Homily: 16th Sunday in Ordinary Time - Cycle B
Friends,
these last couple of weeks, we’ve been hearing a lot about prophets, centering
our reflections around their call to prophesy: the Old Testament prophets, like
Ezekiel and Amos, and the New Testament prophets (those we also call
Evangelists), the Apostles. This week we hear from another prophet, the
prophet Jeremiah, but our focus today is more on his message.
Jeremiah’s
message is a message of warning to the leaders of God’s people. He is
warning them because, instead of leading God’s people in right worship and
moral conduct, they had been leading them into worship of false gods and
allowed moral depravity. This was terrible for the very reasons listed:
that the Kings of God’s people were more than just “governors”, meant to help
maintain order in civil life. They were shepherds,
meant to lead God’s people and to keep them from falling into sin.
Ultimately,
they were supposed to be shepherds who model God’s own shepherding. And
where do we find an image of God’s own shepherding? Today’s Psalm, Psalm 23, is a psalm of God’s
shepherding. Written by King David--a shepherd before he was made king,
who shepherded God’s people rightly (in spite of his numerous failings
throughout the years)--this psalm describes not only God’s shepherding, but the
goal of his shepherding. In essence it says that God shepherds his people
to a place of rest: a place in which it is safe, tranquil, and in which
they can flourish in abundance. In this, we should hear an echo of the
book of Genesis in which God rests after all his labors and in Exodus in
which he commands his people to observe the day of rest (the Sabbath).
Also the voice of Jesus, who said, in criticism of the Pharisees, who
made the Sabbath rest a thing of burden for God’s people: “the Sabbath was made
for man, not man for the Sabbath.” All in all, the message of Psalm 23 is
that God’s shepherding leads mankind to a place of perfect rest.
Thus,
Jeremiah’s critique: the leaders of God’s people were not leading them to rest
and flourishing, but rather into greater labor and turmoil. God, through
Jeremiah, says to them: “I myself will gather them and appoint a
shepherd who will lead them into my rest.” He will be a “righteous shoot
of David” (God’s true “shepherd-king”) who will be a model of right worship and
of moral conduct for God’s people. Perhaps, however, they didn’t expect
that it would be God himself who would come as a descendant of King David to
shepherd his people. Enter, stage right,
Jesus in our Gospel reading today.
Today
we heard how the Apostles gathered back to Jesus after their mission to
proclaim the Gospel in the dispersed towns of Israel and Judah and how Jesus
invites them away from it all to rest a while. As they go,
however, the restless people, who have been dying for a true shepherd, follow
them; and Jesus, the Good Shepherd, was “moved with pity” for them, “for they
were like sheep without a shepherd”. Jesus came to shepherd God’s people
into rest--into true shalom, that is, peace--and so he cannot
turn away from them in their restlessness. Here we see the reason for
Saint Paul’s words from our second reading: “He came and preached peace (i.e. shalom)
to those who were far off and peace to those who were near…”
Friends,
Jesus is the Emmanuel--God with us--who has come to us to shepherd us
into God’s Sabbath--his rest. This is important for us to
acknowledge today because, for the past 50-plus years, we’ve allowed the
secular world to shepherd us: and it has shepherded us wrongly. Don’t
believe me? Look around. By my observation, people today are more
restless than ever: and I’m not talking just about being too busy; rather, I’m
talking about a loss of psychological, emotional, and spiritual stability.
A
prophet of our own time, Blessed Pope Paul VI, predicted unrest 50 years ago
when he released his encyclical letter, Humanae Vitae, otherwise known
as, On the Regulation of Birth. In it, Blessed Paul VI sought to
reinforce and clarify the Church’s teaching on the immorality of the use of
artificial methods of birth control. His prescient moment, however, came
in section 17 of the document in which he predicted three detrimental outcomes
if the use of artificial contraceptives became widespread: 1) marital
infidelity would increase (possible pregnancy, while not a positive deterrent
to infidelity, was an effective one, nonetheless); 2) men would begin to view
women as objects for satisfying their pleasure alone and begin to discard them
as soon as they ceased to satisfy them (Harvey Weinstein and #MeToo, anyone?);
3) Governments, seeing that these methods have become accepted within the
family, will begin to impose the use of contraceptives on people. Believe
me when I tell you that the HHS mandate that coverage for contraceptives be
included in “health care” plans is but a few short steps removed from “you must
abort your baby if it is diagnosed with Down Syndrome”.
Friends,
the results of these predictions are on display for us today: a deep
restlessness as families, who have allowed the secular culture to shepherd
them, struggle to find ways to keep it all together as the barriers to
infidelity, objectification, and government influence have been dismantled.
Unfortunately, Catholic families have not been immune as surveys have
confirmed that Catholics follow the trends of the public at large in regard to
attitudes surrounding the use of artificial contraception; and the statistics
regarding marital infidelity and divorce bear this out: with Catholic families
trending along the same path as the public at large.
And
so, what is the answer? Well, it’s to return to Christ and to allow him
to shepherd us rightly into the rest--that is, the shalom (or peace)--that
he wants for us. To do this, we need to allow the Church, led by Christ’s
Vicar, the Pope, to lead us. Statistics have also shown that families who
conform themselves to the teachings of the Church have happier and more stable
marriages; and that children who come from homes in which these teachings are
followed lead more stable and fulfilling lives. It’s no guarantee, of
course, human weakness always must be accounted for, but social science bears
out that this is a much more solid foundation on which to build a family.
And
we are so blessed here in this diocese to have many dedicated persons who can
help couples learn responsible family planning through natural family planning
methods: methods, that is, which do not separate the unitive and procreative
aspects of human sexuality and thus work to enhance a married couple’s
relationship, even as it helps them to responsibly space out births. If
even just Catholic families embraced these methods as a way for Christ to
shepherd them as a family, our society would be affected in positive ways and
our restlessness would begin to subside.
Friends,
Christ is our Shepherd--Emmanuel, God with us--who has come to gather
us: those who have been far away and those who are near, so that he can lead us
into his rest. As we worship him here today in this Eucharist, let us
allow him to shepherd us anew in our daily lives so that the peace (or shalom)
that each of our hearts seek might be known; and that the world’s restlessness
might be transformed into the peace of God’s kingdom.
Given at Saint Mary’s Cathedral:
Lafayette, IN - July 21st & 22nd, 2018
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