This weekend we made our "in-pew" commitments to our stewardship of treasure at St. Mary's Cathedral. This homily led up to the collecting of the commitment pledge cards and presenting them at the altar.
Homily: 2nd Sunday of Lent – Cycle C
Many of you, I’m sure, will remember
the game show “Let’s Make a Deal” with Monty Hall. It was a show that defined the genre, in many
ways, and whose popularity extends into its reincarnation today, hosted now by
Wayne Brady. You’ll recall that the
premise of the show was pretty simple: regular folk were gathered into the
studio audience where Monte Hall passed through and chose persons randomly to
offer them prizes and then the chance to trade those prizes for the possibility
of winning prizes that were more valuable.
For example: Monty would ask if anyone
had a pair of eyelash tweezers and would give the first person he saw who had a
pair $100. Then he would proceed to deal
with them, offering them something bigger of unknown value (something, perhaps,
behind one of the big doors). The big
doors could hide prizes as valuable as cars or as worthless as a ride on a
donkey around the parking lot after the show.
Thus, the crux of the show: will the person—who had nothing but a pair
of eyelash tweezers to start with—give up the $100 for a chance to win
something much more valuable, knowing that it could actually be something
worthless; thus leaving them to go home having lost even the eyelash tweezers?
Of course, there was never any way to
know for sure what would be beyond those big doors. Thus, the contestants would have to take a
blind leap of faith that there was something valuable behind the door if they
wanted the chance to take home a more valuable prize. The fact that, more often than not, people
did end up taking home more valuable prizes meant that the show remained wildly
popular for a long time.
The contestants on the show had to use
blind faith if they wanted to win a big prize.
On the surface, that doesn’t seem too different from the deal that God
was offering Abram in today’s first reading.
The beginning of our reading lands us
right in the middle of the conversation, it seems, where God invites Abram
outside of his tent and says: “Look up at the sky and count the stars, if you
can. Just so … shall your descendents
be.” Perhaps our natural reaction is to
think, “Abram would have seen thousands of stars… that would be a pretty impressive
promise.” When we keep reading, however,
we realize that it wasn’t at night that God proposed this promise, but it was
the middle of the day, because later in the reading it describes the day
approaching sunset, indicating that the earlier part of the conversation must
have been in the daytime. Abram,
therefore, couldn’t see the stars that God was asking him to count: rather, they
were “hidden” behind the “big door” of the sky.
So, when the reading says that “Abram
put his faith in the Lord”, was it blind faith?
I don’t think so. You see, on
“Let’s Make a Deal” the contestants couldn’t know what was behind the door and,
thus, were “blind” to whether or not it hid a valuable prize. Abram, on the other hand, knew the vast
quantity of stars that were out there: he had seen them. And so, when God promised him that his
descendants would be as numerous as the stars, even though at that moment he
couldn’t begin to count them (because he couldn’t see them), he knew that they
were there and so his faith was not blind.
It’s as if God had said to him: “Just as you know that there is a vast
quantity of stars out there, even though now you cannot see them, so, too,
there is a vast quantity of descendants that will follow you, even though now
you cannot see them. And just as sure as
you are that the stars will appear after the sun sets, so will these numerous
descendants of yours appear after the sun has set on your life.”
This, my brothers and sisters, is the
essence of what faith is. In the Letter
to the Hebrews it says that “faith is the realization of things hoped for, and
the evidence of things not seen.” Faith
is “evidence”, it says. Therefore, when
“Abram put his faith in the Lord” it wasn’t just a good feeling that he had,
but rather a conviction that supplied to him the evidence that his eyes could
not give him. “I cannot see my
descendants,” he might have thought to himself, “but Faith convicts me that
what the Lord says is true; thus, I will place my trust in him.”
Faith, like Abram’s faith, has built and
sustained this parish for 152-plus years. Our ancestors… I use that term loosely here,
meaning “those who have come before us”, since not all of us are direct descendants
of those who founded this parish… our ancestors couldn’t see what would become
of the parish they founded in 1866, but they put their faith in God that his
promise to “multiply their descendants” would be fulfilled. As their “spiritual offspring”, we maintain
that legacy by continuing to put our faith in God: that what we have today can
continue to grow and expand into future generations.
Last weekend, we heard testimonials of
how the presence of this parish and the dedication of its members have made a
powerful and positive impact on the lives of others. We heard from the Starr family, who moved
away from their roots but found acceptance here; and, thus, fertile ground to
plant themselves and establish their own roots.
We heard from Dianna Ping, who discovered in this community the saving
grace that comes to us through Jesus Christ: a grace she just couldn’t find on
her own. And we heard from Rachel Witt,
whose faith has been shaped and deepened as she engaged her work as a catechist:
one of the many opportunities to exercise one’s discipleship here at Saint Mary’s.
Friends, there are literally hundreds
more stories like these among the members of this parish: perhaps you even have
your own. Every story is evidence of
some instance in which members of Saint Mary’s put their faith in God and
trusted in his promise to bring forth “descendants as numerous as the stars of
the sky” from the trust that they have put in him.
Every day, our school and religious
education programs for young people impact families: inviting them to consider their
faith more deeply and challenging them to live it out more fully. Financial support to the school and tuition
assistance to families is crucial to maintaining these ministries. Our RCIA program and adult faith formation
programs are invaluable for helping individuals to come into the Church and to
solidify their place here. Our
subscription to formed.org and flocknote helps to add flexibility in faith
formation and communication: meeting people according to their schedule, not
ours. Our support of outreach ministries
like the Matrix Pregnancy Center, Lafayette Urban Ministries, and, of course,
our sister parish in Haiti are just a few of the ways that our resources reach
beyond our parish to impact those most in need.
Amidst all of this, we still maintain our sacred spaces and supply our
liturgical ministries so that we, too, can continue to be fed by God in Word
and Sacrament.
To top it all off, 75 years ago our ancestors
agreed that Saint Mary of the Immaculate Conception would become the Cathedral
of Saint Mary of the Immaculate Conception when the Diocese of Lafayette-in-Indiana
was newly formed: receiving in that the honor of housing the Bishop’s Chair (or
cathedra), as well as the
responsibility to be a beacon of Catholic Faith to everyone in north-central
Indiana. Your pride in having received
this honor, as well as your commitment to fulfill this responsibility, is
evident in the way that you support this church’s maintenance and regular
renewal, as well as making it available to others.
None of this would be possible on our expression of faith alone. Rather, it is all made possible when we put
our faith into action to support these and many other ministries with our time,
talent, and treasure. For this, I—who am,
in many ways, still one of the newest
members of Saint Mary’s and its legacy—am deeply grateful. ///
In a few weeks Holy Week will be upon
us. One of the many highlights of Holy
Week is the Chrism Mass that we host here.
Although the blessing of the Sacred Oils is often highlighted as the
purpose of the Mass, one other equally important thing occurs: the priests of
the diocese re-new their commitment to the priesthood and to serving the people
of this diocese. Yes, that means that
every year I stand in this sanctuary with my brother priests and before our
bishop to renew my commitment to the priesthood and, thus, to you, the people
of the diocese. It is a re-commitment
that I take very seriously—I see it as the renewal of a sacred covenant between
myself and God/His Church—and it is done out of my love for Christ and my love
for all of you. In that same spirit, I
am asking you to join me this weekend in this yearly renewal of our covenant
with God and his Church by renewing our commitments to support our parish.
This past week you received your
commitment cards in the mail. I hope
that you took the opportunity to prayerfully consider your commitment and that
you remembered to bring your completed commitment card with you today. If not, I will give you a few moments to fill
out one of the blank cards in the pew.
Then, the ushers will come forward to collect the cards. After they have been collected, we will bring
them forward to be placed at the foot of the altar, signifying that we are uniting
these sacrifices with the one, perfect sacrifice that Christ made for us when
he died for us on the Cross: the sacrifice that is our proof that God has
fulfilled every promise that he made to us.
I realize that some of you may not be able to increase your commitment
this year—and that some of you may even need to decrease your commitment. Please do not worry. Placing my faith in God I trust that, through
our prayerful consideration and commitment to sacrifice, God will, nonetheless,
provide for all that we need.
Once again, thank you for your faith:
the faith that has made Christ’s presence among us real and tangible here at
Saint Mary’s parish—now Saint Mary’s Cathedral—for
more than 152 years.
May Abraham, our father in faith, pray
for us that God will make abundantly fruitful the faith that we put into action
through our commitments today.
Given
at Saint Mary’s Cathedral: Lafayette, IN – March 16th & 17th,
2019
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