A Community of Persons

Homily: The Most Holy Trinity – Cycle C

In my last semester of high school, I started to hang out with a classmate of mine named Bill Schmidtz.  Bill was an eccentric guy.  He had a great sense of humor, but was very intense.  It was either “off” or “on” with him, never in between.  This made him a lot of fun to hang around with because where my own inhibitions might keep me from expressing something as strongly as I might want, Bill would just let it fly!  Through our hanging out, Bill introduced me to one of his friends, Trisha, who proved also to be a lot of fun to hang out with.  Over a series of weeks leading up to our graduation—a couple of months perhaps—we spent a lot of time together: hanging out, joking, and enjoying each other’s company.

On one evening during this time, the three of us were at another acquaintance's house, hanging out.  Bill started talking about how cool he thought it was that the three of us were becoming something of an inseparable trio.  Then, in true Bill fashion, he took it to the next level, saying that we needed a name by which we would identify ourselves.  Of course, Bill had a name picked out.  He said, “We’re like a triangle.  We should call ourselves ‘The Triangle’”.  (As I said, Bill was intense... not the most creative, but intense.)  Being teenagers still and, therefore, still akin to lunging at silly things, I remember Trisha and I both agreeing to the name that night.  As the days and weeks went on, we had a lot of fun as “The Triangle”.

Soon, though, high school graduation came and went.  I would soon leave for Michigan to pursue my degree in engineering, Bill would begin his apprenticeship as a plumber, and Trisha had one more year of high school yet before she would graduate.  I’m guessing that it would surprise no one here if I told them that, as the members of “The Triangle” started down these different paths, this once-unified group of persons quickly dissolved into nothing.  24 years later, I don’t think I’ve run into or spoken with either Bill or Trisha.

So, why this story at the beginning of the homily on Trinity Sunday?  Well, because I think that Bill tapped into something fundamental when he recognized the bond, fragile as it was, that had grown between himself, Trisha, and I.  In calling us the “triangle”, he was recognizing what he thought was a completeness in us, just like a triangle is complete, in itself.  As the three points in the triangle, we had bonds of good will that, for a time, kept us together.  Those bonds proved to be somewhat superficial, however, and so they quickly dissolved once distance made it hard to stay connected.  Nonetheless, in recognizing the “community of persons” that these bonds created, Bill was projecting (somewhat unwittingly, I’m sure) an innate sense that, having been created in God’s image, we are meant to form these kinds of communities of persons: especially ones that are bonded together in deep ways.

Hopefully, at this point, you’re seeing where I’m going with this, because what I’m describing here is a faint reflection of what it is that we celebrate this Sunday: that God, himself, is a community of persons, who nonetheless remains singular in his being.  Just as the three points, bonded together by the lines that connect them, make the triangle; and just as the triangle dissolves into nothing if one of those points or bonds is removed; so God is whole and complete in himself as this community of persons, united in the bonds of their eternal outpouring of love.  If any one of these points is removed, or if the bond of love between them ceases to be, then God is no longer who he has revealed himself to be.  In fact, I’d be so bold to say that he would no longer be God, at all!

Having been created in God’s image and likeness, we are created to be a community of persons, inseparably united by the bonds of love.  This, in fact, is the reason for which we were created: to be one with God in the community of persons that he is in himself.  As little children use play to enter into the lives of the adults around them, acting as parents in make-believe homes and as professionals in make-believe offices, farm fields, and factories—instinctually knowing that they are destined to enter into that world someday—so we human beings know instinctually that we are meant to enter into that perfect community of persons in eternal life and, thus, strive to create that in this world by entering into exclusive unions with one another.  In naming our little trio, Bill was formalizing what we had done instinctually: formed a small community of persons.

Just as a child’s play in the world of adults quickly dissolves when it becomes work or simply uninteresting, so do many of these communities of persons into which we enter dissolve if there isn’t something substantial to hold them together.  “The Triangle” quickly dissolved because our bonds were our mutual enjoyment of each other’s company.  We didn’t know each other very deeply; and so, when distance meant that we could no longer enjoy each other’s company easily (that is, when it became work), we became disinterested and lost contact.

The three Persons of the Holy Trinity, however, are bonded by infinitely perfect bonds: the Father knows the Son infinitely and the Son knows the Father infinitely; and their infinite outpouring of love to each other bursts forth as a third Person, the Holy Spirit (who, himself, is infinitely known and loved by the Father and the Son and who infinitely knows and loves them each in return).  This Holy Spirit bursts forth so that the infinite love of these persons can be known and shared by all.

This last part—that who God is in himself allows that we could know and share in who he is as a community of persons—is our reason to celebrate and give thanks this day.  Every community of persons, even the community of persons that most closely resembles the Holy Trinity—that of the human family—is still, because of our limitedness as human persons, lacking the completeness that God is in himself.  Nonetheless, we instinctually recognize that we are made for that completeness.  If we could never achieve that completeness, however, then our lives would be a total frustration.  But God has made it so that we could enter into that completeness—a completeness that we lost in the Garden of Eden, but then was restored in Jesus Christ—and so, we can rejoice that the hope that we have instinctually of experiencing that completeness will not disappoint, as Saint Paul reminded us in our second reading, and thus worship God here with joy, in spite of whatever difficulties we may be facing in our lives.

Friends, this joy that we celebrate here today because of who God is in himself is the joy that we must take with us as we enter back into this Ordinary Time.  This is because, as missionary disciples of God, we must make this good news known to all: that God, perfect in himself, allows and deeply desires that we, his creatures, could know him and enter into his divine life and, thus, find our fulfillment.  And so, as we give thanks to him today in this Eucharist—itself a taste of this perfect communion with him—let us ask for the grace to make this good news known in our lives and thus make this earth a foreshadowing of the perfect community of persons we will enjoy in eternal life.

Given at Saint Mary’s Cathedral: Lafayette, IN – June 15^th & 16^th, 2019

Our noble and necessary bodies

Homily: The Ascension of the Lord – Cycle C

          Friends, today we celebrate this great feast of the Ascension: the final, culminating act of our redemption. This is not, of course, the crucial act: that was Jesus’ Passion, Death, and Resurrection.  Rather, it is the culminating act: the ultimate reason for which Jesus took on our human flesh; and that is, to re-unite our humanity to God. This, of course, is a joyful thing. I mean, just think about your humanity for a moment. Think about what happens when you don’t take a shower or a bath for a couple of days. Think about changing diapers on babies or when they spit up on your shoulder. Our humanity—as we experience it in this world, at least—is a messy (and, quite frankly, often gross) thing. Yet the Divine Son of God, the Second Person of the Holy Trinity, took on our humanity, in all its grossness, suffered all of the worst things that it can experience in this world, and glorified it in his resurrection so that it could be restored to its perfect communion with the Holy Trinity: which is to say, into an existence of perfect and eternal bliss.

          This is something astounding!  And if you aren’t astounded by this, then you should be!  In the early centuries of the Church, Christians argued about the true nature of Jesus’ humanity: Did he truly have a human nature, alongside his divine nature, or did his divine nature simply “reside” in a human body while he walked on earth?  The fact that, after his resurrection, Jesus still had a human body, made of flesh and bone, and that he took that body with him as he ascended into heaven shows us, those early Christians argued, that Jesus’ divine nature was truly united to a human nature; and that this human nature, while always remaining distinct from his divine nature, can never be separated from him.  It’s truly mind-blowing to think about this because, even with all of our scientific achievements, we have no way of conceptualizing how our human bodies can exist outside of space and time.

          Nevertheless, what Jesus proved for us when he ascended in his human body is that our bodies are noble, and that they have a noble purpose.  In fact, I would say that our bodies are truly sacramental, in nature.  If you remember your catechism well, you’ll remember that a sacrament is an “efficacious sign of grace”: it’s something perceivable by our senses that makes imperceivably things happen.  For example, in baptism, the person is washed with water while invoking the Holy Trinity, which effects the grace of the cleansing of the person’s soul from sin (Original Sin and any personal sin) and marking it permanently for God.  In other words, the physical, perceivable washing makes a spiritual, imperceivable washing happen.  Thus, another way to define a sacrament is to say that it is “a visible sign of an invisible reality.”  A sacramental, in this sense, is something that does a “sacrament-like” thing.

          Our human bodies are sacramentals in that they are visible signs of invisible realities.  What is that “invisible reality”?  The presence of a human soul.  Subconsciously we get this, because whenever we see what appears to be a human body without a soul, we know it’s something less than human, a monster, right? (Any “Walking Dead” fans out there? Zombies are monsters because they are human bodies without souls.) Our bodies are more than just signs, however, they are integral parts of who we are as human persons.  This we also understand, fundamentally, because when someone does violence to our bodies, we rightly see it as an attack on the person, who cannot be known except through his/her body.

All this is to remind us today that the restoration of our communion with God could not be accomplished through spiritual means alone: it had to happen with our bodies.  This means that, any restoration that could have been effected without bodily communion would have been incomplete.  Jesus came, however, to restore our communion with God completely: thus, the Incarnation; the Passion, Death, and Resurrection; and, now, yes, the Ascension.  Real communion with God requires our bodies, as well as our soul.

          This message is also why, I think, that the Church has transferred the celebration of this great feast to Sunday.  Technically, 40 days after Easter happened last Thursday, but we celebrate the Ascension on Sunday so that the vast majority of us might be able to celebrate this important feast.  It is the feast of the culmination of our salvation and a reminder that our human bodies have a noble purpose.  The world tells us that our bodies are something to be used and thrown away.  Through Jesus, God reveals that our bodies are valuable and necessary.

          These valuable bodies are not meant to be static, however.  Rather, they are meant to move.  In Luke’s Gospel “movement” is the sign of a disciple: that is, someone responding to grace.  If we think about the parable of the Prodigal Son, we see that the prodigal responds to grace and moves to return to his father, and the older son stands still—he will not move—and refuses his father’s graces.  This is a common theme in Luke’s gospel.  Thus, it feels a little weird when, at the beginning of the Acts of the Apostles, Luke writes that Jesus told the disciples to “stay and wait”.  This, of course, is only to prepare them for the next big movement that will come with the arrival of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost: then they will move—and move big time—to take the Gospel message to the ends of the world.  We, who celebrate this feast, must be ready to move when the Spirit comes to us.

          Friends, Let’s use this time to meditate this week on this great mystery of the Ascension: that through Christ’s body, which has entered the eternal sanctuary in heaven on our behalf, we too will one day ascend bodily into full and perfect communion with God in heaven.  As we do, let us also pray and prepare to use these bodies that we have been given not only to be outward expression of ourselves—the visible signs of our invisible souls—but also to be expressions of God’s love that has been poured into our hearts: in other words, the visible sign of that invisible reality.  In doing so, we will be proclaiming God’s kingdom: the kingdom of heaven to which all men and women are invited and over which rules Christ, our risen Lord and king.  Alleluia!

Given at Saint Mary’s Cathedral: Lafayette, IN – June 1^st & 2^nd, 2019

The drama under the surface

Homily: The Baptism of the Lord – Cycle C

On January 8^th, 1978, a baby boy was baptized at Saint Mary Nativity Catholic Church.  Little did his parents and godparents know at the time that this boy would be destined to stand one day right where I am standing and preach to you, the good people of this parish, the Good News of Jesus Christ.  No, they could not know this as the mysterious plans of God would take this boy far and wide until that day that he would come here, carrying this most important news. “Who is this boy?” you might be asking. “Who is this boy destined to bring us Good News?”  Well, my friends, it’s… me. It’s just me.

You know, I remembered my baptism anniversary this past week and I realized that the whole thing was rather… undramatic.  So, I thought I’d try to infuse a little drama into it here in my homily. My guess is that, for just about everyone here, the same is true.  So true that I’m willing to bet that there aren’t five people in this church who know when their baptism anniversary is.  Am I right? Raise your hands if you know the date of your baptism.  Almost all of us here do not remember the date of our baptism.  And why? Well, probably because they were all pretty undramatic, I suppose. Nonetheless, hidden below the surface, incredibly dramatic things happened.

Jesus’ baptism, on the surface, wasn’t very dramatic either.  In fact, Luke’s Gospel barely gives it a sentence. He wrote: “After all the people had been baptized and Jesus also had been baptized and was praying...”  That’s it. No drama. Just another dip in the water like the multitudes of others that had been coming to John for his “baptism of repentance”. Under the surface, however, this was incredibly dramatic.

Imagine for a moment that you are standing in line for confession; and imagine that this is a “regular” confession for you: one in which you don’t feel the anxiety of anything major to confess, but nonetheless have acknowledged that there are some things in your life that need the grace of God’s forgiveness.  Look up and down the line. You’ll see some folks you recognize and others you do not. Now imagine that one of those folks is Jesus. Which one? Who knows? But this is the situation in which Jesus comes to be baptized by John. Jesus, a guy who looks like anyone else, comes to receive John’s baptism of repentance.  He waits his turn, enters the river, and allows John to baptize him. After, he prays.  No drama.  Hidden below the surface, however, something incredibly dramatic happened: something mostly obscured by what happened after.

What happened after was this great theophany—the manifestation of the Holy Trinity—as the skies were torn open and the Holy Spirit descended upon him and the voice of God the Father was heard declaring to him that he is his “beloved Son”.  This was pretty dramatic, to be sure. This public manifestation of Jesus’ identity steals the stage from the drama that happened in the water. The hidden drama in the water, however, was no less significant.

When you and I were baptized, I’ll bet that the most dramatic thing that happened outwardly was that the priest poured too much water and got some in your eyes or your godfather dropped your lit candle on the carpet.  Nonetheless a great drama happened, unseen to any of us: we were cleansed of sin, the Spirit of God descended upon us, and we were permanently sealed by God, marking us as his beloved children. Incredible! Something permanent and infinitely irrevocable happened to us with what looked like nothing more than a splash of water.  This hidden drama of our baptism, though, wouldn’t have been possible without the hidden drama of Jesus’.

You see, what happened at Jesus’ baptism was not God’s adoption of him (as some ancient writers had proposed—as if he hadn’t always been God’s Son and as if he just happened to be, like, the “one-millionth-customer”; thus, winning the grand prize of becoming God’s son).  Rather, what happened at his baptism was the sanctification of water as the means of new life. Jesus did not need John’s baptism: he had no need of repentance. Yet he shows us the depths of his humility by submitting to John’s baptism anyway. In doing so he purified the waters of baptism and made them powerful: able to effect the hidden drama that happens at every baptism that we celebrate today and to be the sign of new life that it inaugurates.

The public manifestation that Jesus is the Son of God was the outward expression of new life that his baptism brought.  From that moment, Jesus’ hidden life in Nazareth was over and his life of public ministry was inaugurated. So, too, for us.  Once the hidden drama of baptism unfolded, a new life in faith was inaugurated for each of us. We were incorporated into Christ and, thus, we can now no longer live a hidden life.  Rather, our lives must consist in being manifestations of the truths that have been revealed to us throughout this Christmas season: that Jesus is the divine person in human flesh—the Son of God—and that he has come to save us.

My brothers and sisters, none of us needs screenwriters to make our baptisms seem more dramatic.  There is a depth of drama already built in, hidden under the surface. What we need, however, is to let the ensuing drama—the drama of the manifestation of Jesus to the world—play out in our lives by proclaiming this Good News (with our mouths!), by living upright and holy lives (for the Saint Paul tells us that “The grace of God has appeared, saving all and training us to reject godless ways and worldly desires and to live temperately, justly, and devoutly in this age”), and by serving those in need, no matter where we are.

My brothers and sisters, God has called each of us to be a manifestation—an epiphany—of his presence to the world.  As we enter into Ordinary Time let us resolve to respond to that call, so that the drama of each of our lives might lead to the greater glory of him: the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, who lives and reigns forever and ever… AMEN!

Given at Saint Mary’s Cathedral: Lafayette, IN – January 13^th, 2019

The Holy Trinity: It's what we're here for

Homily: The Most Holy Trinity – Cycle B

          One of the fundamental questions of life is one with which both young and old struggle.  Normally the question comes up during some sort of life crisis or during some “liminal” moment in a person’s life: in other words, moments when the future of one’s life isn’t clear and that person is faced with making a decision that will determine the course of the next stage of his/her life.  That question?  “What is the purpose of life?”  Or, put more simply, “What am I here for?”

          For the young, this is a vocational question, right?  As we grow into adulthood, we all gain a sense that we were put on this earth to do something and that our task is to discover what it is that we have been called to do.  Modern culture has made this difficult for young people because it tells them that there are no guiding principles on which to base your decision.  “The sky is the limit” we tell them.  “Follow your dreams” …even though we know that dreams are fickle and that not everyone has the capacity to reach the sky.  It’s sad to see someone who has made it into their thirties, who has pursued their “dreams”, but yet finds him/herself adrift, still feeling like he/she doesn’t know what the purpose of his/her life is.

          For the elderly, the struggle can be just as real.  I’ve made it an effort during my time here to visit with our homebound parishioners and many of them express a feeling of purposelessness, too.  They’ll say to me: “Father, I just don’t know why I’m still here.”  They’ve worked, raised a family, and tried to be active in retirement, but now their health is limiting their ability to tangibly contribute to their community and so they start to question: “What am I here for?”

          This latter case is a bit surprising as many of our older Catholics grew up in the Church that taught the “Baltimore Catechism” almost exclusively.  This catechism provided the fundamental truths about life, about God, and about our relationship to him and the world in a straight-forward, question and answer format.  One of those questions was “Why did God make you?”  (In other words, “What are you here for?”)  And the answer… does anybody here remember the answer?  The answer is this: “God made me to know Him, to love Him, and to serve Him in this world, and to be happy with Him forever in the next.”  There it is, friends.  This is our guiding principle.  Simple, right?

          Yes, it is.  But we all know that when an unknown future or adversity squares its face against us that we can often forget this: the purpose for which we were made.  In a sense, we “can’t see the forest for the trees”.  Therefore, as we’ve returned to Ordinary Time after our long and joy-filled Easter celebration, the Church gives us this Sunday, Trinity Sunday, in order to bring us back to our roots and to help us step out on mission once again.  In celebrating who God is, in Himself—three Divine Persons in one unified Godhead—we are reminded of that fundamental relationship that directs our lives: that our lives come from God and are directed towards God.  Today’s scriptures reinforce this fact.

          In our first reading from the book of Deuteronomy, the Israelites have been wandering through the desert for 40 years and are on the cusp of entering the land into which God had promised to bring them, and Moses exhorts them to remember who God is when they enter the land.  He recounts how God had made himself known to them, his chosen people, by powerful signs and by leading them forth from slavery and he says, “This is why you must now know, and fix in your heart, that the Lord is God in the heavens above and on earth below, and that there is no other.”  In other words, Moses is exhorting them to know God; and to know him through the gracious way that he has cared for them throughout their 40-year exodus.

          This, too, is how we come to know God: by remembering how he has worked: both in our own lives, those unique ways that his graciousness has touched each of us, and throughout history, starting with the Bible and the history of the Church, especially in the lives of the saints.  This Trinity Sunday, we can commit ourselves to know God better by committing ourselves to studying the Bible and some of the great spiritual works of saints, both old and new.  The spiritual biographies/autobiographies of holy men and women like Saint Augustine, Saint Theresa of Avila, Saint Terese of Lisieux, Dorothy Day, Thomas Merton, Saint Theresa of Calcutta, and Saint John Paul II are just a few worth considering.  Knowing God is the basis for loving God.  Thus, this is an indispensable step to fulfilling our purpose in life.

          In the second reading, we hear Saint Paul speaking about the “Spirit of adoption” that we have all received.  He goes on to say that it is the Spirit himself that witnesses to the fact that we are now children of God.  As adopted sons and daughters of God (and, therefore, brothers and sisters of Christ), we are endowed with the grace of being loved by God as his beloved children.  In fact, as brothers and sisters of Christ himself—the Second Person of the Holy Trinity—we are caught up in the eternal outpouring of love that the Father makes to the Son and the Son returns to the Father, and which eternally explodes forth and pours out into the universe in the form of the Holy Spirit.

          Therefore, we love God as Christ loves the Father: by receiving the love that is poured out to us and by returning that love with an outpouring of our lives.  This love is expressed in adoration: which we can do privately, in our personal prayer time at home, lifting our minds and hearts to him, praising him for who he is and his glory that shines forth in the universe, and also publicly, like when we gather for the Eucharist or Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament.  These are acts of devotion, sprung forth from our knowledge of who he is and of his great love for us as his adopted sons and daughters.  It is this love for God that, then, impels us into service.

          In the Gospel reading, Jesus gives his disciples the “Great Commission”.  On this Trinity Sunday, we should certainly hear this command to baptize “in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit” as a revelation of who God is, in himself.  But in the context of this homily, it should also be heard as the commission to service.  Having spent three years with Christ as he preached and worked miracles, then having been witnesses to his Passion, Death, and Resurrection, Christ’s disciples knew and loved him.  Now, they were being shown how they would serve him: “Go and make disciples of all nations…”  And that they did.  With great love and devotion, they poured out their lives in service of the Gospel so that all peoples would come to know, love, and serve God in this world, and be happy with him forever in the next.

          We serve God when we seek out the particular way that God has called each of us to fulfill this great commission and then strive to live it.  When we know and, therefore, love him, we offer ourselves generously and seek a way of life that allows us to serve the building of his kingdom here on earth by working towards the good of others.  For some that means clerical state (that is, priesthood or the diaconate) or the religious life.  For most that will mean a career in some kind of trade or business and then, perhaps, raising a family.  In all, the question is not “what do I want to do?” (because if you know and love God, you want to serve him!), but rather, “what is God calling me to do?”  You will already know your purpose, but the answer to the latter question will show you how you are going to fulfill that purpose.

          And if you’re elderly and you’ve completed your career and your children are all grown and off on their own and if your health doesn’t allow for you to participate much in the life of your family, parish, or community… what is your purpose then?  It is still to know, love, and serve God in this world, and to be happy with him forever in the next.  Living out the last years of your life still striving to know God and love him more deeply, and still striving to serve him by praying and offering your sufferings for the conversion of sinners and the release of souls from purgatory, you will be fulfilling your purpose in life and you will become a saint.

          Friends, as we celebrate this great feast honoring God for who he is, in himself, may we commit ourselves to know him more completely, to love him more profoundly, and to serve him with our whole lives, regardless of the state in which we find ourselves; so that we, too, may one day share in the fullness of Divine Love that God is in himself: a foretaste of which we experience here in this Holy Eucharist.

Given at All Saints Parish: Logansport, IN – May 26^th & 27^th, 2018

The Gospel of the Ascension

Homily: The Ascension of the Lord – Cycle B

          Friends, today we celebrate this great feast of the Ascension: the final, culminating act of our redemption.  This is not, of course, the crucial act: that was Jesus’ Passion, Death, and Resurrection.  Rather, it is the culminating act: the ultimate reason for which Jesus took on our human flesh; and that is, to re-unite our humanity to God.  This, of course, is a joyful thing.  I mean, just think about your humanity for a moment.  Think about what happens when you don’t take a shower or a bath for a couple of days.  Think about changing diapers on babies or when they spit up on your shoulder.  Our humanity—as we experience it in this world, at least—is a messy (and, quite frankly, often gross) thing.  Yet the Divine Son of God, the Second Person of the Holy Trinity, took on our humanity, in all its grossness, suffered all of the worst things that it can experience in this world, and glorified it in his resurrection so that it could be restored to its perfect communion with the Holy Trinity: which is to say, into an existence of perfect and eternal bliss.

          Yet, in our Scriptures today, the greatness of this event does not seem to be the message.  The message, rather, seems to focus on the mission that Christ gives to his apostles.  In the first reading from the beginning of the Acts of the Apostles, we hear Jesus speaking about the Holy Spirit that Jesus will send to empower them to be his “witnesses in Jerusalem, throughout Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”  Then, in our reading from the Gospel of Mark, we hear Jesus giving them his specific command: “Go into the whole world and proclaim the gospel to every creature.”  Notice at the end of that reading, after it describes Jesus’ ascension, it doesn’t say “And the disciples sat around and marveled that Jesus has taken our human nature to be re-united with the Holy Trinity.”  Rather it says that “they went forth and preached everywhere”.  So why would the Scriptures spend so few verses on the Ascension and so many on the mission?

          This is because the Easter season is not only about celebration, but about preparation.  If you heard my homily last Sunday or any number of occasions over these past 40-some days, you’ll know that I’ve been encouraging us to consider this time of Easter as a time of preparation to be re-sent out on mission.  This is what the original “Easter Season” was, as the Acts of the Apostles records for us, saying: “He presented himself alive to them by many proofs after he had suffered, appearing to them during forty days and speaking about the kingdom of God.”  What was this, but a preparation for being sent out to be his “witnesses … to the ends of the earth”?  Therefore, as I have said, if our celebration of Easter is going to be anything more than an excuse to eat our favorite foods that we gave up for Lent, and if our celebration of Pentecost is going to be anything more than a brief flash of red at church before going back to the green of Ordinary Time, then we, too, should have been preparing to renew our efforts to fulfill this great mission to proclaim the Gospel.

          But this begs the question… And what is the “gospel” (that is, “what is the “good news”)?  The Gospel is exactly that of which I spoke at the beginning of this homily: that “God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him might not perish but might have eternal life.”  “Wait, that’s not what you said at the beginning of the homily.”  Well, yes it is.  The Life, Passion, Death, Resurrection, and Ascension of Jesus Christ is what “giving his only Son” looked like; and restoring our humanity to its original glory so that it may dwell with God in eternal bliss once again (meaning that each of us with a human nature can also dwell with God in eternal bliss) is the ultimate result of this “good news”.

          Notice, for a moment, what the “gospel” isn’t: it isn’t that Jesus came to show us how to be good persons and, therefore, we are eternally grateful to him for it.  It is that our broken, messy, and often gross humanity has been perfected (that is, glorified) in Jesus Christ; and that, through him, we, too, can achieve and enjoy that perfection.

          Friends, if you need any sign that this gospel is needed in today’s world, you don’t have to look too far.  Did anyone watch the Met Gala last week (or at least see news reports about it)?  If you did, what you saw was disfigured humanity on display.  Not in any raucous bad behavior, mind you, but in how fashion designers proved infinitely capable of desecrating beautiful things while believing that they were improving upon them.  This kind of thinking—that we can perfect ourselves by our own ingenuity and, thus, have heaven right here—is our greatest modern plague; and it usually results in things looking more distorted (and, therefore, less perfect) than they were in the first place.  The gospel of Jesus Christ is the answer for anyone who has gone down this dead-end road.

          Unfortunately, however, many people around us do not even know that there is anything more for which to hope than this disfigured humanity and our attempts to perfect it by ourselves.  Thus, we must be re-sent out on mission.  Just like Jesus’ first apostles, we, too, are called to be his “witnesses … to the ends of the earth” to bring this good news: that life is not just about how good you can make it in this world, but that it’s destined for something so much greater, as Jesus, in his ascension, has shown us.  We are witnesses when we live as Saint Paul exhorts us to live in today’s second reading when he says: “I … urge you to live in a manner worthy of the calling you have received, with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another through love, striving to preserve the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace…”  In this way we will model authentic human community, built on love, and, thus, attract those seeking a perfect humanity so that they might find it in its fullness through union with Jesus Christ.

          Therefore, my friends, in this final week of the Easter season—that is, the final week of preparation to be re-sent out on mission—let us pray fervently for a renewal of God’s Holy Spirit in us: so that we can be Church—and, therefore, witnesses—for Christ once again.

Given at All Saints Parish: Logansport, IN – May 12^th & 13^th, 2018

The reality of God is bigger than our perceptions

Homily: Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity – Cycle A

          I love science!  As a former engineer, my brain is wired for science.  What I mean by that is that it is wired in such a way that, when I see something that I don’t understand, I automatically begin to wonder about it and try to figure it out.  Quite frankly, most of us are wired for science in some way: usually in a very practical way.

          Here’s what I mean.  Say that you enter a room with which you are unfamiliar.  It’s a little bit warm in the room and you observe that there is a ceiling fan.  You know a thing or two about ceiling fans, but you’ve never turned on this particular fan, so you set yourself to figuring out how to turn it on.  You think, “Maybe the wall switch will turn it on”, and so you flip the wall switches.  If that doesn’t work you think, “Maybe I need to pull the chain on the fan to turn it on”, and so you reach up and pull the chain.  If that doesn’t work you think, “Maybe there’s a combination of the wall switches and the chain that need to be aligned to turn it on”, and so you begin to turn switches on and off, pulling the chain at each setting.  If that still doesn’t work, we think… what?  That it’s broken… of course!  We’ve observed, hypothesized, tested each hypothesis and observed some more, and when we’ve run out of hypotheses we draw a conclusion.  That, my friends, is science; and we do it almost every day.

          As much as I love science, because I love figuring out how to make things work, I have one big problem with it.  You see, the problem with science is that it equates perception with reality.  In other words, science makes conclusions about reality based solely on what it can perceive.  In my example above, we concluded that the fan was broken because no switches or combination of switches would start it spinning.  We made a conclusion about reality based solely on what we observed.  The reality, however, could be that the fan functions perfectly well, but that the switch may be broken or maybe electricity wasn’t flowing at all to the system.  In other words, there could be factors beyond our perception that could contribute to the reality.  Science does not admit these factors and so sometimes draws incorrect conclusions about reality.

          For people of faith there is no other proof of the limitations of science than when we think about God.  Imagine for a moment that you didn’t know much about God (and let’s assume that you at least give credence to the fact that there is a God: that is, an all-powerful, all-knowing creator of the universe).  What would you do to figure out more about him?  Well, you’d observe, I suppose: you’d listen to what people said or wrote about him.  Then you might hypothesize about what he’d be like, followed by observing to see if you’re hypothesis was correct.

          Doing that you’d find out that people say that God is loving, kind, and merciful; that he has the power to control everything that happens in the universe; that nothing happens without his knowing about it and either making it happen or, at least, permitting it to happen.  Then you’d say, “Well, if that’s the case, then things should be pretty good around me.  People ought to be living in harmony with one another and there should be peace, because a God of love and kindness, who can control what happens in the world, would surely desire there to be love and kindness throughout the world.”  Having formed your hypothesis, you then observe the world and what would you see?  Love and kindness in many places, for sure; but also hatred, violence, and discord in as many, if not more places.  Having observed this, your conclusion might be: “God is not who people say he is, because what I perceive does not conform to that proposed reality.”  This is the error that many people in our society make today: they perceive a world broken by sin and they conclude that if God was who people say that he is, he wouldn’t allow the world to be like this.  Since the world is this way, God must not be who people say that he is; rather, he might be nothing more than a mythical creature meant to make people feel better about living in this broken world.

          The problem with this, of course, is that there are factors outside of one’s perception that contribute to the reality.  In other words, reality is greater than our perception.  Thinking theoretically, we can somewhat easily come to the conclusion that there must be a God: an all-powerful being—the uncreated creator—who created all things.  In order to know that God is benevolent, however, we would have to do a lot more work.  To see that all creation works towards the propagation of life, instead of against it, and that this propagation is a good thing, could lead us to conclude that God is good and has the good of creation in mind.  But to know God as we know him, as loving, kind, and merciful—or, as we celebrate him today, as a communion of persons—is something that we can know only if he, himself, has revealed it to us.

          Thankfully, this is something that he has revealed to us; and it is not something that he has revealed by some sort of divine declaration (even though he has done that).  Rather, he has revealed this to us by his actions.  In the book of Exodus, we read that God declared himself before Moses to be “a merciful and gracious God, slow to anger and rich in kindness and fidelity” and he proved this as time and again he spared the Israelite people from destruction, even though they had repeatedly offended him.  So gracious and merciful is he—and so deeply in love of his creation—that, as we read in the Gospel, he “gave his only Son so that everyone who believes in him might not perish but might have eternal life.”  In doing so, he not only proved, once again, that what he said about himself is true, but he also revealed that he is a communion of persons within himself.  And how do we know that Jesus truly is the Son of God and, thus, God himself?  Because of the works that he did: most prominently his resurrection from the dead.

          Thus, the celebration that we come to today: the Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity.  Today we celebrate who God is in himself: not because we somehow perceive this with our senses, but rather because of the gift of Faith that has been placed in our hearts and because of the works that he has worked in the past (and continues to work today) that go beyond our ability to test scientifically.  In celebrating God as Trinity, we not only celebrate who he is, but also what that means for us.  We know that God is Love and so is a community of persons.  Because of this we know that, when God creates, he creates in love.  We know that, having created human beings to be persons, like himself, he created us solely so that we might share in his divine life, which is love.  Finally, we know that, when we turned away from him in sin, he did not shun us, but rather came close to us, becoming one of us in his Son who would make atonement for our sins and, thus, make it possible for us to share in the divine life once again.

          And so, my brothers and sisters, as we celebrate today who God is in himself, let us rejoice also in who we are in him: beloved sons and daughters destined to spend eternity with him; and let us commit ourselves, therefore, to follow the admonition of Saint Paul to the Corinthians and “mend our ways, encourage one another, agree with one another, and live in peace” so that “the God of love and peace will be with us” and all those scientific skeptics might begin to see the truth that we proclaim: that the reality of God is much bigger than their perceptions, but that he nonetheless cares about each and every one; and that he desires that each and every one dwell with him in eternal light, happiness, and peace: the very same light, happiness, and peace that we experience, under sacramental signs, here at this altar.

Given at All Saints Parish: Logansport, IN – June 10^th & 11^th, 2017

More than meets the eye

Homily: Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity – Cycle C

          When I was a kid, I was fascinated by mechanical things.  (Well, to be honest, I still am.)  One of my favorite toys were the “Transformers”, which was a toy that transformed from a vehicle of some sort (a car, truck, or an airplane) into a robot.  I loved them because I could play with them and figure out how they transformed from the vehicle to the robot and back again.  These toys always came with instructions on how to transform them, but I almost never looked at them; I was so fascinated by figuring it out on my own.

          There were times, however, when I had to consult the instructions.  Often, what I found out was that, aside from discovering how to correctly transform the toy, there was some other feature about the toy that I didn’t know about (a secret compartment or something) and so my enjoyment was enhanced.  What I discovered was that my own fascination and ability to figure things out only went so far.  At some point, I needed something from outside of me to help me know everything there was to know about the toy.

          Now, we all have this inherent ability to figure things out (although some of us have a greater interest in doing it than others).  Thus the created universe is open to us.  We have proven to ourselves that all that is needed to unlock the secrets of the universe is our time, effort, and commitment to discovering them; and our incredible technological advances are proving this very fact.  Believe it or not, this also applies to God.  Let me explain.

          I dare to say that most of us learned about God by what has been handed down to us from parents, grandparents, our priests and religious education catechists.  This, however, is not the only way to know that God exists.  The fact of the matter is the existence of God is a conclusion to which we can come solely using our reason alone.  It’s not easy, of course, but much like my figuring out how to transform my toys and much like we are figuring out the deep mysteries of the universe, with enough time and effort, we can conclude—from reason alone—that God exists.

          Saint Thomas Aquinas, in fact, gave us five ways to prove God’s existence that come from reasonably thinking about creation itself.  For example: we all know that nothing moves without being moved by some impulse: either from inside of itself or outside of itself.  (The rock doesn’t turn over on its own, right?)  Well, the sequence of motion had to start somewhere, right?  I mean there had to be something that was before all things that started the first thing in motion, right?  Otherwise we couldn’t explain why there is motion at all.  This first “unmoved mover”, Saint Thomas has said, “is what we call ‘God’”. 

          You can see, of course, that this only tells us that the one that we call “God” exists, but that it doesn’t tell us much about who God is, in himself.  In other words, we can know that there is a “supreme being” who existed before all things and thus is the source of the existence of all things, but we cannot know that he is three persons in the one Godhead.  To know who God is in himself requires something beyond what we can reason: an instruction manual from the creator of it all.  In other words, that God reveal himself to us.

          What a blessing it is, then, that God has revealed himself to us as a communion of three persons—Father, Son, and Holy Spirit—who are all of the same substance—the eternal, all-powerful, all-knowing, ever-present God.  It is for this reason that we celebrate this particular feast, the solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity: to honor God in who he is in himself and to give thanks to him for revealing himself to us and for what who he is means for us.  In fact, our readings today point to how who God is in himself—this plurality of persons—has benefitted us.

          In the first reading from the book of Proverbs, we hear how wisdom was with God before all things were and how wisdom was the “craftsman” at the side of God, the Father, as he created the world.  This reveals not only that God, the Father, is the author of life, but that he created all life in wisdom, giving order and wise sense to the world so that it could be a place of beauty and harmony.

          In the second reading from Saint Paul’s letter to the Romans, we hear how we have regained “peace” with God through Jesus Christ, the Son of God, who is the Second Person of the Trinity.  For this reason we have true hope (that is assurance of things not yet achieved), because it is not through our (always faulty) efforts that we hope to achieved this peace, but rather through the perfect effort of God who become man for us.

          Finally, in the Gospel reading, we read that Jesus would send us the Holy Spirit as the gift of his enduring presence that will remind us of all that he taught us and reveal to us the fullness of truth as we become capable of receiving it.  It is this revelation of the Holy Spirit—and Jesus’ revelation that he, the Father, and the Spirit are one—that completes the revelation of who God is, so that we may not be afraid of his power, but rather that we might approach him, because we know him.

          Nonetheless, the problem of “how” God can be three persons yet only one being remains unresolved.  In fact, no “taking it apart” by our own efforts will ever reveal enough about the Holy Trinity for us to ever understand it fully.  That’s okay, however, because this truth is not like the truths of physics or chemistry: they aren’t truths that, once understood, are then for us to use and manipulate.  Rather, it is a truth to be admired; a truth that should lead us to adoration because of its sublime beauty.

          Knowing, however, that we are destined to live in communion with the Divine Trinity, we can live in this world of suffering and never despair; because, as Saint Paul said in today’s second reading “affliction produces endurance, and endurance, proven character, and proven character, hope, and hope does not disappoint…”  This, my brothers and sisters, is what we must proclaim to the world—and what we are especially trying to proclaim in this Year of Mercy—that the suffering of this world is not all there is, but that real hope for a life of peace exists and can be ours when we have faith in Jesus, the Divine Son of God who became incarnate for us.

          Let us, then, allow ourselves to be animated by this celebration today—especially by the communion with God that we share at this table—to go forth and proclaim this truth with our lives and thus give hope to all those in despair, so that all might know the joy that faith in God, the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, brings to those who put their trust in him.

Given at All Saints Parish: Logansport, IN – May 21^st & 22^nd, 2016

Transitions are hard, God is harder.

          I'm looking forward to being down in Brown County, Indiana with my brother priests from the Diocese of Lafayette-in-Indiana this week.  It will be a time of rest and fraternity that we don't often get as priests, especially since our parishes are so spread out across rural Indiana.  Please pray for us this week.  We will certainly remember you all in prayer.  Thanks!

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Homily: The Most Holy Trinity – Cycle B

          Transitions are hard.  It doesn’t matter if it’s a big transition or a small one, if it’s something that we’ve anticipated or not, or even if it’s something that we’ve wanted versus something that we didn’t want, transitions are hard.  This is because every transition involves some kind of loss.  In other words, in order for us to move into the next thing there’s always something that we need to leave behind.  For example, say that I get that new job that I had wanted.  In order for me to move into that job, I have to leave my current job (which, perhaps, is something that I’m happy to do).  It also means, however, that I have to leave all of those people that I’ve been working with; and perhaps some of them have become good friends.  Thus, in order to make this transition, I have to leave behind some of these relationships.

          One of my professors in the seminary—the one who introduced us into counseling those who have suffered a loss—would often remind us that grief counseling has a place during marriage preparation.  “Regardless of whether or not the man or the woman recognizes it,” he would say, “each is getting ready to lose something when they marry.”  Their independence is the biggest thing, of course, but there are also smaller things, like that couch that he loves that she won’t allow in the house or the tiffany lamp collection that she’s been working on that he knows won’t survive the kids when they come along.  This professor had a great line that he would use with folks who would tell him that they just got married; he’d say: “Oh, I’m sorry for your loss,” because marriage is a transition and transitions are hard.

          Our scriptures even give us an example of this today.  In our first reading from the book of Deuteronomy, we hear Moses giving what appears to be a “pep talk” to the Israelite people.  They had been wandering in the desert for forty years after having been freed from slavery in Egypt, waiting to enter the land promised to them by God.  Now they were just across the Jordan River from that land and they would soon enter into it.  They were weary from being nomads for so many years, but kept wandering in the hope of reaching this land that they were now so close to entering.  And so, why did they need a pep talk?

          You see, for the people that Moses was speaking to, wandering in the desert is all that they had ever known.  Their parents were the generation that participated in the exodus from Egypt.  Not long after the miracle of the parting of the Red Sea did they arrive near the land that God had promised to them.  After a group of scouts reported that the land they were about to enter was populated by “veritable giants”, however, the people rebelled against God and refused to enter.  So, they were punished by being led out into the desert to wander until that generation died off.  Thus their children, whom Moses was speaking to in today’s reading, had known only wandering.  And while they all desired deeply to enter into the Promised Land, once they were face to face with making that transition they began to become anxious because they would have to leave off what they knew for something unknown.

          As I thought about it for a little bit, I began to realize that during this time of year many of us are experiencing transitions.  Some of them are things that we’ve anticipated and looked forward to: many colleges have already celebrated graduations and our high schools are celebrating them now; June is a month of weddings and we have a list of them happening here; and today/yesterday we celebrated the ordination of a priest and two men to the transitional diaconate.  Some, however, are transitions that have been forced upon us: like Fr. Mike’s reassignment to Rochester and my new role here; the closing of our parish school; and the transitions that happen surrounding deaths: the person who transitions from this life to the next and his or her loved ones who have to transition into a life without his or her physical presence.  And I’m sure there are many other transitions that are happening right now that you all could think of.

          This is why I find it very providential that we are celebrating the feast of the Most Holy Trinity this weekend: that is, in the midst of this “time of transitions”.  If we go back to our reading from Deuteronomy—that is, to Moses’ speech—we see that his “pep talk” is a bit of history lesson.  Moses is recounting for the Israelites the “signs and wonders” that God had worked for their parents in Egypt, which led to their exodus from slavery, as well as the signs and wonders that God had worked for them as he led them in their desert wanderings.  Moses is reminding them of these things so as to give them courage: in a sense, he’s saying to them, “Look at how incredibly God has treated us since before the exodus and up until this time.  He will not, therefore, abandon us as we enter into this land that he has promised us.  And so we must go forward with courage, holding fast to our faith in God, who is with us, and honoring him by keeping all of his commandments.”

          The doctrine of the Holy Trinity is, arguably, the most important doctrine of our faith, because it pertains to the very nature of God.  It states that there is only one God, but that this one God has revealed himself to us as eternally existing as three distinct, co-equal, co-eternal persons: the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.  This means so much for us.  Most important for us today, however, is that God eternally exists as this perfect communion of persons.

          Now, this doctrine is something that God has revealed to us: we didn’t make it up.  Therefore, it is unchanging: unchangeable, in fact.  Thus the same God who led the Israelites out of Egypt by great signs and wonders and led them into the Promised Land, the same God who took on human flesh so that he might die to redeem us from our sins and then rise again so that we might enjoy eternal life, the same God who descended on the Apostles at Pentecost, is the God who is with us today and into the future: the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.  Therefore, we see that God is “solid”: a rock on which we can anchor our hope, even in the face of transition.

          My brothers and sisters, Saint Paul reminds us today that “Those who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God” and that “[We] did not receive a spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but [we] received a Spirit of adoption, through whom we cry ‘Abba, Father!’”  In this time of transitions, let us not fall into fear about what we must lose, but rather let us go forward, led by the Spirit of God, to face each transition bravely, trusting that God is with us: the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit; as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be in that world that will not end, amen.

Given at All Saints Parish: Logansport, IN – May 30^th & 31^st, 2015

The Communion... that we share.

So I didn't get last week's homily up because I had to leave for the work camp trip with the youth early Sunday morning.  It's providential, I think, because I see these last two Sundays as being intimately connected.  In celebrating the Most Holy Trinity, we are celebration God, who is a communion of persons in himself.  In celebrating the Most Holy Body and Blood of Christ, we are celebrating that, through our participation in the Eucharist, God has invited us to share the communion that he is.  Thus, the two celebrations go together; and so, my homilies this week come to you... together ;-)

P.S. We had a great experience at Catholic Heart Work Camp in Milwaukee :-D

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Homily: The Most Holy Trinity – Cycle A

          I don’t know if any of you remember having finger painted when you were in kindergarten, but I would guess that most of you at least remember your kids having the opportunity to finger paint when they were there.  Now for kids, finger painting is kind of like a dream come true.  I have a blank slate, I don’t have to use any tools (except for those I’m most adept at using… my fingers) and I’ve been covered in an plastic apron which pretty much gives me license to make as big of a mess as I’d like to during the process.  For the kindergarten teacher, however, I imagine that finger paint day is the day that he or she has to summon up all of his or her courage to go to work.  This is a day in which every child at every moment is teetering on the brink of disaster.  Thus, while the goal of other days is success and accomplishments for the children, the goal of finger paint day (again, I imagine) is survival.

          If I remember my kindergarten art projects correctly (finger painting included), when all was said and done we almost always had something to show for it; and we almost always had a “big-‘ol hot mess” on our hands.  Nonetheless, I don’t remember one time when either my teacher or my parents took a look at what that mess produced and said anything but how beautiful it was.  Now (as you all know, I’m sure) it didn’t matter if the art project had any sort of artistic merit on its own; because it was the effort and the love that went into producing it (and its accompanying mess) that gave the project all of the merit it needed.

          Reflecting on this year’s Easter Vigil, I find myself making a lot of parallels.  It was my first time presiding at the Vigil Mass and if you’ve ever been to one you’ll know that it is a very complex liturgy.  There’s the liturgy of light, when we bring in the newly blessed Easter Candle, an extended liturgy of the Word, baptisms, confirmations, and first Holy Communions, all mashed together in one Mass.  Add on top of all of that the need to celebrate the liturgy in two languages and I shouldn’t have been surprised that the whole thing felt like one “big-‘ol hot mess”.  Nonetheless, after it was finished, almost everyone who spoke to me afterwards expressed just how beautiful they thought it was.  Just like in the finger painting, it wasn’t the product itself (the liturgy) that merited these comments, but rather it was the effort and the love  that went into celebrating it (and, of course, the presence of the Holy Spirit) that gained for it all of its merit.

          You know, for years men and women of faith have tried to figure God out.  All the way back to Abraham, Moses, and the Ancient Israelites and up until today, we have tried to come to grips with this God who, in spite of being all-powerful, nonetheless loves us and desires communion with us.  For the Ancient Israelites it was slightly easier.  God hadn’t yet revealed himself as three persons in one God.  Nonetheless, the mystery of the creating God who had chosen them for his people still kept them intrigued.  In Jesus, and through the Paschal Mystery, God has reveled himself as a Trinity: a mystery of three holy Persons in the one, singular godhead.  If you’ve ever tried to come to grips with this reality—and more so, if you’ve ever tried to explain this reality to someone else—then you’ve probably realized that it is a much more complex mystery even than what it seems; and that any explanation that you come up with probably leaves you (and your hearer) more confused than when you began.  In other words, you usually end up with a “big-‘ol hot mess.”

          Still further, when we try to live out of this reality—that God is three and God is one, and that, though perfect in himself, he nonetheless desires a relationship with us: a relationship that demands certain things of us—we often find that we fall short (way short) of what it is that this demands of us.  Perhaps some of us even despair that we could ever realize what has been promised to us.  Sometimes, no matter how hard we try, we find that we’re left with little more than a “big-‘ol hot mess.”

          This is where the grace of this feast that we celebrate today, the feast of the Most Holy Trinity, comes into play.  You know, we don’t celebrate this feast because we already know all that there is to know about the Trinity and thus hold it up like some kind of accomplishment.  We celebrate it, rather, because acknowledging God for who he has revealed himself to be is a way to help us deal with the messes that we make in our lives.

          In our first reading, we heard about Moses going up onto Mount Sinai with the stone tablets in his hand.  What we didn’t hear is that this was the second time that he was going up.  The first time he went up, he received the Ten Commandments from God.  And when he brought them down, he found that the people had gotten anxious while they were waiting for him to return and so decided to make an idol—an image of God—whom they then worshiped.  So angry was Moses to see this that he threw down the stone tablets and shattered them to pieces.

          Thus, Moses went back up the mountain to beg God for another shot, for him and for his people.  The people had gotten themselves in a “big-‘ol hot mess” and Moses went back to ask for mercy (and for another copy of the Ten Commandments).  When God revealed himself to Moses a second time, he did not call himself “the God of wrath and vengeance”, but rather “a merciful and gracious God, slow to anger and rich in kindness and fidelity.”  At hearing this, Moses, already fearful of God’s response, could only fall down and worship; that this God, powerful beyond comprehension, would spare this people who had made such of mess out of his graciousness was truly a thing of wonder.  At that moment, Moses saw who God really was and he was filled with awe.

          For all of us here today, this feast provides us with an opportunity to experience something of what Moses experienced on the top of Mount Sinai.  We all come here, having been here before and having heard all of God’s admonitions for how to live our lives in constant communion with him, and we realize that, in spite of our best (or, perhaps even, our barely minimal) efforts to fulfill all that God has commanded us, we have fallen short and basically have made a “big-‘ol hot mess” out of it all.  Nonetheless, we come here and God reveals himself to us for who he really is—the Father, whose creative, life-giving love has made us and sustains us, the Son, whose saving love redeemed us from our sin, and the Spirit, whose sanctifying, healing action works among us even now—and our reaction is (or at least it should be) the same as Moses’: to fall down and worship him who so graciously revealed himself to us.

          This loving, merciful God who has revealed himself to us in three persons looks upon all that we have done—good, bad, and everything in-between—and he sees the mess it has produced.  More than anything, however, he sees the effort and the love that we put into striving to fulfill his commandments; and his response is the same response that we give when we receive a kindergartner’s finger painting: “Yeah, it’s a mess, but it’s beautiful.”

          My brothers and sisters, as our Holy Father encouraged the young people at World Youth Day last year, let us not let our fear of stirring things up and making a mess prevent us from trying our hardest to fulfill God’s command to go out into the world and make disciples.  In fact, let’s be intent on making a mess: for from out of that mess God’s Kingdom will come, the beautiful mess that unites us perfectly to the Holy Trinity; Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

Given at All Saints Parish: Logansport, IN – June 14^th, 2014

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Homily: Corpus Christi – Cycle A

          As Americans, we know that we can be pretty pragmatic.  We like things to fit into structures and routines so that we really don’t have to think about them.  As a result, things that we do frequently become common or ordinary to us and we oftentimes forget how important they really are for us.  Consider our morning breakfast: a couple of pieces of toast or perhaps a bowl of cereal, a glass of orange juice and a cup of coffee and we’re on our way.  Yet, it throws our whole day off, doesn’t it, if we find we’ve run out of bread or someone finished the last bowl of our favorite cereal.  We just feel better if it remains the same, day in and day out, and we don’t realize how important it is to us until we don’t have it anymore.

          In today’s first reading, we hear Moses reminding the Israelite people, who had been wandering in the desert for forty years after leaving Egypt, about what a miracle it was for them to have the manna as food for their journey.  Way back at the beginning of their journey, the Israelites grumbled against Moses and against God after they were led out into the desert from Egypt because they had no source of food to sustain them during their exodus.  God responded and promised “bread from heaven,” the manna that appeared each morning like dew across the ground.  Each day the Israelites would gather enough to feed their family for the day and on the next day—faithfully, for forty years—more would appear.  If you could imagine what it would be like to eat the same food every day for forty years straight, you might understand that the Israelites began to take this blessing for granted.  The manna, as miraculous as it was, had become common and the Israelites had come to take it for granted.

          I would venture to say that some of us here might experience a similar problem.  Many of us have been parishioners here for a long time: perhaps some of us even for forty-plus years.  We know what mass we attend and where we generally sit (I say “generally” because there are always those “floaters” who sometimes end up in our seats, right?), the music perhaps is somewhat predictable and we generally know what to expect from the experience—I mean, the mass is the mass, right?  And it all becomes very routine for us.  Even though every week we are called here to worship God and to receive the Body and Blood of Jesus in the form of bread and wine—the true bread come down from heaven—we nonetheless sometimes find ourselves looking forward more to the opportunity to meet with friends; or on the flipside considering it a chore to be drudged through so that we can get on with the rest of our day.  Because we come here every week and because the mass—by design, by the way—generally looks and feels the same, it has become familiar to us and perhaps we forget what a miracle it is to be called here to receive the Body and Blood of our Lord Jesus Christ.

          As we look back again at the Israelites and Moses’ speech from the first reading today, we recognize one important fact.  In spite of all of their years of taking it for granted, God never once failed to provide it for them.  For forty years the Israelites wandered, grumbled, and wandered some more and in all of that time God never failed to provide them with that miraculous bread from heaven.  The manna, therefore, was their viaticum—which literally translates to “on the way with you”, but less formally means “food for the journey.”  Manna was the miraculous “bread from heaven” that sustained them on their way and was their reminder of God’s providential presence with them throughout it all.

          In giving us this great feast of Corpus Christi, the Church is doing what Moses did for the Israelites a few thousand years ago.  It is reminding us of what a miracle it is that we are called here every week and have the opportunity to receive the Most Holy Body and Blood of Christ in the form of bread and wine.  It is a reminder that, even if we sometimes take it for granted, God will never fail to give us the Eucharist, our viaticum, our “food for the journey.”  And this is so important for us to remember.  Not just because it is food—obviously the little portion that we receive is not much to satisfy us—nor only because it is spiritual food—which of course it is—but primarily because it is our intimate comunion with God.  God gave the Israelites bread for their bodies, but the manna, however, was just that, bread.  The bread that God provides us in the Eucharist is both bread for our bodies and spiritual food to nourish us on our journey, but because it is the Body and Blood of Jesus, our Lord, it is also a participation in the intimate communion that is God: the communion which we celebrated last week in the feast of the Most Holy Trinity.  The Body and Blood of Jesus is the fulfillment of what the manna of the ancient Israelites foreshadowed.  It is the sacrament of God’s presence intended to effect, that is, literally, to make, our communion with God, until that day when we cross over from this life into the land promised to us, not the land of Canaan that God promised to the Israelites, but rather God’s heavenly kingdom.

          My brothers and sisters, the real, sacramental presence of God—the Body Blood, Soul, and Divinity of Jesus Christ—in the form of bread and wine is the most perfect gift that God has given us.  It is the sign of God’s presence with us, even in the midst of our worst afflictions.  Many people today, much like the people of ancient Israel, often want extraordinary signs that God is with them in their affliction.  What I want you all to realize today, however, is that God has given us such a sign.  Yet, in his great condescension to us he has allowed this extraordinary sign to be experienced by us as ordinary.  I realize that sometimes when we are in the midst of our worst afflictions, we want—we feel we need—the clouds to part and a voice to come from the sky saying, “It’s ok, I am with you.”  We want to see Jesus face to face and have him put his arm around us and say, “I know that this is hard, but look I haven’t left you.”  But what I am telling you is that God has done that for us.  Every time that we walk into a church and mass is being celebrated, or even if we only get a glimpse of that red candle flickering in the corner—we can know that God has not abandoned us, but rather that he is with us.  Thus, in the midst of our worst afflictions, God calls us to run to him in the Blessed Sacrament.  He calls us to receive him as often as possible so that his presence may comfort us and strengthen us for the journey.  This is why he sent his Son to us and this is why Jesus instituted this great sacrament.  He did it for us.

          Moses needed to remind the people of Israel that the sign of God’s providential care was something right under their noses: the miraculous bread from heaven that they received every day.  Today, the Church gives us this great feast of the Most Holy Body and Blood of Christ to remind us of the same thing and more.  The Blessed Sacrament that we receive ordinarily from this altar is the sign of God’s providential care as we wander as pilgrims on this earth.  It is also the bread that will strengthen us to remain steadfast in faith through all of our trials.  Most importantly, it is our intimate connection to God, who desires communion with us.

          As we continue to plow head-long back into the “routine” of ordinary time, let us strive to remember what an extraordinary gift it is that God has given us, the invitation, as Saint Paul says, “to participate in the body and blood of Christ,” and let us strive to celebrate this gift as extraordinary, even amidst our ordinary participation in it, an opportunity that we enjoy here today.

Given at All Saints Parish: Logansport, IN – June 21^st & 22^nd, 2014

The Solemnity of the Most Holy Body and Blood of Christ (Corpus Christi)