Thirty-Second Sunday in Ordinary Time

Dominica XXXII per Annum C

10 November 2019

 Ideas have consequences.  We see that in the Gospel exchange today between Jesus and the Sadducees.  The Sadducees were a distinct movement or party within Judaism.  They were a rather small but influential and elite group owing to their descent from a priestly line and thus, their influence in the Temple and the functions of worship.  They were also distinct in some of their beliefs.  For example, they had a much more restrictive approach to Scripture, accepting only the Books of Moses as authoritative (the Books of Moses being the Pentateuch, the first five books of our Bible).  They did not believe in the existence of angels.  And they rejected the notion of a resurrection.  So, it was not only their aristocratic lineage that set them apart, but also their thoughts, opinions, and beliefs.  Ideas have consequences.

 With this in mind let’s look at the two Gospel lessons (marriage and angels) and see just how different popular thought in society today is from the thought formed by divine teaching from Jesus.  I’ll start with angels.  It is a popular thought in society to claim that when a person dies he becomes an angel.  At the time of funerals, you see on cards and hear in poems direct claims that the deceased is now an angel watching over us or that Heaven has gained an angel.  Pinterest will literally explode with examples of this idea.  Now that idea may be based more on sentimentality, yet it has consequences.  Based on the revelation of Scripture and philosophical reasoning, angels are distinct beings that are purely spiritual.  As such it is not proper to their being to have a body.  That’s what it means to be an angel: an intelligent personal being that is purely spiritual and not bodily.  Quite a different level of being is the human being who properly exists as a unity of body and soul.  A human being has both a bodily element and a spiritual element.  As creatures of superior intelligence, and not being limited by a body, angels are, to use less technical terms, higher on the “food chain” than a human being, just as a human being is higher on the food chain than an animal, which is higher on the food chain than a plant.  So, what is the consequence of the popular idea that after death we become angels?  Now I hope no one brought any rotten produce from your backyard garden, but I have to break it to you that, first of all, such a notion is not true, is not consistent with the Scriptures, and therefore not a belief a Catholic should adopt.  Secondly, if after death we hold that a person can go up the food chain to become an angel, then we have to accept the possibility and logical consequence that we can also go down the food chain and become a dog, or worse a cat.  No one wants to accept going down the food chain and I don’t see popular poems around death and dying making any claims when a person dies that Heaven, or Hell for that matter, has gained a cat!  But wait!  Didn’t Jesus say that in the resurrection and in the age to come we will become angels?  Be careful.  He said those deemed worthy to attain to the age to come will be “like angels” and he says that not to indicate that a dead human being changes his rank of being and joins the choirs of angels.  Rather, he says they become like angels specifically in that they no longer die.  The dead person enters immortality, like the angels, but the dead person does so awaiting to be rejoined to his resurrected body.  It’s the way we properly exist as human beings.  In other words, a human being remains a human being and an angel remains an angel.

 Switching gears to the Gospel lesson on marriage, in society, popular thought and opinion (these days anyway) is that marriage is primarily, or even only, about the adults, that it is first and foremost about the fulfillment of the adult parties.  Therefore, whatever fulfills any two consenting adults is good and acceptable; and, is as good and acceptable as what fulfills any other two adults.  There are consequences of this thought.  So, we have slogans like “love is love.”  And we have bumper stickers of a blue square containing a yellow equal sign, and a red version of the same image.  This has consequences and it leads to a completely subjective understanding of marriage that results in marriage being whatever anyone wants to make of it.  And so, the consequence of popular thought leads to two men or two women simulating marriage and doing so nowadays with legal codification.  And it would be hopelessly naïve to think that this opinion about marriage won’t easily and quickly become no longer mostly about what two people want but will become any combination of numbers or genders or transgenders.  But what the Scriptures reveal, and therefore what a Catholic holds, about marriage is very different.  The Gospel selection today gives a small glimpse of this divine lesson.  Jesus responds to the situation presented by the Sadducees.  They present a silly hypothetical case of a woman married seven times in this world.  If you believe in a resurrection, well then, whose wife will she be when she returns to a bodily life in the new world to come?  Jesus responds that those who are deemed worthy to attain to the resurrection do not marry.  This is the case because in the resurrection he says specifically that “they can no longer die.”  So, what is the consequence of that thought?  What do we learn from it?  If in the resurrection people do not marry because they cannot die that means that a primary reason for marriage in this age is precisely for procreation, the continuation of life, since we can and do die in this world.  Society’s opinion leads to the rejection of children as a primary purpose and blessing in marriage by the promotion of contraception.  And society’s opinion rejects the exclusive nature and value of the complementarity of the two sexes whose unity in marriage models the unity of God Himself whose image in creation is shown in making us both male and female.  Based on the Natural Law, based on Sacred Scripture and Sacred Tradition, the Catholic holds that openness to life and the unity of the spouses are the primary purposes of marriage.  Furthermore, we hold that it is precisely these fundamental purposes that are for the good of the spouses and which lead to their fulfillment and flourishing.

 Ideas have consequences.  We need to be careful about what we permit to influence our thoughts and opinions because that translates into our beliefs and our actions.  I fear that it is fashionable, especially these days and in the arena of the faith, to want quick and easy answers and to not treat seriously that Scripture and Tradition are our guides and that they need to be carefully studied.  If we are people of faith who know Jesus to be God and master of our life, then popular opinion in society needs much greater scrutiny so that we make sure we are not led astray.  For the consequence of being led astray would mean not only the possibility of being wrong but could also mean we are not worthy to attain to heavenly resurrection.

 The Maccabean brothers in the first reading give us a powerful example of just how important it is to be aware of which ideas we permit to form and influence us.  These seven brothers, together with their valiant mother, are examples of fidelity in the face of the popular and secular thinking of their time.  When societal pressure and the secular force of the king demanded they violate God’s law they refused and died for that faith.  Their witness remains for us today.  For as much as we value the present life, and we should, we can’t compromise the offer of the life to come.  If we permit ourselves to be formed by the uncritical adoption of popular societal opinion how will we ever hope, to be like the Maccabees, to provide an example of fidelity in our time?  Ideas have consequences.  We come from God and we are made for Him and we are called to return to Him.  In the meantime, we have the duty to stand as witnesses to divine truth so that others reject falsehood and share our hope for a heavenly resurrection.  As we prayed in the Collect of this Holy Mass: “Almighty God, …keep from us all adversity, so that… we may pursue in freedom of heart the things that are yours.”

Thirty-First Sunday in Ordinary Time

Dominica XXXI per Annum C

3 November 2019

 Still on Jesus’ extended journey to Jerusalem narrated by St. Luke, in the verses immediately before today’s Gospel passage, just outside the city gate of Jericho Jesus had healed a blind beggar who wanted to see.  Now inside the city, amid throngs of people, Zacchaeus wants to see Jesus.  Zacchaeus could see with his eyes; his eyes functioned properly.  The Gospel narrative tells us important details, however, about Zacchaeus’ moral stature, not just his physical height.  Tax collectors were viewed as public sinners.  The Israelites who were tax collectors were viewed as cheats among God’s people because they cooperated with the occupying Roman government to take money from their own kind.  Added to that, tax collectors made money by taking their own cut from their own people.  Zacchaeus is not just any tax collector but a “chief tax collector AND a wealthy man.”  First century ears would hear this description and immediately hear that Zacchaeus was a very grave, dishonest, and public sinner.  The difference between the blind beggar and Zacchaeus then becomes clear: Unlike the blind beggar, Zacchaeus had the use of his eyes but he is morally blind and in spiritual darkness for he is lost and headed to eternal destruction.  The final line of the Gospel selection fills in the picture of just how important for salvation was Zacchaeus’ encounter with Jesus: “For the Son of Man has come to seek and to save what was lost.”

I find this Gospel account intriguing for who is doing the seeking.  The first part of the Gospel shows us that Zacchaeus had a strong desire to see Jesus.  He fights his way in the crowd but, being short, he knows he won’t be able to catch a glimpse of Jesus.  Zacchaeus desires to see Jesus and he employs whatever is necessary to see him.  But as Jesus passes by notice that the subject switches and it is Jesus who is doing the seeking.  Jesus, who is, as the first reading said, the “Lord and lover of souls,” reads Zacchaeus’ heart.  Jesus knows that despite his great sin, Zacchaeus is in the process of changing.  Zacchaeus’ desire to see Jesus is not a matter of his eyes, which function well, but of his faith and its expression in moral conversion.  And so, it is Jesus who stops and looks up at Zacchaeus.  Jesus meets Zacchaeus’ desire and Zacchaeus’ efforts, and so Jesus calls out to Zacchaeus with an invitation for more intimate life and communion with him.  “Come down quickly, for today I must stay at your house.”  As the light of new life dawns on Zacchaeus he moves from being the chief tax collector who has cheated everyone to – we might say – being the chief of stewardship who now gives half of his belongings to the poor and who repays those he has extorted by repaying four times over – far more than required by Jewish law.  When you have Jesus, the greatest treasure, well, giving up material things is of comparatively little consequence.

 What are you seeking in life?  Or better yet, Whom are you seeking in life?  Is it Jesus?  Is it a relationship with him?  Is it salvation in his kingdom?  And if you want to seek Jesus are you taking a cue from Zacchaeus and using the means necessary to accomplish that goal?  Are you rising up, like climbing that sycamore tree, to place your eyes on Jesus?  Are you ready and willing to receive Jesus with joy today into your house?  If I say I seek Jesus but I’m not working to focus my way of thinking and acting to be like the Gospel, then not only am I NOT climbing that tree to see Jesus, but I’m actually descending; I’m digging a hole.  If I want to see Jesus but I won’t battle that tendency to gossip or to drink heavily, or any other sin, then not only am I NOT climbing that tree, but I’m actually digging a hole.  If I say I seek Jesus but I won’t work to eradicate lust and to live greater purity of heart, mind, and body, then I’m not placing myself in a position to see Jesus; rather, I’m digging a hole.  If I hang out in the crowd somewhere near Jesus but I don’t make the effort to pray and to confess my sins then I’m not making my way up that tree, but I’m digging a hole.  That hole won’t help me see Jesus.  But it will swallow up my body and result in seeing damnation!  The choice to let oneself be transformed by Jesus is yours and it is mine.  Ultimately, what it comes down to, as it did for Zachhaeus, is will I let myself be found by Jesus?  Will I put myself where I can be found by Jesus?

 Jericho is a place in the Old Testament where walls tumbled down so that God’s people could enter the fortified city and be victorious.  That setting in today’s passage – Jericho – is rich then.  What walls need to tumble down in our lives, walls that prevent us from seeing Jesus?  What walls in our moral life prevent us from entering deeper life with Jesus?  What walls in our spiritual life keep us distant from the Lord who seeks us and who desires us to have salvation?  Truly seek Jesus.  Truly desire life with him.  And then, like Zacchaeus, employ the effort necessary to make that happen.  And you know what?  Jesus will look up at you, tell you he’s been seeking you, and then he’ll ask to come dwell with you while the grumblers and complainers remain lost and unsaved.  The salvation that Jesus brings – the salvation that he himself is! – means that he invites us to come down from the tree while he himself climbs up the tree: not a sycamore tree, but the tree that is the wood of the Cross, where all who look upon him lifted high (cf. Jn. 3:14-15; Num. 21:8-9) find that “today salvation has come to this house.”

Twenty-Ninth Sunday in Ordinary Time

Dominica XXIX per Annum C

20 October 2019

 This weekend I am going to continue reflections on the state of things in the Church and in the world, motivated by the recent abuse report from our Archdiocese.  The sinful and criminal scourge of sexual abuse together with the moral rot within so much of our leadership that has contributed to failures in handling abuse is a subject that I think we simply must talk about and it cannot be swept under the rug.  I think it is also owed to you to hear words on this from a priest.  Given the realities of disorder and immorality in our society and within the Church I do NOT, sadly, anticipate that this will be the last time we have to reflect upon this topic.  But I do hope that a new level of transparency is happening now, which can only bode well for the witness the Church can give to our world such that other institutions and groups might be driven to more transparently address abuse where we know it also takes place in the secular world.  In God’s Providence, His Sacred Word in the scripture selections this weekend seems quite appropriate for the pulse I sense in our community.  In particular, I find great consolation in the Old Testament (first reading) image of fraternal support and intercessory prayer: Moses having help holding up the staff to gain victory for God’s people.  And I find consolation in considering the new staff of God, that is the Cross of Jesus, by which on the hill of Calvary his arms are outstretched to gain us the ultimate victory of salvation.  And then the perfect Gospel for us today.  Maybe I shouldn’t assume to attribute this to you as a group, but I know this Gospel speaks to me: Jesus gives his disciples a parable “about the necessity for them to pray always without becoming weary.”

Thank you, Lord!  That’s just the message I needed to hear right now because weariness I think describes my general sentiment.  Maybe that resonates with you too.  All week I have been reflecting upon weariness and trying to notice how weariness is just sort of hanging in the air.  The original Greek in this passage that we translate in English as “weary” has a rich variety of meaning.  It refers to what can happen when we are in a bad situation, when we are immersed in suffering or in evil.  The literal root of the word refers to the tendency to faint or to turn coward when being “in evil.”  The connotation of the word in this use carries the sense of being disappointed, or losing heart, or growing weary when we suffer evil.  Now, to be clear, I am not at all suggesting that there isn’t joy in daily living or that there aren’t so many good things that take place over the course of a day.  However, when I stop to think and to reflect upon the state of affairs in our world, both the secular world outside and the state of affairs inside the Church, I think I notice a sense of being fatigued, of being dissatisfied, and being impatient.  Maybe I’m not the only one.

Looking at the broader secular world things seem more and more unhinged from truth and reality.  And more to the point, the velocity with which we have become unhinged seems to have increased exponentially.  I suggest that our political discourse in the United States can serve as the magnifying glass to see the dissolution in our secular world.  Looking into that magnifying glass I think we see a fanatical blood lust for abortion on demand, that seems like its own evil, distinct from the fact of the evil of abortion itself.  I think we also see a rapid rise in the tyranny of the transgender movement which, frankly, just looks like complete chaos.  Switching gears now to look to the Church, I don’t think we can just assume that life within the Church is our little safe haven because disorder and chaos mark the Church too, at least in her human membership.  More and more I hear from so many Catholics who are disturbed by the confusing decisions, documents, and actions that come even from the Vatican.  There is a Synod of bishops going on currently in Rome and it, like the couple of previous synods in the last few years, seems determined to sew confusion even in already settled matters of doctrine and in long-standing disciplines.  We look to our bishops, but so many seem to be lacking real apostolic courage to proclaim authentic Catholic faith when it might cost them popularity among people or among fellow bishops, or even higher ups in Rome.  How much do they need to hear today’s second reading from St. Paul: “I charge you in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who will judge the living and the dead, … proclaim the word; be persistent whether it is convenient or inconvenient.”  Added to all this is the great sadness of the abuse scandal and the complete loss of trust it carries with it.  I’m not going to burden us with any more observations than these few examples.  Again, maybe it is just me, but I know I need to hear the divine command to not grow weary, to not become a coward, to not despair.  Rather, we pray always and await God to secure the rights of His chosen ones and to do justice speedily.

 So what do we do?  What can we do here?  First of all, our turbulent times outside and inside the Church are a painful but important lesson that our firm and lasting foundation given to us by Jesus is Sacred Tradition and Sacred Scripture.  Our only answer and solution to the problems in society and in the Church is to be more deeply immersed in authentic Catholic Tradition.  That Tradition is the full deposit of God’s Word to us and contains the spoken, oral teaching and discipline of the Apostles and that privileged portion of oral teaching written down in the Sacred Scriptures.  To be immersed in Sacred Scripture and Sacred Tradition gives us an anchor and a firm foundation that does not move even though the winds of chaos batter us.  Secondly, taking the lesson from today’s Gospel, we must be persistent in prayer and not give in to weariness.  You and I want our prayers answered right away, correct?  I have some sobering news for us.  Notice that final line of today’s Gospel?  Jesus said, “But when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth?”  I hate to have to tell you this but that seems to frame Jesus’ teaching in this Gospel in the terms of the end times, meaning that Jesus is saying the justice and the vindication that will speedily come from God is in reference to the final judgment.  In other words, he does not mean that we should expect our prayers to bring a speedy resolution of earthly injustice.  And not, sadly, on our timeline.  So, we must be determined to pray and to be persistent and to not become weary of the events of our times.  I promised you some guidance in our prayer response in light of our local abuse report.  (1) I suggest that we invoke the Blessed Virgin Mary and St. Joseph in our prayers, with a specific focus of having before our eyes authentic feminine and masculine examples of discipleship.  The daily Rosary is clearly a great prayer to adopt.  (2) I suggest that we make time to be committed to be before the Lord in our Adoration Chapel and to make every effort to incorporate adoration into our spiritual life.  To be there simply before the Lord who is present.  To raise to him all the concerns that rise up in our hearts.  And to have ourselves prepared to receive from his open Heart the gift of merciful love that flows so abundantly from that Divine Heart.  (3) I suggest that you consider how you might make attendance at daily Mass possible.  To be more regularly, frequently, nourished by the Sacred Scriptures proclaimed at Mass and to receive the Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity of the Lord more regularly strengthens us in battle.  And, finally, (4) something we will do together is that on the first three Wednesdays of November we will move the daily Mass into the main church and we will offer those Masses in particular for reparation for the sin of abuse and for the healing of victims.  As you responded so enthusiastically to this last year, I hope you will make the effort to join together on those first three Wednesdays of November for the evening daily Mass held here in the main church.

  In the first reading, God’s people were victorious against a fierce enemy while Moses held his arms aloft with the staff of God.  Moses was not alone.  He had the help of others to raise the staff.  That gives us an early example of intercessory prayer and the value of coming together in mutual support and prayer.  My friends, the new staff of God is the Cross of Jesus, where his arms are spread out for our salvation.  The psalm today tells us we lift our eyes toward the mountain whence shall come our help.  Lifting our eyes to the mountain and to the Cross is precisely what we do sacramentally at the Holy Mass.  In the raised sanctuary, like the Hill of Calvary, we set our eyes upon the ultimate victory of God, both the crucifixion by which the debt of sin is paid, and upon the resurrected flesh of Jesus Christ given to us in Holy Communion to aid our weariness!  If exhaustion, loss of trust, and loss of hope wage war upon you then hear the Gospel remind you how much more the just Judge will respond to our persistent prayers.

In the face of so many challenges both in secular culture and in the Church, and in places far away and also near, what you and I can do is to live the orthodox Catholic faith in the only place that matters for us: Here and now… in the family, the domestic Church; in the witness of our lives out in our small segment of the world, at work, at school, in our neighborhood, in gatherings of friends; and in this parish.  This is our sphere of influence.  This is where we are called to pray always and to help one another when we grow weary.  This is the place where the lives of the saints – YOU –  these saints are made!  That “book,” we might call it, of local holiness is the answer to present crisis and it needs to be written upon the pages of our very lives.  Gods gives us the grace – the “ink,” so to speak – to write that story.  God the Father’s answer to this fallen world is Jesus Christ.  But we must never forget that by faith and baptism we have been made members of the Body of Christ.  And so, it is up to you and to me to respond to God’s gifts and to be disciplined and zealous in our cooperation with His grace so that we become more and more the living image of Christ in our broken world.

Audio: Twenty-ninth Sunday in Ordinary Time

In his homily for this Sunday, Fr. Stephen Hamilton once again reflects upon the state of the Church in light of the recent clergy abuse report released by the archdiocese.

Reading 1 EX 17:8-13
Responsorial Psalm PS 121:1-2, 3-4, 5-6, 7-8
Reading 2 2 TM 3:14-4:2
Alleluia HEB 4:12
Gospel LK 18:1-8

Twenty-Eighth Sunday in Ordinary Time

Dominica XXVIII per Annum C

13 October 2019

 Once we get past Labor Day one presumes most people have settled back into a regular routine with a new academic year under way at schools and a new formation year in full swing at the parish.  Parish programming running full-steam means the parish budget sees a dramatic uptick in expenses.  And this is also a time of year when we have the joy of seeing and greeting new faces who have recently joined the parish.  For all of these reasons it is a fairly common practice in parishes in the early fall to address stewardship, a time to reflect upon and to renew our call to sacrificial giving and our use of time, talent, and treasure.  Stewardship is one of the foundational practices of a disciple who believes in Jesus and who believes what the words mean to say that Jesus is the master of my life.  I previously told you that I would be specifically addressing parish finances and last month I had set this weekend for that talk.  But the recent release of the investigative report of abuse allegations in our archdiocese causes me to conclude that it would be more prudent for me to delay that talk for a few more weeks as we each wrestle with our reactions and pray about our response to that report.  Since it is helpful for current and new parishioners who do not know about or use our electronic giving program, Faith Direct, we are still doing a normal fall promotion of Faith Direct.  Faith Direct materials can be found in the narthex and an invitation will be coming to you by email.  But my more detailed treatment of parish finances and our common responsibility for sacrificial giving will wait until at least next month.  Together with that delay, and as I organized last year, I want you to know that I am taking time to pray and to consider parish opportunities for prayer and penance as our spiritual response to our local report.         

 I think the Gospel selection today teaches us a basic principle for life that applies equally to our spiritual life with God.  That lesson is a two-fold awareness: First, the awareness of ourselves and our afflictions.  And, secondly, the awareness of what God is doing in us.  One of the challenges of modern life marked by its frenetic pace, noise, and interruptions is that we can be easily swept along in daily living with little discipline to spend time in reflection and prayer.  The result is that we can tend to be rather numb and unaware of what stirs within us, the good and the bad.  My friends, we aren’t meant to be machines.  We are a unity of body and soul, mind and heart, reason and faith.  Emphasize the one to the exclusion of the other and you aren’t living a fully human life.  How easily and frequently we bury our faces in the backlit screen of a phone or other device, I think, serves as the sign for how easily we can be swept up in distractions that make us less aware of all that stirs in us.  Distraction is one thing; but the result is my main concern as a pastor.  The result is loss of self-awareness and awareness about God’s work with us and in us.  The Gospel shows us how important this basic principle of awareness is.

I can recall events of life when I have wondered why did I react to a given situation in the way I did?  And I have been surprised upon deeper reflection to realize that my reaction was less about the facts of the given situation and more about something else under the surface.  I can recall times of life when, much to my surprise, I came to realize that something like fear or shame or sadness was the deeper reality that explained my surface reactions.  Maybe you would agree that it is generally better overall health and functioning to be aware of what stirs inside you.  But I suggest there is a still more important reason for awareness than just overall health.  And that reason is because awareness impacts our relationship with God, our admitting the truth of what we each bring to the relationship with God.  And it impacts our ability to notice what God is doing in us.

 I’ll give a couple of examples from my own experience.  It took me years to finally notice and admit anger with God about some experiences of life.  I wondered why my prayer seemed dry or why God seemed distant.  I was tempted to believe He wasn’t there for me, wasn’t there in my attempts to pray.  Imagine my surprise when I realized that God was waiting for me where the anger was.  In other words, it was really I who was not authentically there in prayer.  God was at the place where I really was, where I needed to be… but I had to be aware and admit and go to the anger to find Him.  Another example from just a few years ago was when the priests of the archdiocese were gathered to learn about how we would each run the recent archdiocesan capital campaign in our parishes.  In that gathering, I asked some rather pointed questions, with just enough edginess, that unwittingly I became branded as “the opposition.”  But you know what I realized upon further self-reflection?  My reaction was really fear, more than it was any opposition to the campaign strategy or to the things the campaign would support.  I was afraid to have to directly ask someone for money.  I was afraid of rejection.  I was afraid of having to rely on someone else and to appear needy.  And going still deeper I had to admit it made me insecure, and I don’t like that.  And that is where this awareness took a particularly important spiritual turn.  I had to ask myself, so where do I place my security?  And I had to notice that I wasn’t placing my security in God.  You see, if I know and trust that God is my security then I can both have or not have money or resources and all will be well.  If I have God as my security then I can both give money and resources to others, or receive money and resources from others and its okay.  If I know and trust that God is my security then I can ask someone else for a pledge gift and whether they say yes or no, my security doesn’t change because it is in God and not in a person’s response to the request.  Learning the value of awareness has been for me not only a good life lesson for natural health; it has been a powerful lesson about spiritual health because awareness permits me to be honest, sincere, real, and authentic in my relationship with God.  That in turn helps me take note of what God is doing in me and to then be able to make a response to Him.

 I suggest awareness is a valuable lesson for us from the Gospel today.  It is really quite simple but profound.  It’s a lesson that is easy to miss in the scene with the lepers.  But listen again.  “As [Jesus] was entering a village, ten lepers met him,… saying ‘Jesus, Master!  Have pity on us!’  And when he saw them, he said, ‘Go show yourselves to the priests.’  As they were going they were cleansed.  And one of them, realizing he had been healed, returned, glorifying God… and fell at the feet of Jesus and thanked him.”  Only one of them realized.  It’s the lesson of awareness.  And it had a direct impact on the healed leper’s relationship with God because that awareness led him back to Jesus in a posture of worship (he fell at his feet) and in gratitude.  Leprosy is a clear affliction, a disease.  But the truth is we each have and carry afflictions, both physical and spiritual, some obvious and public, like leprosy would be; others, more subtle or hidden.  Perhaps it is those hidden spiritual diseases that are even more dangerous than something like an obvious physical disease.  I say, “more dangerous,” because we can remain unaware of hidden disease, or we can simply hide it, leaving it unconfessed and unaddressed.  Is our awareness of our afflictions and awareness of what God is doing in us a critical lesson with spiritual implications?  I think so.  I think the Gospel shows us just how much is riding on awareness.  The passage doesn’t tell us everything that happened with the other nine healed lepers.  We know they were physically healed.  But what about deeper healing in their relationship with God?  What about the deeper matter of their salvation?  Can we know anything about that?  I think we can.  For only one of the ten – the one who was aware and realized – heard these words: “Stand up and go; your faith has saved you.”        

Twenty-Seventh Sunday in Ordinary Time

Dominica XXVII per Annum C

6 October 2019

In today’s Gospel selection, the apostles have some private time with the Lord on the extended journey to Jerusalem and in the context of the many difficult and challenging parables we have been hearing from this section of St. Luke for many weeks now.  The apostles say to Jesus something that I bet could easily be the prayer each of us makes to Jesus: “Increase our faith.”

God is so very good and so very good in the mysterious ways He operates, even when His ways are inconvenient to our way of thinking and far from ideal in our desire to control our lives and our own surroundings.  Time and again I have to say, God is so good to us and to what we truly need to grow in this life and to arrive at Heaven!  I try to give a lot of attention to my preaching by prayer, study, and preparation.  I usually need at least all week to do this.  But late this week on Thursday the long-awaited independent report of clergy abuse and the critique of the handling of abuse in our archdiocese from 1960 to the present was finally released.  I feel compelled to speak to you about it this weekend.  But I have had only a few hours and not all week to prepare for this.  The report is a devastating topic about real victims whose lives and whose faith are severely harmed.  The report is about local people.  The report includes some people I respect and trust.  The report has me shocked and furious.  Given all this and given only a few hours to switch gears to talk about this before you, what kind of crazy man am I to say “God is so good to us?”  Because as I began reflecting on our local report and noticing my own internal reactions my eyes fell again, but in a new way, on those words to the Lord, “Increase our faith.”  God is good to us because in His mysterious Providence things have happened such that we have this devastating report together with the messages of this weekend’s Scripture selections from His word to us!

Lord, increase our faith, we beg you!  Listen to how perfect these words are for us at this time.  Back up a few verses and see how this passage begins, the setting of these words.  Jesus said to them, “Temptations and sin are sure to come; but woe to him by whom they come!  It would be better for him if a millstone were hung round his neck and he were cast into the sea, than that he should cause one of these little ones to sin” (Lk. 17:1-2).  Jesus goes on to tell the apostles to rebuke sinners and to forgive them if they repent.  To all this the apostles beg, “Increase our faith!”

But what is the precise meaning of this request?  What kind of faith do the apostles reference?  “Faith” is typically understood or treated in two broad categories.  There is the objective content of what is believed.  We might call this the intellectual “stuff” of faith.  I suggest that is most likely typically the meaning you and I immediately have when we speak of having faith.  But there is also the subjective dimension of the word “faith,” meaning the personal adherence by the one who believes.  We might call this the trust of the believer, that deeper movement beyond what I believe that aids my having trust in the one in whom I believe.  The Greek word for “faith” in the Scripture carries both these dimensions and we should stop to consider that because I suspect that in English we often hear and use the word “faith” in mostly the first dimension of the intellectual content of what is believed.  Given this notion of trust that is also part of the concept of faith I want to reflect with you on the apostles request and make it our own: Lord, increase our faith.  Lord, increase our trust!  Like the original setting of this apostolic prayer, we are rocked and unsettled by scandal, by crime, and by sin.  We know the content of the faith tells us of the reality of sin and the reality of God’s power to heal it.  We know we ourselves must receive mercy and forgiveness for our sins.  And we too wrestle with that uncomfortable challenge to be people of mercy who forgive when a sinner repents.  Can we not easily also cry out, “Lord, increase our faith?!”

 As we each pray for an increase in a trusting faith in this difficult time I want to make some observations about the Independent Investigation that our Archdiocese commissioned into the instances of abuse and the method of handling abuse locally.

First, I want to say again and unequivocally, that focus, care, support, and prayers needs to always first be given to victims.  Nothing can undo the harm done to them.  But the Cross and Resurrection of Jesus bring for them too healing and new life, as it does for all of us in whatever wounds we carry.

This investigation was commissioned in August 2018 with the indication that its results would be published in a few months.  More than a year later, I think we can see and understand now why the report took so long… because it was so extensive and thorough... and because there were serious complications along the way.  The Archdiocese gave unprecedented access to files and every time the independent law firm came across an allegation they had to pursue it as far as it could go.  This took much more time than anticipated.

Last year at this time I said in a homily that I hoped we could just get everything out at once and stop the piecemeal release of things that prolongs this ordeal and makes it like a wound that never seems to heal.  I think our Archdiocese’s report goes a long way to that goal.  There will be more to come as earlier time periods are also investigated.  But as difficult as this is, we can have confidence that we are on the path of the unvarnished truth.  We cannot draw back from or fear the truth.  The commitment to transparency and accountability in this report is remarkable.  The Archdiocese is choosing truth over secrecy, even when the truth shows us in a poor light and reveals ongoing systemic failures in our leadership.  If you are like me you may desperately want to believe that our local report stands out among other dioceses for its scope and transparency.  Let me assure you that is true.  There is an international organization called SNAP, which stands for the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests.  You can imagine that there is usually some tension and high criticism of the Church from SNAP, and with good reason.  In Friday’s article on our report in the Oklahoman newspaper there was one such critical quote from a SNAP national board member.  So imagine my surprise when later in the day I came across an online religion journal [“Audits of Oklahoma dioceses identify 22 accused clerics,” Crux, 4 October 2019, by Sean Murphy, https://cruxnow.com/church-in-the-usa/2019/10/04/audits-of-oklahoma-dioceses-identify-22-accused-clerics/] that ran a story about the report from both Oklahoma dioceses and in that story a man identified as the Executive Director of SNAP USA had some unheard of positive commentary to make about the Archdiocese’s unprecedented reporting.  I think you need to hear this.  I of course really wanted to believe that people like SNAP who follow all of this reporting around the world truly had complimentary things to say about what we did here.  But, I’m gun shy to say things I really don’t have firsthand knowledge of.  So, I got a sort of wild idea.  I did a Google search and I called up the Executive Director of SNAP USA, Mr. Zach Hiner.  He answered the phone and I identified myself as a priest of this archdiocese.  We had a very pleasant conversation in which I asked him to confirm for me what SNAP has to say about the OKC report.  Obviously, the matter of the report is criminal and sinful, devastating and damning, and disturbing in the revelation of systemic failures in record keeping and the loss and destruction of records.  But Mr. Hiner was incredibly positive and effusive in his praise of the report the Archdiocese freely commissioned here.  He has read countless reports from dioceses about abuse allegations.  He says they mostly offer a list of names of the accused, dates of ordination, date of removal from ministry, current whereabouts of the accused, and date of death if deceased.  He said rarely is there ever even a bit of information about the particulars of the accusation.  Mr. Hiner said if all we did here was offer a bit of additional information that would have already been noteworthy.  But that we permitted such depth of investigating, with details about the accusations including timelines, and information about the internal handlings of accusations and accused priests… this, he said, is something he has never seen in any report.  He went on to say that the fact our local leadership actually “got out of the way” – his words! – and let outside investigators see it all, even while knowing it would reflect poorly on our personnel and on our procedures, but that we did it anyway is noteworthy and incredible.  For as ugly as the report’s findings are Mr. Hiner says he sees in the actions of our local leadership in this matter real signs of the tenor of things in our local Church by which we get the problem and are committed to the transparency that will truly address abuse and seek to ensure that it does not happen again.  He thanked me for wanting to make sure I had accurate information to share with you about how SNAP views our report and he thanked me for taking the time to call and make sure I had good information.  I thanked him for giving me his time and being willing to talk to me.  Oddly enough, in God’s mysterious ways, my conversation with the Executive Director of SNAP was one of the more positive highlights of my last few days.

I invite you to go to the website of the Archdiocese and follow links to the report and to related information about the topic.  The Archdiocese has made some graphs that can be helpful as we each wrestle with the reality of abuse.  In the current report the files of all priests who were active in our archdiocese from 1960 until the present were investigated.  This represents about 545 priests.  Of those 545 priests, 11 were found to have substantiated allegations of abuse, which is about 2% of the priests represented in the report, with the most recent instances of substantiated abuse taking place in the 1990s, but none substantiated since that decade.  Without minimizing the real harm that 2% represents we should note that our Safe Environment protocols are working and that our environment in the Church is safer now than ever.  We can sometimes be frustrated on the parish level with all the paperwork and what seems like hassle to undertake background checks and Safe Environment training.  But given the reality of abuse and the reality of how improved things are because of our protocols we should recommit ourselves to these procedures, if for no other reason than to honor the victims from earlier decades who did not benefit from this vigilance from the Church they trusted.

 Perhaps by this point in history we are not as shocked as we once were by the notion that even a priest could be a horrifically evil sinner and a disgusting criminal who engaged in the abuse of a soul in his charge.  Maybe what is more shocking to us now is to learn of the failures of Church officials as we see their mishandling of abuse allegations revealed.  Maybe we are each different in what shocks us most depending on our personal circumstances and life experiences.  Whatever the case, and admitting my own deep disappointment and sadness at seeing on display the failures of leaders I held in esteem, we do have to be rather sober in our application of present-day understanding and standards regarding abuse to the actions of those in the past as they attempted to handle abuse.  That in no way absolves their abysmal failures because in instances of clear patterns of repeated abuse by the same cleric they should have been better in their handling of matters.  But being sober in our application of present standards to past activities can help temper our reaction since the truth of the past is more complicated than our feelings are usually ready to admit.

However our understanding of abuse and standards of handling abuse allegations may have evolved over time, especially in the last few decades, we are now without excuse in how we address this and handle it.  It is my enduring hope that the unprecedented depth of this report can permit us to go to the very core of this ugly wound in our Church and in our world.  Just as a doctor or nurse has to go right to a wound, into its ugliness and pain, to scrub it, clean it, and treat it…. the pain of treating a wound is accepted and embraced with the view of the healing that this leads to.  It is my hope that our opening of this wound in our Church is just such a beginning toward an equally unprecedented healing of this scourge.

And so, rocked and stunned, unsure, and angry we can only cry out to the Lord, “Increase our faith!”  Increase our trust!  We will be tempted to adopt the attitude found in the words of the first reading, “How long, O Lord?  I cry for help but you do not listen!  I cry out to you, ‘Violence!’ but you do not intervene.  Why do you let me see ruin; why must I look at misery?”  I can assure you that in our prayer, individually and collectively, if we are honest and sincere in surfacing the truth of our feelings and raising them to the Lord in all their raw woundedness, that we will find healing, renewed peace, and strength to be Jesus’ disciples.  The key will be also noticing that tendency of the human heart to shut down.  And so the psalm today is a good reminder as we pray for victims of abuse, as we pray for purification of our beloved Church, and as we beg of the Lord for increased faith.  The psalm said, “If today you hear his voice, harden not your hearts.”  Lord, we are nothing but unprofitable, unworthy servants.  We beg you, increase our faith!  Increase our trust!

Twenty-Fifth Sunday in Ordinary Time

Dominica XXV per Annum C

22 September 2019

In the Gospel selection we are told that “a rich man had a steward who was reported to him for squandering his [that is, the rich man’s] property.”  The steward was not managing well the property that did not belong to him, but belonged to the rich man.  And so, the steward is called “on the carpet” and told “Prepare a full account of your stewardship.”  The steward has to face reality that what he has been exercising control and authority over is actually not his property.  The steward realizes he can’t go on living in the same way.  He has to give an account for what he has done and for what he has failed to do.  This frightening reality motivates the steward to act with urgency to quickly to establish a new future for himself.  It is this urgent action to establish security that is what the parable encourages and teaches, what Jesus calls “acting prudently.”  This parable can leave us wondering, “Is Jesus putting forward the example of a dishonest person to encourage us to be… dishonest?”  No, the example of the dishonest steward is meant to grab attention for the real point of Jesus’ lesson.  That lesson is that we must act prudently and decisively to establish our true and lasting security.

The word “stewardship” has a particularly evocative ring within these walls.  Those of you who have been long-term parishioners know that our parish was established with a particular focus on being a stewardship parish, meaning that to be an active disciple here all parishioners are invited and expected to make a sacrificial commitment of their time, their talent, and their treasure to our common life here and to our work to form, support, and build the Kingdom of God in our midst.  When the parish first began and we had nothing but a plot of empty land it was perhaps easier to see and to respond to the urgency of being a steward.  After all, if we weren’t good stewards we’d have nothing but weeds growing up in an empty plot.  But years later now, communicating the message of being stewards at St. Monica Church and communicating what that means for how we each use our time, our talent, and our treasure is, we might say, a bit more difficult… structures are already built, programs are in place, activities are already offered.  We are no longer just a plot of empty land and so it can be easy now for each of us to fail to think about making an account of our stewardship to God when most of what we expect from a parish is already here.  While I think it is important that each of us recalls our parish’s stewardship history, the truth is that there is another reason the word “stewardship” should be evocative for each of us… because far from being only a characteristic of our parish as an institution, the truth is that stewardship is a foundational habit of being a disciple.  What we have care of, what we exercise authority and control over, is actually not ours.  We are its stewards.  It belongs to the One who is rich.  And that is not just a generic rich man, but it is God Who is rich in all things, but Who bestows generous blessings upon us to use for His Kingdom.  It is to this rich “man” that each of us must give an account of our stewardship.  But still more, it is with this rich “man” that we are called into relationship because He has made us His stewards.  So, what is our relationship to the things God gives us?  To our time, our talent, and our treasure?  Do we view them as exclusively ours?  Is our focus to amass more for ourselves?  Is my security in the fact that I believe God does and will provide for me?  Or is it more in what I can provide for myself?

The start of a new formation year with summer travel over and regular activities back in swing is a good opportunity to focus on stewardship for the coming year.  In the coming weeks I will focus one weekend on our parish’s financial position, on our stewardship of money and the need we have for sacrificial giving from each parishioner.  But this weekend is a good opportunity to step back and to focus more broadly, more generally, on the call to be stewards of all of God’s gifts.  In this way, before focusing on giving and parish finances, we can first listen to God’s word and pray and reflect upon the foundation of all stewardship: namely, that a basic habit of a disciple of Jesus is the recognition that all that we have is a gift from God.  We are called to receive from God’s generosity, to care for what we receive, and to use it for His glory, knowing that ultimately we must return what we have to God, and, as we heard in the Gospel today, prepare a full account of our stewardship to the One who is rich and who is the source of all things.

In the parable our attention is grabbed because Jesus seems to be encouraging us to follow the example of a dishonest person.  The steward is clearly cheating his master by stealing from what properly belongs to him in order to write off debts owed to the master.  The steward does this to ingratiate himself to others such that when his master judges him poorly, he will have a new security among those who will want to repay him once he loses his role in the master’s house.  We should not be confused about this parable.  The parable commends the steward not for dishonesty but for acting prudently, more prudently than the children of light, that is you and I, to establish a lasting security for himself.  When what he values is threatened the dishonest steward acts quickly and decisively to establish a new security.  This is what Jesus commends: “For the children of this world are more prudent in dealing with their own generation than are the children of light.”  What gets you to act with urgency and decisiveness when something you value is threatened?  If you reflect on that, the answer to that, doesn’t that show you something of where you place your security?  Then as a follow up it is critical to ask: Is your security placed in God, the things of God, His gifts to you here, and the offer of eternal life in Heaven?  Or is what gets you to act with urgency a sign that your security is misplaced on something or someone else?  We might do some soul searching and ask ourselves, do we feel better about ourselves when we have more recognition?  More belongings?  More power?  More money?  Or when we have less of these things, do we feel worse about ourselves and our life?  These questions can be very revealing about where we place our security.  None of us likes to be dependent on others.  It often evokes fear.  The pressure to secure our own future and to control our lives, we would have to admit, does not find support in the Scriptures (A Spirituality of Fundraising, Nouwen, pp. 31-32).

Jesus knows our need for security.  He also knows that we can’t find that security, lasting security, when our heart is divided.  In what lies our security?  This is a good question to ask as we each reflect on the foundations of stewardship and how we either live well or not well that basic habit of being a disciple.  As disciples we are called to be prudent in establishing our security in God, rather than placing a false security in the things of this world and material goods kept for ourselves.  Jesus says: “No servant can serve two masters.  He will either hate one and love the other, or be devoted to one and despise the other.  You cannot serve both God and mammon.”  We have to make a choice if we will find true and lasting security.  In a few weeks I will address our shared responsibility as stewards for the financial needs of our parish.  But today I think we have an invitation to consider the foundational lesson of stewardship: Namely, to recognize that what we have and what we use belongs to God and we are called to be trustworthy with what belongs to Him.  As stewards our security must be placed in our relationship with God, over Whose goods we exercise stewardship.  Any other security we seek to make for ourselves will not be lasting and in fact would be a false god.  Jesus knows our need for security.  He knows we cannot find that lasting security with divided hearts.  And so he teaches us today, “You cannot serve both God and mammon.”

Twenty-First Sunday in Ordinary Time

Dominica XXI per Annum C

25 August 2019

It is very common here in the Bible-belt that questions of salvation are discussed.  At some point I am sure most of us have been directly asked, “Are you saved?”  To pay attention to the Gospel passage today it is clear that the question of who is saved and how many precedes us by centuries.  Today we hear the question asked of Jesus.

In context, the questioner is asking will only a few Israelite people be saved?    It is important to note that before Jesus’ time and during his time this question surfaced and there were different schools of thought among the rabbis about the world to come, which is the Jewish idea of salvation.  Some rabbis took the position that all Israel, all the members of the Twelve Tribes would be saved.  But another current of thought said that the saved would be few and not many.  In this current of thought some rabbis highlighted different moments of Hebrew/Israelite history and noted groups that would not be saved.  Rabbis noted that the generation of the Flood would not be saved.  This was the generation of Noah and the Scriptures say that wickedness was everywhere and thus God destroyed them with the Flood.  These rabbis highlighted the Israelites whose sin contributed to the Babylonian Exile and the destruction of the Temple would not be saved.  They noted that the notorious sin among the men of Sodom would mean they would not see the world to come.  And rabbis noted that the ten tribes who went into exile in the north and intermingled with the culture and religion of the Assyrians would not be saved.  This position that not all Israelites would be saved is a belief that only a remnant of Israel will see the world to come, the promised Day of the Lord, the new creation, that place of harmony.  With this in mind we can appreciate familiar words about the world to come, like those of the Prophet Isaiah: “Then the wolf shall be a guest of the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the young goat; The baby shall play by the viper’s den, and the child lay his hand on the adder’s lair.  They shall not harm or destroy on all my holy mountain; … On that day the Lord shall again take it in hand to reclaim the remnant of his people” (Is. 11:6, 8-9, 11).

With this background, what about Jesus’ response?  Will only a few be saved?  It is important to note that Jesus adopts this remnant, this the-saved-will-be-few school of thought.  His is a sobering answer.  And it is difficult.  To be clear, it is not difficult to understand.  Rather, it is difficult to accept.  He says, “Strive to enter through the narrow gate, for many, I tell you, will attempt to enter but will not be strong enough.”  And to those outside knocking the Master will say, “I do not know where you are from.”  The most sobering aspect of Jesus’ adopting of the more restrictive notion of salvation is what the image he uses communicates.  The image says that some who are trying to enter his kingdom will not be able to do so.  They will not be strong enough to get in.  The other sobering message of Jesus’ words is that those who are seeking entrance, to whom the Master says, “I do not know where you are from,” are at least acquaintances of the Master.  The lesson here is that mere acquaintanceship with Jesus will not save and will not be enough to gain entrance to the kingdom.  Listen to how close those seeking to enter had been: “And you will say, ‘We ate and drank in your company and you taught in our streets’.”  I don’t know about you, but that is stunning to hear.  Those who will not gain entrance to the kingdom are not merely people completely far off, people who never followed Jesus.  Rather, they are people who interacted with him.  They were in his presence.  They ate with him.  They listened to his teaching.  But still they hear the message: I do not know where you are from!

So the saved will be few and gaining entrance to salvation will be as entering through a narrow gate.  And why will those who are not saved fail to have strength to enter the world to come?  This is important to note.  What does Jesus say of them?  “Depart from me, all you evildoers!”  It is their sin, their wickedness that prevents them from being strong enough to enter salvation.  And this is really key and quite a shock: What does their wickedness mean or result in for their relationship with Jesus?  It is as if he never knew them.  “I do not know where you are from.”  I think this saying highlights a truth of Catholic faith with which perhaps we are uncomfortable and would like to believe is just excessive piety.  We explain and believe that the more serious type of sin, what we call mortal sin, brings to death the soul’s spiritual life with God.  It ends friendship with God.  If not confessed, healed, and repented of, it leads to eternal separation from God.  Surely that is too harsh, we want to say, right?  I mean, come on, if I’m baptized and I basically lead a good life and I want to be with Jesus nothing really separates me from God in any real or meaningful way, right?  Oh?!  The gospel says that those who are seeking entrance to the kingdom know Jesus and had been in his presence.  Yet, they are evildoers.  They are wicked sinners.  And what is the result of doing evil as regards our relationship with the Master?  He looks upon the severed relationship and says, “I do not know where you are from.”  What makes them unable to enter the kingdom?  What makes them strangers to the Lord?  Their grave mortal sins!  They do not simply harm the relationship.  They sever it to the point of rendering the wicked sinner unrecognizable to the Lord.

Do you realize we are supposed to learn something for ourselves and our relationship with Jesus in this hard teaching?  You see, Jesus draws the questioner into the question.  It is the same for us.  In adopting the remnant-will-be-saved school of thought, Jesus makes the question about the questioner’s own salvation and says: “And there will be wailing and grinding of teeth when you see Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob and all the prophets in the kingdom of God and you yourselves cast out.”  So, if Jesus’ answer for the Israelites was that some who entered the covenant would not be saved because of their wickedness, what do we who have entered the New Covenant by baptism learn for our own salvation?  We must strive for the narrow gate and we must turn from our wickedness!

Things within our world and even our Church seem like a sorry circus depending on where you train your focus.  If the world even bothers to think about salvation at all, it basically assumes that all people are going to Heaven.  I mean, maybe not Hitler, but you have to be really bad, like almost unimaginably evil to not make it to Heaven.  That’s not what the Bible and Jesus say.  Go to just about any funeral and from the words spoken it sure seems like the deceased is being canonized and that we have some direct knowledge they are already in Heaven.  That’s incredibly presumptuous.  In the Church some have an acquaintance with Jesus for Christmas and Easter, but not much else.  For others their relationship with Jesus might be more about taking rather than giving from their talent or their treasure.  Others might be present and active in so many good ways, but rarely ever go to confession.  Do those things sound like striving for the narrow gate?  And then there is the really crazy stuff that leaves you scratching your head: People who claim to be faithful followers of the Lord but who lead moral lives very much in conflict with Christ and who act as if that is not a grave problem.  There is moral dissent on issues like adultery, sodomy, abortion, and contraception.  You can find people who claim to be Catholic advocating for abortion and claiming to be Catholic.  You can find Christian groups and even churches flying gay pride flags.  I ask, does that at least promote confusion and perhaps seem to aid others in their grave sin?  Of course it does!  And then there is doctrinal dissent.  This week the top Jesuit priest in the order said another silly thing.  It is becoming a particularly Jesuit charism to say silly, uncatholic things.  He said that the devil is not a personified being but rather a symbolic reality.  Well, that’s not even authentic Catholic teaching.  That’s not even biblical.  This doesn’t help people respond to the narrow way and I wonder when Church leaders will call this nonsense out?

I don’t know the answer to that.  But I do know that I must proclaim the fullness of Catholic truth, that I must strive so that my soul gets to Heaven, and that I must work such that you might get there too.  Given what we learn from Jesus in this passage, the question might be put this way: Will you strive to be the remnant?  Will you seek to follow and to remain on the narrow path?  That’s the way to Heaven, no matter what the world is doing around you.  And while what we learn today is sobering indeed let’s not forget the Good News: God has come to save us and has paid the price for our salvation!  Our response is to strive and to make use of the rich gifts of grace in His Church such that we enter Heaven.  Yes, our efforts are needed and we must strive.  But the Good News is that throughout our efforts we are wrapped in the mercy of God who holds nothing back for our salvation!  It is He who comes “to gather nations of every language” [first reading] that many might see His glory.  We do not disdain or lose heart at the Lord’s discipline [second reading].  Rather we strive to guard and live seriously our relationship with God, knowing we have a Father who ardently desires us to recline at table at the banquet of salvation.

Nineteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time

Dominica XIX per Annum C

11 August 2019

Summer is a common time for family vacations.  Family vacations are a special time to enjoy recreation and to remember what binds us together.  One summer my family took a vacation out to the old family ranch in Montana where my Grandpa Hamilton had grown up and where my dad had spent so many summers as a child.  My grandpa, who had died years before I was born, and the Montana ranch were things I had only seen in pictures until that summer.  That trip gave me a deeper sense of the grandfather I know only in photos, and it gave me a better sense of the life of my ancestors, a life that had been transmitted to me as a descendant.

The first and second readings tell us that we are descendants, born of the faith of our fathers.  We descend from a great cloud of witnesses whose praises are sung throughout the Scriptures.  We receive an inheritance by being chosen by God as we sang in the psalm: “Blessed the people the Lord has chosen to be his own.”  The Scriptures today spend quite some time recalling our family history in the faith.  The first reading highlights the night of the Exodus when our ancestors were freed from Egypt and the second reading recounts several events in the life of Abraham, our father in faith.  Our Jewish ancestors in the faith trusted in the Word of God and put their faith in His promises, even though none of them lived to see His promises, as the second reading said: “All these died in faith.  They did not receive what had been promised but saw it and greeted it from afar.”  They only saw it from afar because what God promised would not be fulfilled until Christ came and established his Church to continue to make, from all nations, sons and daughters of God as numerous as the stars.  Our fathers knew the night of the Passover, but it was not until the night of the Last Supper that the full meaning of the Passover was fulfilled.  And so they only saw it from afar.

We have been made members of God’s family through Christ Jesus.  The life of faith has been transmitted to us, in part, through our ancestors.  And we gain a better sense of these witnesses of faith and what our life truly is by spending time with them in the Scriptures, in prayer, and in living the full life of Christ in his Church.  While what God has promised has been inaugurated on earth by Christ in his Church, we are still much like our ancestors in the faith in that we, too, await the complete fulfillment of what God has begun in Christ – a fulfillment that will only take place in heaven.  And the Lord Jesus teaches us in the gospel that while we await the fulfillment of God’s promises, we must be ready, we must be vigilant or else we might lose out.

The type of readiness Jesus calls us to observe is communicated in the idea of girding our loins and lighting our lamps.  These ideas harken back to the Exodus when the departure by night from Egypt needed the light of torches.  And the readiness to move with haste on that night meant typical ankle-length garments needed to be cinched up at the waist so as not to impede movement or to cause one to trip.  That is what “gird your loins” means.  The modern-day version of “gird your loins” would be something like, get your pants up over your rear!  Now I know this is an odd image in a homily and I’m truly not intending to make fun, but we all know the fashion the past many years to wear pants or shorts hanging extremely low.  My point in raising this fashion is that it is totally impractical for movement.  That’s the same idea in Jesus’ admonition to be ready with girded loins.  If you have ever watched an episode of COPS or LivePD, when the surprise of being lit up by red and blue lights catches someone off guard, the person can’t run very well with low-hanging pants.  Oddly enough this fits very well with Jesus’ point: sort of like being lit up by police lights, if we are to be ready for the surprising and unknown hour of the Son of Man’s return then we have to be ready to move, ready to respond, ready to turn to the light and to say our final “no” to the darkness of sin and the dark kingdom of the prince of this world.  Jesus says: “Gird your loins and light your lamps and be like servants who await their master’s return.”

We must be ready for the Lord’s return.  We must be ready to be judged.  We must be ready for the opportunity to enter the fullness of God’s kingdom.  For the Lord will come on a day and at an hour we do not expect.  On that day the Lord will invite us to heavenly life – what the Bible describes as a rich wedding feast.  This is the feast our ancestors in the faith saw from afar and which we begin to experience even here if we participate in the Holy Eucharist, coming forward worthily after having first received forgiveness for our sins.  The promise of life with Christ in heaven must be the treasure our heart seeks.  We must live that life now and be ready to move with our loins girt, our belts cinched up.  What should we do to be ready to inherit a full place in the kingdom?  We should already be living its inauguration here and now; we should already be doing the work of a servant who awaits the master’s return.  But laziness, complacency, and living to excess, these and other things will leave us unprepared at the Lord’s return, sort of like being caught with our pants falling off our rears!  So, what kind of servants are we?  Do we already live our life in the kingdom?  Or do we consider the time we have as God’s delay, a time when we can get away with sin?  Hearing this Gospel, what kind of servants will we choose to be?  What we do now and how we live now will determine whether we are assigned a place with the faithful or the unfaithful.  Jesus says, “Blessed are those servants whom the master finds vigilant on his arrival.”