Being a faithful prophet

Homily: 14^th Sunday in Ordinary Time – Cycle B

Friends, it's important as we begin our reflection today to remember that we must give thanks in our hearts for the Word of God that we just heard.  We know that every encounter with the Word of God is an encounter with Christ, the living God, whose very life is our salvation.  This is why we say at the end of each reading "thanks be to God" and at the end of the Gospel reading "Praise to you, Lord Jesus Christ".  Those moments of silence that occur after each reading and the Responsorial Psalm are moments to relish that our God has spoken to us.  And so, while it is not always possible to relish in those moments (a squirmy child or an ill-timed sneeze can get in the way), we should always strive to be recollected in those moments.

The truth is that, when the word of God comes to us, it changes us... if we let it.  [repeat]  This is the story of all the prophets, especially those about whom we heard in today's readings.  In each case, the Word of God breaks into their lives and urges them into a new direction.  Although the prophet can choose to refuse the calling that God has given to them, they cannot ignore the fact that they have been called; and by that very fact, itself, their lives have been changed.  The prophet Jonah is a great example of the latter.  He refused God's call to prophesy to the people of Nineveh, but couldn't go back to his life before he encountered God's Word.  Rather, it sent him in a completely different direction.  Ultimately, into the belly of a whale!

The prophet Ezekiel, however, is an example of the former: one who encountered God's Word and responded positively to it.  His life, too, was sent in a completely different direction in order to fulfill a task that God had given to him.  Notice, however, that the defining characteristic of these prophets is not the success they had in getting people to conform to God's word, but rather it was their obedience and their faithfulness to the call that was their glory.

Ezekiel was called to preach to his own people who had fallen away from the right practice of religion and moral conduct.  He wasn't someone of high social status to whom people would automatically listen and he was bringing a message that would surely be unpopular: "God is angry with you for the way you are living.  Repent and turn back to God in penance or else he will punish you!"  For a people who don't think that they're doing anything wrong, this is a tough message to sell!  Throughout Ezekiel's call, however, God emphasizes that it is imperative for him to follow-through: noting on more than one occasion that for him not to speak is to bring the Israelite guilt on his own head; whereas if he does speak to them—in such a way so that the Israelites "shall know that a prophet has been among them"—any further refusal on their part will cause their guilt to remain on them.  Again, what we see in this is that it is Ezekiel's job to bring God's Word into contact with the Israelite people, so that it might change their lives; and that his success will be measured not by converts, but by his obedience and faithfulness to the call.

Christ, as we heard in our Gospel reading today, is the example par excellence for us.  From the very moment of the incarnation in the virginal womb of Mary, Christ was obedient and faithful to God's will.  Time and again, Jesus was rejected by his own people—in other words, he was unsuccessful by any standard—yet he remained faithful and obedient, nonetheless.  Because of this—that is, his faithfulness to the end—he is now glorified in heaven with the Father.

Friends, each of us have been touched by the Word of God and so have been changed.  Therefore, we, too, must respond to God's call to prophesy.  How often, however, do we refuse to follow God's call—that is, we refuse to speak God's Word of truth—simply because we think that we'll be unsuccessful?  In other words, how often do we refuse to speak up—to a family member, a friend, or a coworker—because we think that they will ignore us or, worse yet, reject us: thus, damaging our relationship?  Friends, these are not excuses in God's eyes; and so, even when we think that we will be unsuccessful, God, nonetheless, demands that we go; and so, we must go, remembering that God will not judge us based on whether we were successful in turning hearts back to him, but rather on whether we were obedient and faithful.

Thus, the questions for us today are these: Who is it with whom God is asking me to share his Word?  If I am resistant, why?  What's holding me back?  How can I exercise trust in God in small things, so as to be prepared to trust him in these big things?  This is our "homework" for this week: to allow these questions to lead us to discern where and with whom God is calling me to act.  If we don't feel ready to act (perhaps because it's a big conversation that we're not ready to have), then our work is to ask God to reveal smaller ways in which we can act throughout the week—for example, a simple act of kindness for a stranger that we might not otherwise do—so as to build our trust in God and in his call.  Ultimately, however, if God's Word has called us, we need to act.  Whether or not the person (or persons) to whom we bring this Word respond is God's problem, not ours.  Our problem is to ensure that the Word of God has been spoken to them: that is, in such a way that they "shall know that a prophet has been among them."

Friends, Christ is with us in this work.  He is the Word that we are called to speak.  As we receive him in this Eucharist, let's abandon ourselves to him and allow him to speak through us.

Given at Saint Mary Cathedral: Lafayette, IN – July 8^th, 2018

God's plan for the kingdom

Homily: 11^th Sunday in Ordinary Time – Cycle B

          One of the most prevalent ideologies of our day—one, in fact, that covers many other ideologies—is that we make can make ourselves.  This is the idea that there is no set plan for our lives and so our job is simply to decide what we want to make of it and then to go and do it.  Our scriptures today remind us, however, that there is a plan, much bigger than us, that God is working around us and with which he wants us to cooperate so as to bring about his kingdom; and that our fulfillment comes not when we make ourselves, but when we participate in God’s plan.  Let’s take a look at what I mean.

          Like all good ideologies, the ideology that we can make ourselves is founded in truth.  Having been created in the image and likeness of God, we have freedom to determine our lives.  This is important: because, without this freedom, we would be less than human.  But where the ideology goes wrong is when it assumes that our freedom begins with a blank slate.  In other words, the ideology that states that we can make ourselves assumes that we can be anything we desire—that is, that, if we are free, we are free from all restrictions—and so we must determine for ourselves what we are going to be and then go out and do it ourselves.

          This type of freedom can certainly take us far; and thinking beyond all restrictions has helped us to achieve amazing things (space exploration being one of the most amazing ones, in my opinion).  It has the potential to lead us to great satisfaction in our lives—like when we set out to achieve a dream and then achieve it—but it also can lead us to the depths of despair—like when we realize that the goals upon which we had set all our hopes become unachievable (or, even worse, when we achieve the goals and find the achievement disappointing).  In either case, however, much is lost because this idea of freedom doesn’t take into account the bigger picture: that there is a plan, much bigger than us, that God is working around us and with which he wants us to cooperate.  This is the message in our scriptures today.

          In the first reading and the reading from the Gospel, we hear about how God’s plans are working mysteriously around us in order to build his kingdom.  In the beautifully poetic passage from the prophet Ezekiel, we heard an allegory for how God will build his kingdom.  From the many branches of the cedar tree, which represent the many nations of the world, some big and strong, others less so, God will choose a tender, young branch from the top of the tree, that is, a nation that doesn’t seem significant, and he will remove it from the tree and plant it in a choice place where not only will it grow, but it will grow and stand tall above all of the other nations.  It will be fruitful, meaning prosperous, and the birds of the air, meaning the peoples of all nations, will flock towards it to nest among its branches.

          Notice in this allegory that the tender branch doesn’t choose on its own to be removed from the tree and planted on the place where it can grow to be greater than the tree from which it was taken.  Rather, it is God who chooses the branch and the place where it would be planted so that it can flourish and become the place to which all the birds of the air will flock.  In other words, the “tender branch” couldn’t make itself into God’s kingdom, nor did it prove itself worthy, but rather cooperated with God and his plan working through it in order to achieve the full flourishing for which God had made it.

          This is the message for us.  Certainly, we can make a lot of ourselves in this world by our own doing.  We will never achieve the greatness that God wants for us by working on our own, however.  Rather, we must recognize that, if we exist, we do not exist for ourselves alone, but for a greater purpose: which is to be part of a plan that is working around us, orchestrated by God, to bring about his kingdom: the kingdom in which everyone will discover the full flourishing of happiness (which is the image of the birds of the air that nest in the tree’s branches).  We become part of the plan when we use our freedom to choose to cooperate with it.

          As the Gospel reading shows us, this cooperation doesn’t need to be very complicated.  In it, Jesus gives us two parables about the Kingdom of God.  “What is the Kingdom of God like?”, he asks.  Well, it’s like seeds sown in a field.  The farmer sows them and they become part of the earth.  Then, through the mystery of nature, they begin to grow and eventually produce fruit.  The farmer, having watched all of this, then comes to reap the harvest. 

          For us, this simple image still applies.  Our baptismal call is a simple one of spreading the seeds of the Gospel in the hearts of those around us.  We do this when we speak about our faith, telling others how the love of Christ has made a positive difference in our lives, and by our good works, showing that the love we receive is an unconditional love that begs to spill out to others.  Then, after spreading these seeds of faith, and by watering them by our constant witness to it, we wait as God then works mysteriously in the hearts where these seeds have been sown.  Soon, we begin to see the fruits of our labors in the form of conversions to the faith or in the fulfillment of vocations to Holy Marriage, the priesthood and the religious life: all of which are the harvested fruits of the Kingdom of God.

          In the second parable, Jesus again describes the Kingdom in simple terms.  He says that the Kingdom of God is like a mustard seed and notes that, though one of the smallest seeds, it nonetheless produces a large bush in which birds can make their nest.  What he is emphasizing is that something small and seemingly insignificant can—through God’s mysterious work—grow into something significant that can benefit many.  In doing so, he reminds us that even our smallest good works—a simple gesture, or a smile, or a kind word in a tense situation—things that don’t seem worth saying or doing—can and are used by God to produce great fruits in the lives of others.

          This is a great example for our fathers here today.  Though rarely easy, the task of being a father is simple.  There is no magic formula except to love your children and your spouse, to pray for and with your family, to teach your family the faith and to give example of living it in your own life, and to courageously stand up for the truth—both in your home and in the public square.  These are the seeds of faith that you as fathers are called to sow.  These are the seeds that God will use to produce a great harvest for his Kingdom.

          Friends, we are free to make of ourselves nearly anything that we desire.  But if an all-powerful, all-knowing, and infinitely loving God already has a plan for our eternal happiness, why would we want to follow our own plans?  Why not, instead, give ourselves over to cooperating with his plan, in which we are promised to find great fulfillment and peace?  Let us give ourselves, then, to this good work of planting the seeds of God’s kingdom: for when we do, we’ll find that the happiness that we were pursuing, has actually been pursuing us; and God’s kingdom, the tender shoot that has been planted here among us, will flourish so as to draw all of God’s children back to himself.

Given at All Saints Parish: Logansport, IN – June 17^th, 2018

Your chance to meet the King

Homily: 34^th Sunday in Ordinary Time – Cycle A

Solemnity of Our Lord Jesus Christ, King of the Universe

          Saint Theresa of Calcutta, as most of us know, spent over 50 years serving the dying poor in the slums of Calcutta, India.  She had felt a special “call within her call” to religious life, as she would call it, to attend to those who were dying and poor that she (and the sisters that she eventually gathered around her) would find on the streets of Calcutta.  For the most part, the people for whom she and her sisters cared had no chance of recovery and survival.  That wasn’t Mother Theresa’s purpose, though.  Her call was to acknowledge their human dignity and to make them feel loved and cared for in their dying days.

          Over the years that she completed this service, many asked Mother Theresa, “How do you do it?”  In other words, “How is it possible for you to spend all of your days ministering to people who are physically filthy (because they haven’t bathed in a long time), while breathing intense body odor, dressing open sores and wounds, cleaning fecal matter and throw up, while living in a place with relatively poor sanitation and even poorer ventilation?”  Mother’s answer was always five simple words (which she would count off using the fingers of her hand): “You. Did. It. To. Me.”

          For Mother Theresa, it was her love of Jesus, and Jesus’ promise that he made to his disciples in the judgment parable that we heard in our Gospel reading today, that impelled her on.  For her, Jesus’ judgment warning wasn’t so much of a threat (that is, “look at how you will be punished if fail to do this!”), but rather an amazing opportunity promised to her.  When she read, “whatever you did for one of the least brothers of mine, you did for me”, she saw her chance to meet Jesus, for whom she had fostered and intense love, in the flesh of the poor ones whom she met in the streets of the slums of Calcutta.  In other words, in this phrase, Mother Theresa found the way to order her life rightly so as to demonstrate her love for Jesus in the most intense way.

          Friends, it is true that this passage of Matthew’s Gospel is a depiction of the final judgment.  If we view it only as a fearful thing, however—that is, as something over which we have no control—then we fail to see the beautiful instruction that Jesus gives to us within it.  You see, in telling us how we are going to be judged, Jesus is giving us a clue as to how we are to order our lives rightly.  In effect, Jesus is saying: “If you love me and you wish to serve me, here’s how you do it.”  And what is that way?  To do works of mercy to all those around you.  In doing this, that is, in instructing us in this way, Jesus is demonstrating that he is shepherding his people, just as he promised to do through the prophet Ezekiel centuries before.

          In our first reading, we heard this prophesy from the prophet Ezekiel in which God says that he, himself, will come to tend his sheep.  He is saying this because the shepherds whom he had appointed for his people—that is, the rulers who had followed in the line of King David, the original “shepherd king”—had failed to shepherd his people rightly, which led God to remove his protection from them, which then led to their being conquered by the Babylonians and forced into exile from their land.  This prophesy, then, is a promise that God himself will come and shepherd his people once again and lead them back into their land.  More importantly, however, he promises to lead them into rightly ordered lives, by which they will enjoy God’s friendship for all eternity.

          Today, therefore, as we celebrate this feast of Our Lord Jesus Christ, King of the Universe, we see that what we celebrate is Jesus Christ, the great Shepherd King—not just of one people at one place in time, but of the whole universe—whom God sent to save us from our exile in sin and to shepherd us into rightly ordered living so that we might enter into God’s friendship for eternity.  As King—especially as a King who has shown us such great benevolence by taking on our human nature so that he might suffer all of the effects of our sinfulness (including, and especially, death!) in order to save us from sin and death—he expects that we will serve him and offer to him works that demonstrate our gratefulness for this grace that we have been given.  Even more so, however, our King expects that our works would not be done out of duty alone, but also out of our love for him who has already demonstrated his love so generously for us.  This latter expectation is what Mother Theresa clung to so strongly in her life and in her work: She loved Jesus so much that she delighted in demonstrating her love for him by performing these extraordinary acts of mercy for those “least brothers” of his.

          My brothers and sisters, Jesus is our great Shepherd King and he longs to shepherd us into his kingdom of eternal life and peace.  And so, how do we allow him to shepherd us?  Well, it would be easy for me to say “by doing the works of mercy”.  Perhaps, however, I can offer an even more practical method: what if we simply tried to be less selfish every day?  You know, if we all tried to be a little less selfish every day (and, therefore, more giving to others), then, before we know it, we’d look a lot more like Mother Theresa.  All it takes is a choice—and it is a choice that we’ll have to make every day—but when we do, we begin to let Jesus shepherd us.  And when Jesus shepherds us, then our lives begin to become rightly re-ordered.  And when our lives begin to be rightly re-ordered, then our world will begin to be rightly re-ordered.  And when our world becomes rightly re-ordered, then what else is that but the kingdom of God among us.  And what more could we want than to have the kingdom of God among us?  Once we experience that, then we have nothing else to wait for than the coming of our Shepherd King, Our Lord Jesus Christ, King of the Universe, so that death, the final enemy will be destroyed and we will be given back to God to live in the eternal joy of heaven.

          You probably didn’t think that being a little less selfish today could bring about heaven did you?  But it’s true!  Choose heaven today, therefore, by choosing to be less-selfish and you will be choosing eternal life: the shepherding of our King, Jesus Christ—the very same King who we meet here at this altar.

Given at All Saints Parish: Logansport, IN – November 25^th & 26^th, 2017

I'm not okay and you're not okay... and it's okay to say it.

Homily: 23^rd Sunday of Ordinary Time – Cycle A

          It is a mantra of our times.  It’s only four words, but it manages to send a compelling message that millions find easy to follow.  The phrase?  “I’m OK, you’re OK.”  Perhaps we’ve heard it.  Perhaps we’ve even used it.  In either case, we probably didn’t think that there was anything wrong with it.  Basically, what this phrase says is that I’m fine just the way I am and that if you’re comfortable with the way that you are then you’re fine, too.  On the surface, it is intended to promote harmony between us: “I won’t criticize you if you don’t criticize me, OK?”  (Because we all know that it’s not nice to criticize someone, right?)  And it is the acceptance of what this phrase proposes that promotes the kind of thinking that leads us to say things like, “Who am I to criticize him?” or (on the flipside) “Who is she to criticize me?”

          Of course we all know that our compulsion to make judgments about the way people act or the things people say is not something that we can turn off, like a switch.  Rather, it is something that is very natural to us, because our reason constantly seeks to make sense of the things that happen around us.  And so, when we convince ourselves that it is wrong to criticize people openly we find that we end up criticizing people covertly; through gossip (and we do love to gossip, don’t we?), passive-aggressive behavior, and holding grudges.  This is what society tells us we should do.  Keep our judgments and criticisms to ourselves, or at least don’t bring them out into public.  But what does God have to say about it?  I think our Scriptures today show us.

          Throughout the Old Testament, we see that God appointed prophets to be those people that our modern society tells us we shouldn’t be: the one who openly criticizes the actions of people, who declares certain actions as wicked and calls the evildoers to repentance.  In short, a prophet of God is one who troubles those who have become comfortable in their wrongdoing.  As often is the case when God called his prophets, Ezekiel’s first reaction was very similar to the reaction we often give today: “Who am I to criticize?”  And God responded to him just like he responded to all of the other prophets: “You are the one whom I have appointed.  Therefore, you will go and you will speak to them what you have heard from me.”  To Ezekiel God adds a statement making clear the consequences of the responsibility he is giving to him: “You will go and speak these words to them.  If you don’t, then you will be responsible for their guilt.”  And so we see that, in ancient times, God called some to be responsible for calling his people to repentance.

          Then, in the Gospel reading, we see Jesus revising this principle.  Jesus, who came to redeem us from sin and to proclaim the coming of God’s kingdom, teaches us that, in this kingdom, each of us is responsible for one another.  Therefore, he says, “if your brother sins against you, go yourself and tell him his fault.”  In other words, don’t wait for someone else to correct him, but go to him yourself.  This is how it must be in God’s kingdom.  But how?  You know, it’s not often in the Gospels that Jesus is recorded as having given specific instructions for how to accomplish something; but being reconciled to each other is so important for the building of God’s kingdom that Jesus’ teaching on this topic is recorded for us here.

          First he says “go and tell him his fault between you and him alone.”  In other words, don’t make a spectacle of it—and, for heaven’s sake, don’t gossip about it!—but go to the one who has sinned against you and tell him how what he has done hurt you.  Notice, he doesn’t say to ignore it either; because to ignore it leaves your brother in sin; and, like Ezekiel, if we leave our brother in sin and don’t say anything, then his guilt becomes ours, too.

          If that doesn’t work, Jesus teaches, then bring along one or two others to speak to him.  In other words, bring in an “objective third party” who can reinforce your admonition to your brother and hopefully bring him to repentance.  Again, do not make this a spectacle, but rather do it privately.  Who knows, when you do this you may find that you yourself were wrong, which can help bring about the reconciliation faster.

          If that doesn’t work, then bring your brother to the church, Jesus teaches.  Now this still isn’t a public thing.  Jesus isn’t saying that we should come here and proclaim it to the congregation from the pulpit.  Rather, he is saying to bring it to the pastor and the respected leaders in the community; because perhaps your brother will listen to them.

          Finally, if all else fails, Jesus says, “treat him as you would a Gentile or a tax collector.”  Now I know that this can seem harsh—for elsewhere in the Scriptures Gentiles and tax collectors are despised and treated poorly—but remember how Jesus treated Gentiles and tax collectors: he treated them like persons whose sin was clear, but who he nonetheless loved and desired to see come to repentance.  Thus, his admonition about praying.  If you would treat him as I would treat a Gentile or a tax collector, that is, with love, you will pray for him and for his conversion.  And when two of you agree to pray for his conversion, then I will be there with you and what you pray for shall be granted to you by our Father in heaven.  This is a radically different notion than what society teaches us, right?

          And so now we see that the mantra “I’m OK, you’re OK” is patently false.  We know that there are “right” and “wrong” ways of living and that, most of the time, we’re not OK.  What we don’t need is to be left alone so that we become comfortable living in our errors.  What we do need are people who love us enough to tell us when we are doing wrong so as to help us become OK.  And we need to be those people for others.

          “Yes, father, but I, too, am a sinner.  And so, who am I to judge?”  Who are you?  You’re a Christian!  And you have God’s Holy Spirit living within you!  When you were baptized, you were baptized into Christ, who is priest, prophet, and king.  Thus, you are a prophet; and therefore, like Ezekiel, you are obliged to speak the words that God’s Spirit gives you to speak.  Through baptism God has called each of us to be responsible for one another, in charity.  And what is the charitable way?  The way that Jesus lays out for us in our Gospel reading today.

          My brothers and sisters, if we really want what Jesus wants—that is, to be a family of love that makes present his coming kingdom on earth—then we must take up the task of being responsible for one another as Jesus has taught us.  And this is difficult, because love is difficult.  Strengthened by the love that Jesus poured out on the cross, however—the love that we receive from this altar—we can do it.  So let us take courage so that God’s work of love may be fulfilled in each one of us.

Given at All Saints Parish: Logansport, IN – September 10^th, 2017

I'm not OK and, because I love you, neither are you.

          Great readings this past weekend.  Tough to say more than is already there.  I gave it a shot, though.  I hope that it touches your heart and moves you to take a more loving way to live in community and to be the prophet that God made you to be.

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Homily: 23^rd Sunday of Ordinary Time – Cycle A

          It is a mantra of our times.  It’s only four words, but it manages to send a compelling message that millions find easy to follow.  The phrase?  “I’m OK, you’re OK.”  Perhaps we’ve heard it.  Perhaps we’ve even used it.  In either case, we probably didn’t think that there was anything wrong with it.  Basically, what this phrase says is that I’m fine just the way I am and that if you’re comfortable with the way that you are then you’re fine, too.  On the surface, it is intended to promote harmony between us: “I won’t criticize you if you don’t criticize me, OK?”  Because we all know that it’s not nice to criticize someone, right?  And it is the acceptance of what this phrase proposes that promotes the kind of thinking that leads us to say things like, “Who am I to criticize him?” or (on the flipside) “Who is she to criticize me?”

          Of course we all know that our compulsion to make judgments about the way people act or the things people say is not something that we can turn off, like a switch.  Rather, it is something that is very natural to us, because our reason constantly seeks to make sense of the things that happen around us.  And so, when we convince ourselves that it is wrong to criticize people openly we find that we end up criticizing people covertly; through gossip (and we do love to gossip, don’t we?), passive-aggressive behavior, and holding grudges.  This is what society tells us we should do.  Keep our judgments and criticisms to ourselves, or at least don’t bring them out into public.  But what does God have to say about it?  I think our Scriptures today show us.

          Throughout the Old Testament, we see that God appointed prophets to be those people that our modern society tells us we shouldn’t be: the one who openly criticizes the actions of people, who declares certain actions as wicked and calls the evildoers to repentance.  In short, a prophet of God is one who troubles those who have become comfortable in their wrongdoing.  As often is the case when God called his prophets, Ezekiel’s first reaction was very similar to the reaction we often give today: “Who am I to criticize?”  And God responded to him just like he responded to all of the other prophets: “You are the one whom I have appointed.  Therefore, you will go and you will speak to them what you have heard from me.”  To Ezekiel God adds a statement making clear the consequences of the responsibility he is giving to him: “You will go and speak these words to them.  If you don’t, then you will be responsible for their guilt.”  And so we see that, in ancient times, God called some to be responsible for calling his people to repentance.

          Then, in the Gospel reading, we see Jesus revising this principle.  Now remember, Jesus is God—the Second Person of the Trinity—so he has the authority to do this, OK?”  Jesus, who came to redeem us from sin and to proclaim the coming of God’s kingdom, teaches us that, in this kingdom, each of us is responsible for one another.  Therefore, he says, “if your brother sins against you, go yourself and tell him his fault.”  In other words, don’t wait for someone else to correct him, but go to him yourself.  This is how it must be in God’s kingdom.  But how?  You know, it’s not often in the Gospels that Jesus is recorded as having given specific instructions for how to accomplish something; but being reconciled to each other is so important for the building of God’s kingdom that Jesus’ teaching on this topic is recorded for us here.

          First he says “go and tell him his fault between you and him alone.”  In other words, don’t make a spectacle of it—and, for heaven’s sake, don’t gossip about it!—but go to the one who has sinned against you and tell him how what he has done hurt you.  Notice, he doesn’t say to ignore it either; because to ignore it leaves your brother in sin; and, like Ezekiel, if we leave our brother in sin and don’t say anything, then their guilt becomes ours, too.

          If that doesn’t work, Jesus teaches, then bring along one or two others to speak to him.  In other words, bring in an “objective third party” who can reinforce your admonition to your brother and hopefully bring him to repentance.  Again, do not make this a spectacle, but rather do it privately.  Who knows, when you do this you may find that you yourself were wrong, which can help bring about the reconciliation faster.

          If that doesn’t work, then bring your brother to the church, Jesus teaches.  Now this still isn’t a public thing.  Jesus isn’t saying that we should come here and proclaim it to the congregation from the pulpit.  Rather, he is saying to bring it to the pastor and the respected leaders in the community; because perhaps your brother will listen to them.

          Finally, if all else fails, Jesus says, “treat him as you would a Gentile or a tax collector.”  Now I know that this can seem harsh—for elsewhere in the Scriptures Gentiles and tax collectors are despised—but remember how Jesus treated Gentiles and tax collectors: he treated them like persons whose sin was clear, but who he nonetheless loved and desired to see come to repentance.  Thus, his admonition about praying.  If you would treat him as I would treat a Gentile or a tax collector, that is, with love, you will pray for him and for his conversion.  And when two of you agree to pray for his conversion, then I will be there with you and what you pray for shall be granted to you by our Father in heaven.  This is a radically different notion than what society teaches us, right?

          And so now we see that the mantra “I’m OK, you’re OK” is patently false.  We know that there are “right” and “wrong” ways of living and that, most of the time, we’re not OK.  What we don’t need is to be left alone so that we become comfortable living in our errors.  What we do need are people who love us enough to tell us when we are doing wrong so as to help us become OK.  And we need to be those people for others.

          “Yes, father, but I, too, am a sinner.  And so, who am I to judge?”  Who are you?  You’re a Christian!  And you have God’s Holy Spirit living within you!  When you were baptized, you were baptized into Christ, who is priest, prophet, and king.  Thus, you are a prophet; and therefore, like Ezekiel, you are obliged to speak the words that God’s Spirit gives you to speak.  Through baptism God has called each of us to be responsible for one another, in charity.  And what is the charitable way?  The way that Jesus lays out for us in our Gospel reading today.

          My brothers and sisters, if we really want what Jesus wants—that is, to be a family of love that makes present his coming kingdom on earth—then we must take up the task of being responsible for one another as Jesus has taught us.  And this is difficult, because love is difficult.  Strengthened by the love that Jesus poured out on the cross, however—the love that we receive from this altar—we can do it.  So let us take courage so that God’s work of love may be fulfilled in each one of us.

Given at All Saints Parish: Logansport, IN – September 7^th, 2014

The God that disappoints (sometimes)

5th Sunday of Lent... Holy Week is right around the corner!  And a new Pope to boot!  It's going to be another incredible new experience, I suppose :)  Please pray for me that I'll be able to weather all of the stress and truly pray through this great feast of our faith!

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Homily: 5th Sunday of Lent – Cycle C (Scrutinies)

I would guess that most of us here have had one of those “where was God” moments already in our lives.  It seems like it is one of those inevitable experiences in life.  Mom’s sudden diagnosis with stage four breast cancer or grandpa’s sudden stroke.  The best friend who was killed in a car accident or the child lost to miscarriage.  Or perhaps even the loss of a beloved pet.  All of which often leave us wanting to say, like Martha and Mary in our Gospel today, “Jesus, if only you had been here…”

My own family had a moment like that.  Almost twenty years ago now, my brother Douglas was killed during an armed robbery at the place where he worked.  He was 20 years old at the time and my sisters and I were all in our teens.  Needless to say, in the middle of what is already a tumultuous time in the life of a family—the time when all of the children are in that teen age range—this event greatly unsettled our world.

Now my mom is a pretty strong woman.  Like any good Catholic mother, she made sure that all of her children grew up practicing the Catholic faith.  The sudden, seemingly meaningless death of one of her children, however, deeply shook her faith.  (You know when Jesus says in the Gospel “Tonight all of you will have your faith shaken…” and Peter says “Lord, maybe all the rest of them, but me never…” well, my mom is kind of like Peter in that way and the death of my brother was that “faith-shaking” event.)

For a long time my mother was unable to forgive God for what happened.  She, like Martha, blamed God for my brother’s death.  In the process, she had to confront (we all had to confront it, really) the fact that the reality that she was facing brought into question everything that she had believed to be true about God: namely that God was loving, caring, and protecting to those who remain true to his laws and commands.  “I’ve done my part,” I could hear her say, “but where were you!?!?”

Martha and Mary, even though they had the distinct advantage of being able to vent their emotions directly to Jesus, face to face, nonetheless experienced a very similar moment.  A sudden illness had come upon their brother Lazarus and, although they had sent word to Jesus, he didn’t come quickly enough and their brother died.  Jesus, of course, knew what he was going to do and so, as Martha expressed her frustration that Jesus seemingly didn’t try hard enough to come and save her brother, Jesus calmly and warmly invites her to a new understanding of death.  After Martha expresses her faith that her brother will rise again in the final judgment, Jesus, in turn, invites her to see who it is that is standing before her: “I am the resurrection and the life,” he tells her.  What he seems to be saying is, “You don’t have to wait for the resurrection at the end of time, because the one who is the resurrection is standing right here before you.

What Christ was doing was calling Martha to a radical hope in the face of despair: which was a hope that she already hinted at having when she said, “But even now I know that whatever you ask of God, God will give you.”  And why do we have to be reminded of this?  Well, it’s because sometimes we need a reminder that God didn’t promise that he would shield us from all that could hurt us.  Rather, he promised us that he would never abandon us in our woundedness.  Thus, we hear in the prophecy of Ezekiel that God doesn’t say “Don’t worry, I’ll never let you die,” but rather, “I will open your graves and have you rise from them.”  In other words, “Although you may feel like you’ve died, not even death will stop me from restoring you to the life that I have promised to you.”  It is this promise, then, that calls us to a radical kind of hope: radical, because hope that comes in the face of despair is the most pure kind of hope that one can have.

I would guess that just about all of us, however, have never experienced the second half of Martha and Mary’s experience: that is, we’ve probably never experienced God actually intervening to bring our loved one back to life, regardless of how much we’ve actually pleaded him for it.  Thus, the challenge for us is to find a way to take hold of this radical kind of hope in the midst of our unresolved despair.  This is a very personal challenge, for it is something that we have to resolve within ourselves.  First, we have to acknowledge our disappointment with God that he did not live up to our expectations (regardless of whether or not they were realistic expectations to have of God, because the fact of the matter is that they were our expectations and, thus, they were real).  Then, we have to find a way to open ourselves back up to him to allow him the chance to show us that he has not abandoned us.  This takes a lot of humility and vulnerability on our part, which, quite frankly, can be scary.

As I mentioned, my mom is a strong woman.  And so, let’s just say that she doesn’t do “vulnerable” very well.  Her faith, however, had been so strong—and so deeply imbedded in her understanding of who she was—that she knew that she had to find a way to get a hold of that hope in the face of this unresolved despair.  So she turned back to prayer.  Through it, and by staying close to the sacraments, she has been able to find a way to open herself back up to God so as to give him the chance to show her the hope that still exists even though the hurt from the loss still remains.  I suspect that she is still finding it, just as all of us in the family are still finding it, each in our own way, even now, nearly 20 years after his death.

My brothers and sisters, Lent isn’t just about “getting right with the laws of the Church.”  Rather, Lent is really about reconciling ourselves with God and with one another.  Unfortunately, just maintaining our Lenten fasts isn’t going to be enough to make that reconciliation happen.  At best, it can make us open to it, but that’s as far as it can take us.  The hard work of Lent is, rather, is this opening of ourselves to God: first acknowledging our disappointment with him and then being open to discovering a new, more meaningful way to be in relationship with him.

With the help of his grace, however, which is found in prayer and in the sacraments, we, too can come to believe, as Martha and Mary did, in the promise God has made to us—that he would open our graves and raise us from them—and, thus, we can find the peace that will allow us to move forward, trusting in the promise of joy that awaits us on Easter morning.

Given at All Saints Parish: Logansport, IN – March 17th, 2013