify this type of murmuring, this limiting of Jesus, we might ask ourselves, does our stated faith that Jesus is God matter to us?  Do we let that faith make demands on our life?  Is that stated faith visible in how we live, in how we prioritize our life, and the things we do each day?  This way of confronting murmuring is the call to move from faith on the lips only, to a faith that rests our security, our present life, and future life on the truth that Jesus is God and He is with us.  This second type of murmuring can mark even us.  Is God a priority in my life?  I might never dream of skipping Sunday Mass, but Monday through Friday… is there much evidence that God is a priority?  Do I seek to grow in awareness of the presence of God by daily prayer, frequent confession, and worthy reception of Holy Communion as often as possible?  Or do I let the day get away from me, with barely a moment given to pray?  Do I come to God only when I think I need something, or when I want something?  Do I treat God as a type of vending machine?  I come on my terms and expect Him to pump out what I want when I give Him the slightest attention.  Is my vision about life in this world, a godly vision?  Do I see my life and the world around me as created to be good and profoundly loved by God?  Is there anything I owe God with the gift of my life?   And will I give it?  Unknowingly, have the struggles in my life, my “desert wanderings”, caused me to live as a Christian in such a way that I am really murmuring against the Lord, doubting his ability as God?  When we confront our murmuring, and seek to reject it, it makes living the faith a more vibrant thing.  It makes coming to the sacraments something more rich.  It makes it easier to give time to God in prayer.  It makes sacrificial giving of my resources easier too.  It makes it possible to respond to my vocation, believing that God will give me what I need to accomplish it.  Rejecting our murmuring so that we grow in faith, makes us more receptive to all the blessings God wants to give us, but which our lack of faith can stifle.  Jesus said, “No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draw him.”  In other words, for us to believe in God it is necessary that we let Him pour out His grace upon us.  So, will we do the things that can help faith and strengthen it?  Or will we do the bare minimum in our murmuring?  Before we get to belief in the Holy Eucharist, we need to first work on the lesson of today’s Gospel passage: the call to believe that Jesus is God.  As we have these privileged weeks to reflect on our Catholic faith in the Holy Eucharist, I want to encourage you to acknowledge wherever you are in your faith and to consider what murmurings can tend to creep in.  Especially as regards growing in proper Eucharistic faith, I want to encourage you to come before the Lord in our chapel for adoration.  Even if you don’t think you have enough Catholic faith in the Holy Eucharist, the place to start is to acknowledge Jesus as God.  Come to be in the godly place of our chapel and ask the Lord to reveal Himself to you so that you know him to be God, and so that your faith in the Holy Eucharist can grow.  Prepare yourself in advance for Holy Mass, reading the Sunday readings and naming what specific intentions or prayers you have for each Mass, things and needs you want to lift up at Mass when the priest lifts up the offerings at the altar.  These practices can help to prepare each of us for stronger faith and for what the Lord said in the midst of the murmuring in the Gospel, “It is written in the prophets: They shall all be taught by God.”

Sixteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time

Dominica XVI per Annum B
21 July 2024

 We have a rather brief Gospel passage today that draws upon prophecy from the Old Testament.  The first reading from the Prophet Jeremiah gives us some insight into the background of the Gospel passage.  The prophet Jeremiah speaks of wicked and sinful shepherds who mislead and scatter the flock.  The sinfulness of their religious authorities, leads God’s people into idolatry and dissolves their proper identity.  Ten of the twelve tribes of God’s people settle in the north and these ten tribes come to be called Israel.  The remaining two tribes in the south come to be called Judah.  Israel, the ten tribes in the north, pay the price for their idolatry when they are invaded by Assyria and taken away into exile.  From there, they are scattered among the Gentile nations in the region, mixed in with other peoples, such that they are lost, their proper bloodline cannot be identified.  Using the image from Jeremiah, the sheep have been scattered and driven away and bad shepherds have contributed to this.  Jeremiah goes on to prophecy about God’s solution.  God Himself will gather the remnant of the flock and he will appoint new shepherds over the people.  This is to take place in the time of the Messiah, for Jeremiah says the promise that God Himself will do this will take place when a shoot is raised up from David.  And then both Judah and Israel will be saved and will dwell in security.

In the Gospel we are in the time of the Messiah.  Jesus is identified with the promise of a righteous shoot from David.  Jesus is the priest, the prophet, and the king whose throne will last forever.  He is also the shepherd who will fulfill what Jeremiah said.  Jesus, the Good Shepherd, associates other shepherds with his work.  He establishes a hierarchy in his kingdom.  In the Gospel, we see that the Lord has sent the apostles out to begin their work as shepherds.  In the Gospel passage they return to report to the Lord all that has taken place.  And people are responding with great enthusiasm.  In fact, the response to the proclamation of the Gospel is so great and exhausting that the apostles don’t even have time to eat and need to pull away to rest.  The vast crowds pressing around Jesus and around the apostles call to mind the image hanging in the air from Jeremiah and other prophets regarding God’s people who had been scattered by past exile.  The remnant sheep are indeed being gathered from distant places and brought to graze in good pasture where none shall be missing.  The sheep are being gathered by Jesus himself, but also by other shepherds the Lord chooses to associate with this work.

When Jesus saw the vast crowd responding to this work his heart was moved with pity.  What he does next, how he responds to this movement of pity is telling.  The Gospel says that the Lord began to teach them many things.  The Lord recognized that a deeper hunger and longing was drawing the crowds to respond.  The people are leaving their homes and their work to come and hear the good news because they ultimately hunger for more than physical food.  They hunger to know God, to know God’s love and to have salvation.  They hunger to know truth.

I want to make two applications from this brief gospel passage.  The Lord looks upon us with pity and compassion too.  The spirit of the world, the spirit of this age, is marked by confusion about truth.  In this sense, Pontius Pilate can serve as an example of the spirit of the world in his interrogation of Jesus before the crucifixion, when Pilate asks, “What is truth?”  Just as there is the story of the Good News, the world also has its own secular narrative.  Our modern means of communication help that narrative to be spread far and wide such that vast crowds accept the secular message.  To the degree that the world’s narrative is lacking truth, or even downright false, souls in our age can be scattered in exile like sheep without a shepherd.  But the Lord, the Good Shepherd, has pity on us.  And so, he desires to teach us.  He has established his Church and associated other shepherds with him so that we may be taught.

Thus, the first application of this Gospel is, we ourselves must be interested in being taught, so that we are fed with truth that comes from the Lord and is communicated in every age through his Church.  We let the Lord teach us when we listen to his Church and study saving doctrine.  We also let the Lord teach us when we take responsibility to study the Scriptures and the faith.  We don’t have to become scholars or academics, but we should put forth some effort to be informed of sacred teaching and truth.  To not study and know the teachings of Jesus will result in feeding on half-truths and lies, which leads to being shepherded more by the spirt of the world than by Jesus.

The second application is, we ourselves need to be willing to speak the truth to others.  In this way, we are like the apostles who are sent out to other sheep.  We have received saving teaching not only for ourselves, but to share.  We need to respond with pity and compassion to people’s deeper hunger by speaking the truth.  We should instruct our children properly and we should be willing to speak to others in our places of work, in social gatherings, in politics, and in encounters during our ordinary day.  This is not always easy, but it is our duty.  Our sharing of sacred teaching, of truth, may be rejected, but that does not absolve us from sharing first of all our living relationship with Jesus and the teaching that goes hand-in-hand with responding to the narrative of the Gospel.

We first need to have a living relationship with Jesus.  And we must be interested both in knowing the truth and in sharing it with others so that the vast crowds of our day, like sheep without a shepherd, may experience the love of God and be saved.