Mary's Assumption and the dignity of our bodies

Homily: Solemnity of the Assumption (Day) – Cycle C

          Recently, I read an article by Dr. John Grondelski in which he speaks about how the reality of Mary’s Assumption, body and soul, into heaven has much to teach us today, particularly when it comes to the attitude with which we treat our bodies.  I thought that he was spot on and so I want to try to summarize this here for you today as we celebrate this great mystery of our faith.

          As with the Ascension of our Lord, in his glorified human body, into heaven, the Assumption of Mary presents us with a bit of a faith dilemma: How can our human bodies, which are profoundly affected by time and finitude, exist in eternity? and what does it mean that, ultimately, we will exist bodily (not just spiritually) in eternity?  This is not an easy question to answer in our modern culture, as we seem to be in a period where, in regards to the body, les extremes se touchent (“the extremes meet”).

          On the one hand, we have a culture that seems to idolize the body and physical appearances.  Instagram alone has both caused a need for and given rise to a “positive body image” movement: the result of a culture that makes physical appearance and bodily satisfaction of paramount value.

          At the same time, our culture promotes the idolization of the “I”, and that the “I”, that is the wholeness of the person, is reduced to consciousness and thought.  In this extreme, a person’s body is nothing but a tool that he/she uses to interact with the world, but which has no direct impact on who he/she is as a person.  Biological sex is meaningless.  How one identifies in one’s consciousness is paramount.  The body, therefore, is useful, at best, and expendable, at worst.

          So the body is everything and the body is nothing, says a profoundly conflicted modern culture.  How blessed are we, then, to have a faith that can help resolve this conflict by stepping back from the extremes to show us the true value of the human body.  Most recently, it was Pope Saint John Paul II who strove to show the genuine value of the human body as related to the person in his catechesis, the Theology of the Body.

          As did many theologians before him, he recognized that, in becoming incarnate, God invincibly assured us that the bodies he created for us are good and essential to who we are as persons.  In taking that human body, in glorified form, into heaven in his Ascension, he further demonstrated the value of the body as the means through which we will enter into communion with him.  In Mary’s Assumption, body and soul, into heaven, Saint John Paul II saw the fulfillment of God’s promise to return and to bring his holy ones home to himself.  Thus, he could teach that the body—in the form that it is given to us, male and female—is both good and essential to who we are as creatures, created in the imago Dei, the image of God.

          Today, as we honor Mary as the first of Christ’s disciples to experience the full restoration promised to us when our first parents were expelled from Eden, let us not hesitate to speak of the dignity of the human body as the means by which we will experience communion with God in eternity.  And let us give thanks, here in this Eucharist, that we can experience that communion even now: offered to us through Christ’s Body and Blood that is made present to us—really and truly present—here on this altar.

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

Honoring the Divine Mercy

Homily: 2^nd Sunday of Easter (Divine Mercy Sunday) – Cycle B

          This weekend we celebrate the second Sunday of Easter, which is also the 8^th day of Easter, otherwise known as the octave day.  “Octave” day, because for each day during the last week, we have been celebrating as if it is still Easter Sunday.  Hopefully, the joy you felt last Sunday has stayed with you throughout this week and into today, because this is what the Church truly wishes for us.

          This 8^th day of Easter has, since the year 2000, been named “Divine Mercy Sunday”: primarily in response to the instruction given by Jesus in a series of visions to Divine Mercy Sister (now “Saint”) Faustina Kowalska, in which he asked that the 2^nd Sunday of Easter be dedicated to honoring the Divine Mercy.  That begs the question, of course: “What does it mean when we say that we are ‘honoring the Divine Mercy’?” as well as “What does that look like for us?”  Both our celebration and our scriptures today open for us both of these answers and so let’s take a look.

          First, let’s be sure that we understand why we honor the Divine Mercy on the 2^nd Sunday of Easter.  Last week, we celebrated the Resurrection of Jesus.  This event, in and of itself, is worthy of solemn celebration and honor: that Jesus, the 2^nd Person of the Divine Trinity of persons, took on human flesh, lived among us, suffered the full force of evil-induced pain that the world can offer, and overcame the world by rising from the dead—in the same body, yes, but a body that had been transformed to be the glorious image of humanity restored to its original splendor.

          This Sunday we celebrate an equally beautiful thing: that God’s power, as demonstrated when Christ rose from the dead, was not just for himself—that is, to demonstrate to us his power and so oblige us to worship him alone (although he would be in the right to do that)—but that his power was for us, too.  In other words, we celebrate God’s mercy: that, through baptism, we have participation in the Resurrection: participation in the splendor of Christ’s glorified humanity.  The fact that this celebration comes on the octave day of Easter reminds us that these two celebrations—the Resurrection of Jesus and our participation in it—form one complete celebration of Easter.

          Therefore, when we celebrate today, we are truly honoring the Divine Mercy in that we honor Christ, who paid the price of God’s justice so that we could receive forgiveness of our sins.  Notice that, although throughout the Gospels we hear that Jesus gave his disciples a share in his power to heal the sick and drive out demons, Jesus doesn’t give them the power to forgive sins until after his death and resurrection: indicating that, in some sense, this power couldn’t be transferred until the full debt for sin had been paid.  And so, again, in honoring Christ for his saving work we are truly honoring the Divine Mercy which brought it about.

          Now that we’ve seen what it means to honor the Divine Mercy, we can answer the question “What does honoring the Divine Mercy look like for us?”: that is, “How do I honor the Divine Mercy in my everyday life?”  Here we can look to the early Christian community.

          In our first reading from the Acts of the Apostles, we heard not about Jesus’ first disciples fearful and huddling in the upper room, but rather about the post-Pentecost community proclaiming Christ openly and growing day by day.  We heard how “The community of believers was of one heart and mind, and no one claimed that any of his possessions was his own, but they had everything in common.”  From a historical standpoint, this made sense: because the first Christians were convinced that Jesus was going to return in their lifetime and so began to dissociate themselves from the world so as to be ready for Christ when he came.  Now we today can look at this in one of two ways: we can say either “Look at how the first Christians lived!  That is how we should be living!” or we can say “That was how they were called to live at that time, but we aren’t called to live that way in this time.”  The problem with this is that neither of these two responses is completely right.  And so, I would like to propose a middle ground, one that demonstrates how we are to live today so as to honor the Divine Mercy.

          One of the things that I can see in that early Christian community is how aware they were of the Divine Mercy.  Astonished that this gift would be available to them, they quickly recognized that to have the Divine Mercy was more important than having anything in this world.  Thus, when the interpretation of Jesus’ prophecy was that he would return within their lifetime, they freely shared everything they had with the community because their possessions had become unimportant to them.  For them, what was most important was sharing this good news and living in immediate preparation for Christ’s return.

          We who have received this same astonishing gift must interpret the prophecy of Jesus’ return for our own times and respond accordingly.  First, however, we must recognize the Divine Mercy as the most valuable gift we could ever receive and, thus, prefer nothing in this world to it.  Then, like the first Christians, we must remain vigilant for Jesus’ return: for although he has not yet returned, nearly two thousand years after his resurrection and ascension into heaven, he may still choose our lifetime to return.  The way that we remain vigilant is by being detached from our worldly possessions: ready to share them with others when demanded of us; because, soon enough, we’ll take leave of them all anyway.

          Nonetheless, the Father’s plan may be for Jesus not to return for another two thousand (or more) years!  Therefore, like the first generations of Christians learned, we have to plan for our future so that, if necessary, we can continue to proclaim this good news until the day that Christ appears again in glory.  Finding the balance between the two is the work of our lives.

          To make this somewhat concrete for us, I’d like to use a very practical rule that saints throughout the centuries have used, and of which 20^th century U.S. Catholic Activist Dorothy Day gave simple form.  She said “If you have two coats, one of them belongs to the poor.”

          Friends, if we acknowledge the great gift that we have in the Divine Mercy—that is, the forgiveness of sins because Jesus paid the price for us—then we must honor the Divine Mercy by living mercy in our lives.  We do this when we lived detached from this world: providing for our needs, yes, but then sharing freely so that others may receive what they need.  And so today, as we bask in this celebration of God’s mercy, may the discipline of our Lenten fast, now ended, bring about a more concrete experience of God’s mercy for all—and, thus, his kingdom: the kingdom we experience most fully in this world, here in this Eucharist.

Given at all Saints Parish: Logansport, IN – April 8^th, 2018

Turning over the tables of the familiar

Homily: 3^rd Sunday of Lent – Cycle B

          Familiarity breeds contempt… at least that’s what the modern proverb says.  What this saying is, well, saying is that, as we come to know someone more deeply, we realize just how much we actually don’t like that person; that is, that with familiarity comes knowledge not just of the person’s attractive traits, but also of their uglier ones (and we all have them, don’t we?).  I think, in a certain sense, we can all see some truth in this saying.  But there’s another aspect of this saying that also carries some truth: that is, that familiarity also breeds complacency.

          We can see this in our daily routines.  Most of you have lived in Logansport or the surrounding area for some time; and the landmarks that you used to notice as you went about your daily tasks—such as taking the kids to school, or making a run to the grocery store, or even just driving to work—after a while just kind of fade into the landscape, don’t they?  After years of living in this one place, you often find that the features of your neighborhood no longer seem to register in your consciousness.

          This can happen with people, too.  Our co-workers, classmates, close friends, brothers and sisters, and even our spouses become so familiar to us and part of our daily routine, that the appreciation of how special they are to our lives is not something that enters our daily consciousness.  And so, while this familiarity doesn’t necessarily breed contempt, it does often breed complacency.

          In the first reading today, we heard the recounting of the Ten Commandments.  For many of us, I suspect that listening to these being read is kind of like making our daily drive to work or school: we were conscious that we began the trip, but when we got to our destination we weren’t quite sure how we got there.  In other words, the Ten Commandments are perhaps so familiar to us that they’ve become “part of the landscape” and no longer impact our daily consciousness.

          And this is nothing new.  The ancient Jews also fell into this trap.  They had the Law for many years and most people were very familiar with it and its demands.  Thus, following the precepts of the Law had become for them like our daily routine: nothing more than part of the daily landscape through which they had to navigate.  And this to the extent that they turned what is called the “Temple Cult”—that is, the sacrifices offered in the Temple both in homage of God and as an atonement for sins—into a business for profit.

          That’s when Jesus breaks into the scene and disrupts the familiar.  He saw the way that Satan had distorted the truth that the Law represented—that is, that it was a way for God’s chosen people to remain in “right relationship” with Him—and turned it into a Law of cold demands and business transactions.  Jesus saw that this had become so familiar to the people that they simply accepted it as the conditions for living as the People of God. By turning over the tables of the familiar, Jesus was hoping to reawaken in them an awareness of the true relationship to which God had called them.

          The zeal with which Jesus desired that the Temple—his Father’s house—be free from defilement is the same zeal that he has for our hearts.  He wants to turn over the tables of the familiar in our hearts and drive out any distorted images of self, of others, of God, and of what God asks of us so that we can once again see the beauty of the relationship to which he has called us: both collectively as the People of God and individually as adopted sons and daughters. ///

          Yet, unlike the Temple, Christ cannot just burst into our hearts and start turning things over.  God created us for freedom and for him to do so would violate that dignity.  And so this Lent—as he does throughout the year, but particularly in this holy season—Jesus calls us once again to open our hearts to him and to give him permission to shed light on anything in them that is unholy, that is untrue, and thus to drive them out, so as to purify his “temples of the Holy Spirit.”

          My brothers and sisters, if all we have done this Lent is take up our old familiar practices of prayer, fasting, and almsgiving, then we have little more to hope for when we arrive at Easter Sunday than a feeling of relief for not having to maintain these disciplines any longer.  The challenge we have before us today is to make this Lent different by “opening wide the doors to Christ,” which was the clarion call of Saint Pope John Paul II.  We do this by turning our gaze away from ourselves and towards others.

          In prayer, we ask God to show us ways that we can overcome our sinful habits by turning towards our neighbor and offering a word of encouragement, a gentle correction when they need it, a helping hand in their difficulties, and a humble acknowledgement of how we’ve hurt them in the past that is accompanied by a sincere desire for forgiveness.  Then we return to God, offering him our successes and our failures and asking again for the grace to recognize our weaknesses and to trust in his help to overcome them.

          This work, of course, is uncomfortable.  It is uncomfortable because we have to give up our control to Christ and make ourselves vulnerable to him and to others.  But that’s ok, because, as our retired Holy Father, Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI says, “the world offers you comfort, but you were not made for comfort; rather you were made for greatness.”

          My brothers and sisters, this Lent cannot be just about “sticking it out” to the end, but rather it must be about achieving the greatness for which we were made.  And so, let Christ—the Christ we encounter here in the sacrifice we offer and in the meal we share—turn over the familiar in your hearts.  If you do so, then you will be truly ready to encounter anew the joy of Easter.

Given at All Saints Parish: Logansport, IN – March 4^th, 2018

A time of mercy

Homily: 24^th Sunday in Ordinary Time – Cycle C

          Yesterday, I celebrated a wedding for a young couple from our parish.  On Friday evening the couple invited me to the dinner after the rehearsal.  After the dinner the groom’s father sat down next to me and wanted to talk.  He’s not Catholic and he recently had a similar conversation with his Lutheran pastor (whom he surmised was similar in age to me), and so he wanted to take the opportunity to get my opinion on the same question.

          It was a very earnest question: “Taking a look at everything that is going on in the world, is there any hope,” he asked, “or have we already lost the world?”  My first answer, of course, was “Yes, of course there is hope!  God hasn’t changed.  He is still the all-powerful Lord of the universe.  And nothing has changed about Jesus, his Son, who saved us from sin and death by his own death and resurrection.”  To this he nodded in agreement as if he already knew the answer.  Thus, it was the second part of that question to which he seemed to need an answer.  “Doesn’t it seem as if we have lost the world to the forces of darkness and evil?”  To this, I tried to be a little more nuanced.

          I wondered, perhaps, if he was worried about the final judgment and about being caught up in the final unleashing of God’s wrath on the human race because of its increasing disregard for his commandments.  I tried to assure him that his feelings were a sign that this is a time of action: a time when people of faith must be intentional about sharing the Good News of Jesus in both word and in action.  I assured him that now is a time of mercy, but only if we take action.

          It’s true, isn’t it, that God’s anger should be blazing against us because of rampant sin in our world, especially by those who call themselves “Christians”?  We’ve offended him, time and again.  But look around; it doesn’t seem like anything resembling God’s anger is working around us, does it?  Rather, what we’ve been given is a time of mercy, instead.  Our scriptures today reveal to us that this has been God’s pattern from the beginning.

          In the first reading, we hear about Moses, acting as a type of Christ, who intercedes before God on behalf of the Israelite people to turn away God’s anger from them.  The people have fashioned an idol which they have been worshiping: an offense so grave that God wants to put them to death immediately.  Moses, resisting the offer from God to have a nation of people made for himself, invokes the promises that God made to the people’s righteous forefathers, saying, in effect, “Although these people don’t deserve your mercy, please give it to them for the sake of Abraham, Isaac, and Israel.”  To this God relents and bestows his mercy on the people who deserved his righteous judgment.

          In the second reading, we heard Saint Paul who wrote of his gratitude that he had been “considered trustworthy” to be a minister of the Gospel.  He acknowledged that, because of his actions as a persecutor of Christians, he deserved the full wrath of God; but that he had been “mercifully treated” by God; and not for his benefit alone, but rather for the benefit of the Gospel: that, in treating Paul mercifully, God would prove that no sin is too big for his mercy.

          Then, in the Gospel, we heard three parables that Jesus used to illustrate how extensive God’s mercy is towards us.  In them, Jesus teaches us that God refuses to let us be lost.  The shepherd, who risks his own life (and the life of the ninety-nine sheep who didn’t stray) in order to find the one sheep who was lost, and the woman, who turns over her whole house to find the one coin even though she had nine others, are illustrations of how God doggedly pursues any of us who have turned away from him.  The father who daily waits with anxious anticipation for his prodigal son to return home, and who receives him with joy and celebration when he does, is an illustration of God’s “prodigal” willingness to ignore our past when we turn away from it and back towards him so that we might not be lost forever to darkness, but rather live forever with him in the light of grace.

          But it is not just the scriptures that confirm that this is a time of mercy from God.  Rather, there have been many events in the last century that demonstrate this as well.  The apparitions of Mary at Fatima in Portugal in which she called the world to repentance and acts of reparation for sins so as to avert tragedies that were to come.  The mystical revelations of Jesus to Sr. Faustina Kowalska in Poland in which he gave her the task to foster a renewed devotion to Divine Mercy.  The election of Pope John Paul II, which made it possible for St. Faustina’s message to be spread throughout the world.  And now, this Jubilee Year of Mercy, which calls us both to open ourselves to an experience of God’s mercy and to share God’s mercy with those around us.  All of these (and more) point to this time as being our chance (perhaps our last chance) to repent and to plead for God’s mercy before God’s final judgment takes place.

          The events of September 11th, 2001, which we also remember today, are a sign that the time of mercy is now: because when violence like this increases in our world, so the need to proclaim God’s mercy to the world increases as well.  As we remember these tragic events, let us not allow them to remain in the realm of lamentation.  Rather, let us use them to remind us of our need to act: first to convert ourselves so that we are not objects of the just judgment of God, and then to go out and to call others to conversion and thus transform the world.

          My brothers and sisters, our world has gone far astray from God, but it is never too late to return.  This is because God's mercies are not exhausted; rather, they are renewed every morning.  Particularly here, on this altar of sacrifice, God's mercies are renewed as Jesus becomes truly present to us.  With confidence, then, let us approach this throne of grace and receive God's mercy: Jesus, our Savior.  Then, let us go forth from here to be instruments of God's mercy, that the day of judgment might be a day of joy in which we all will be united with God our Father forever.

Given at All Saints Parish: Logansport, IN – September 11^th, 2016

Reflections on my Pilgrimage to Poland

         Although I didn't advertise it much, I recently made a pilgrimage to Poland with a small group of young adults from the Frassati Society of Young Adult Catholics.  I was the spiritual director for the trip which was based in Krakow, the same place where World Youth Day will be held later this month.  One week ago today we returned to the States.  With a week to recover from jet lag and to reflect on my experience, I thought I'd try to share some of the highlights with you who read my blog.

         First, I was very blessed to be the spiritual guide of a beautiful group of young women who impressed me with their enthusiasm, reverence, love for God and overall joie de vivre.  Although I joked about how difficult it would be for me, a man, to spend nine emotional days with nine women, I cannot help but sing their praises, as the strong witness to faith that they showed deeply bolstered my own.  (There were, of course, plenty of times that I wished there were guys on the trip, but the ladies truly gave me very little to complain about.)

Our pilgrim group after landing in Poland

         Next, my reflections.  As I've been reflecting on my experience, I found that there were so many things that impacted me.  I don't know that I can share them all, however, so I thought I'd try to boil them down into some highlights that might summarize my experience.

1. Saint John Paul II

Without doubt, the face that dominated this pilgrimage was the face of Saint John Paul II.  This makes sense, of course, since we were staying in Krakow, which many have called "the city of John Paul II".  As the first Polish Pope and a canonized saint, it's no wonder that his face dominated our journey.  The Polish people are rightly proud of their saintly son and it certainly showed in every place that we visited.

I myself had to admit that I didn't know St. JPII very well before setting off on this journey.  I knew of him and some of the highlights of his life, but I didn't really know him.  I got to know him both in preparation for this trip and during the trip in a very special way.  He was a very special man who suffered greatly in his life, but who God had obviously destined for great things and who, through faith, achieved them.  Somehow, through all of the darkness he experienced, he continued to live with positivity.  He believed, even through the darkness, that Jesus had overcome it and that all we had to do was to continue to live with this confidence and share it with others to see the victory of Christ realized.  He truly was, as his biographer George Weigel called him, a "Witness to Hope".

From the Saint John Paul II Shrine, just outside of Krakow

Now that I know him better, I feel and understand the powerful devotion that so many people have to him.  I will now look to him as both an example and an intercessor as I strive to become a pastor after the heart of the Good Shepherd.

2. Devotion to Mary

In an article that I read on the way back to the States, it said that St. JPII was greatly responsible for restoring devotion to the Blessed Virgin Mary after it had become something "passe" after the Second Vatican Council.  Although I know that Vatican II never downplayed who Mary is and her role in the life of the Church, I read those words and felt a sense that there truly has been a loss of devotion to Mary in many parts of the Church.

This pilgrimage, however, awakened in me my own devotion to Mary.  Our Lady of Czestochowa is a national icon in Poland and I cannot think of one church in which this icon wasn't found.  Poles definitely see her as their mother and John Paul II was no exception.  After his mother died at a young age, his father took him into the parish church in Wadowice where they knelt before the miraculous image of Our Lady of Perpetual Help.  His father pointed to the image and said to young Karol, "She is your mother now." Praying before that very same image was powerful for me as I've had a particular devotion to Mary under the that same title.  Seeing that image along with visiting the shrine of Our Lady of Czestochowa were powerful reminders to me both of Mary's maternal love for me and of her powerful presence in the Church.

Miraculous image of Our Lady of Perpetual Help in the Minor Basilica of the Presentation of Mary in Wadowice, Poland, the childhood home of Pope Saint John Paul II

If all this wasn't enough, there was a museum right next door to our hotel in which an exhibit featuring different images of Mary under the title "Mother of Mercy" was opening while we visited.  Mary was a big part of our pilgrimage experience.

3. Merciful Love

We, of course, are in the middle of the Jubilee Year of Mercy.  No pilgrimage to Poland would be complete without a visit to the Sanctuary of Divine Mercy, where Saint Faustina Kowalska received her mystical visions of Jesus who asked her to reignite devotion to his Divine Mercy in the world.  To prepare ourselves for our visit to this shrine, we completed Fr. Michael Gaitley's "33 Days to Merciful Love" as a preparation to consecrate ourselves to Jesus' merciful love.  God's providence could not have been better as our consecration day fell on a Friday, which was the solemnity of the Birth of St. John the Baptist, and in which we could pray the Chaplet of Divine Mercy with St. Faustina's sisters at the hour of mercy (3:00 p.m.) in the chapel in which St. Faustina is buried!  The day was overflowing with God's mercy as we (unintentionally) received Benediction from the Blessed Sacrament THREE TIMES that day: once after praying the Divine Mercy Chaplet and then, after returning to Krakow, two more times in two different churches that we visited!

Image of Divine Mercy in the Lower Church of the Sanctuary where we made our consecration to Merciful Love.

Convent and chapel where St. Faustina is buried.

Our hearts were definitely full of God's Mercy on this day and since then.  This is the time of Mercy and I myself know that it is now my task to share both what I've received (an outpouring of God's Mercy) and this devotion with everyone I encounter.

          Wrapping up this reflection, all I can say is how grateful I am to have been invited to be a part of this trip.  The Frassati Society was a big part of what re-integrated me into the Church and led to my discerning a vocation to the priesthood.  Being up in Logansport, I've felt somewhat separated from that group and so being able to be a part of this pilgrimage was a great gift to me.  That, coupled with the chance to celebrate Mass in these holy places did this priest's heart much good.

         My brothers and sisters, this is the time of Mercy!  We must proclaim it from the rooftops that darkness is not the end, but rather that God's goodness and mercy overcomes all.  May Mary, the Mother of Mercy, keep us in her heart and the heart of her Son, Jesus, so that we might have the courage live this message in our lives.

Verso l'alto!

Pentecost and the Church's unifying mission

Homily: Pentecost – Cycle C

          Many of us, I dare say, remember the events surrounding the death of Saint John Paul II in 2005.  It was really extraordinary how, from the moment that news broke that he was approaching death, up to and through his death and his funeral, the world became fixated on the life of this man.  Those extraordinary few weeks also gave us a brief glimpse of mankind somewhat united as men and women throughout the world watched with and prayed for this man who had had such an impact on the world.

          It was counted that more than three thousand foreign journalists descended upon Rome as John Paul II was dying; and, almost overnight, hundreds of media broadcast tents sprang up on the outskirts of Vatican City.  This worldwide media gave around-the-clock coverage to viewers across the globe, to people of every age and ethnic group.  Then, during the week before the funeral, it was estimated that 2 million pilgrims paid their last respects in person to the pope as he lay in state: some of them waiting in line up to 24 hours to do so.

          On the night before the funeral, more than 800,000 pilgrims spent the night praying and waiting in the streets and plazas of Rome.  Most of these were young people who had come to the Vatican from all five of the continents.  All night long you could see them waiting in line for confession at makeshift, outdoor confessionals that Rome's priests had set up on doorsteps and under lamp posts.

          The funeral itself was followed closely by millions via television and radio and the amount of world leaders who were present was extraordinary.  It included four queens, five kings, seventy prime ministers or heads of government, and more than 100 other recognized dignitaries.  Dozens of Orthodox, Protestant, and Jewish leaders joined them, as well.  Yes, one wouldn’t have been exaggerating if they would have said that the funeral of Saint John Paul II looked and sounded like Pentecost.

          Many of us might be surprised to discover however, that Pentecost is not a Christian festival in origin.  Rather, it was a Jewish festival (which is why it is named as if it already existed in the Acts of the Apostles).  For the ancient Jews, Pentecost was one of the top three religious holidays (known as “pilgrimage feasts”, because believers were expected to make a pilgrimage to Jerusalem in order to celebrate it).  Pentecost was known also as the feast of “weeks” because it falls seven weeks (or 50 days) after Passover.  (The word “Pentecost”, in fact, comes from the Greek word for “50”.)  For the Jewish people, this feast celebrates two important things: things that make it fitting to be the day on which the Holy Spirit descended from heaven to give birth to the Church.

          First, on Pentecost, the first fruits of the spring grain harvest were offered to God in a special sacrifice at the Temple.  Now, that may sound strange to us, because we live in a climate that has only one harvest each year.  In Palestine, however, they have two yearly harvests: one in spring and one in fall.  In this sense, it is appropriate that God sent the Holy Spirit to his Church in a public way on Pentecost.  This is because the Holy Spirit is the first fruit of the harvest of the New Covenant; and the New Covenant is Christ giving us a new, redeemed life of grace; and this life begins here on earth under the action of the Holy Spirit; and, just like the first sweet corn to come off of the stalks does not make the harvest, but is enjoyed and offered to those we wish to honor the most, so, too, the action of the Holy Spirit, which came as first fruits nearly 2000 years ago, will only reach its fulfillment—i.e. the full harvest—in heaven.

          The second thing that the Jewish festival of Pentecost celebrates is the commemoration of when God gave Moses the Ten Commandments on Mount Sinai.  Soon after the Israelites had miraculously escaped from Egypt, God sent them the Law, which would be a guide for them on how they should live now that they were freed from slavery to Pharaoh.  And so, in this sense, too, it was appropriate that God sent his Church the Holy Spirit during Pentecost.  This is because the Holy Spirit is the bond of unity between the Father and the Son; and the Law of the New Covenant, that is, the Law of the Church, is unity.  Thus, the unifying power of the Spirit is the new “Law of the Covenant”, which descended upon the Church at Pentecost.  In a way, the descent of the Holy Spirit fulfilled the old covenant Law by making it universal.  For this reason, Saint Paul could write to the Corinthians and say that the Church is a body that has many parts yet remains one, united body.  Bringing unity, in Christ, to the divided human family; this is the work of the Church, which began on Pentecost and won't stop till history ends.

          If we think back now to the funeral of Saint John Paul II, we see a further illustration that this effort of the Church to reunite the human family continues today, symbolized by the architecture of the Church's most famous plaza, the place where Saint John Paul II’s funeral was celebrated: that is, Saint Peter's square, in Rome.  Almost a hundred thousand people can fit inside that plaza, which is as wide as three football fields and located in front of Saint Peter's Basilica.  It is constructed in the shape of a rectangle connecting the basilica's entrance with a huge oval space surrounded by almost 350 massive columns and pilasters.  If you look down at the plaza from above, those curved lines of columns surrounding the oval look like huge arms spread in welcome.  The artist who designed the plaza, Gianlorenzo Bernini, described this as a symbol of "the maternal arms of Mother Church".

          As we know, the arms of a mother are always ready to welcome all her children, both the ones who are already full members of the family, and those still looking for their spiritual home.  And these arms of Mother Church have indeed welcomed pilgrims from every continent, age group, and walk of life for the last 500 years—ever since this expanded plaza was first constructed.  And the crowds are still coming. Every Wednesday the Pope welcomes pilgrims to the plaza, and in the last two years the number of pilgrims in those audiences has averaged 20,000 per week.  The unity symbolized by this space even goes beyond the limits of time; because lining the columns and walls around the plaza are 140 taller-than-life-sized statues of saints: men and women, peasants and kings, hermits and housewives, who come from every period of history and every corner of the globe.   Again, this is the Church's work—reuniting the divided human family with God and with each other—a work that began on Pentecost.

          Now, there are many people, many of whom are non-Christians, who would agree that uniting mankind is a worthy goal.  In fact, there are many international lobbying groups who are dedicated full time to noble causes like achieving world peace, eradicating poverty, and reducing the sale of military weapons.  Indeed, the modern world is full of creative initiatives for unity.

          As Christians, though, our efforts are different.  This is because we aim not only at the symptoms of disunity, but at its cause.  The Church has taught us throughout its history that the fundamental cause of disunity in the human family is sin, the rebellion of the human heart against God.  “How can we all be united in one family,” she argues, “unless we all love and obey one Father?”  Now, we know that it wasn't the Apostles' human brilliance that enabled them to speak in foreign tongues on that first Pentecost, but rather that it was God's grace—the Holy Spirit—working in and through the Church.  And so, if we are to fulfill our role as members of this Church whose mission is building unity—that is, if we are to be active, efficient, and effective builders of unity in our families, schools, communities, and workplaces—then we must, first and foremost, be men and women of prayer.

          Prayer, my brothers and sisters, binds us firmly to God, so that through us his strength can bring together the scattered pieces of fallen humanity; and a mature prayer life makes us partners in the work of the Holy Spirit in the world.  Today, therefore, when the Holy Spirit renews his presence in us and in the world during this Mass, let's renew our commitment to becoming mature men and women of prayer, so that we can then become mature men and women of action and boldly advance the Church's beautiful and urgent mission to bring true unity to the human race: the unity in God’s Spirit that we hope one day to know fully in heaven.

Given at All Saints Parish, Logansport, IN – May 14^th & 15^th, 2016

God's mercy continues to come to us

          What a great weekend for me!  Friday night with the Knights of Columbus to open up their State Convention in Indianapolis, then Saturday morning concelebrating the Mass of First Holy Communion with my godson Isaiah, then today celebrating our two new pope saints, Saint John XXIII and Saint John Paul II the Great (#2popesaints) with a Holy Hour before the Blessed Sacrament and praying the Chaplet of Divine Mercy!

God's mercy is truly infinite!  Alleluia!  He is Risen!

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Homily: 2^nd Sunday of Easter – Cycle A

          Back when I was a deacon, I spent the summer getting pastoral experience in Anderson.  One of the things that I did while I was there was to try and get the young adult Catholics to connect with one another.  And so I organized a weekly gathering - much like the Theology on Tap events here - to discuss a topic of faith or an issue that is important in their lives.

          I had met Jennifer a few weeks before as she and her parents were walking out of mass.  She was a college student home for the summer and so I invited her to come to our weekly meetings.  She didn't come the first week, but the second or third she did.  I think that night I presented a little thing on the saints and devotion to them, but then opened the table up to any other questions or discussion that the folks wanted to have.  After a little bit of general conversation I heard Rebecca (the youth and young adult minister at the time) say, "I think that would be an excellent question for the Deacon!"

          "Ok," I thought, "I guess that means that I'm on."  Jennifer, a little bit shy to ask, said "but what if you struggle to believe that the Eucharist is really the body and blood of Jesus?"  Now, I've heard this question asked before, but never in a direct way to me.  In other words, I've always heard it in terms of someone else saying to me "well, I was talking to this person and they said that they don't believe in the Real Presence, but I wasn't sure what to tell them."  Now I was that person receiving the challenge to explain/defend this belief.

          At first, I tried to explain it reasonably.  I explained how the Scriptures record Jesus giving his disciples not only the instruction to eat his flesh and drink his blood, but also the manner in which we would do just that when he said "this is my body" and "this is my blood".  And I explained how our reasoning can only take us so far and that eventually we need to make a step in the dark to get to the place of complete faith (making the proverbial "leap of faith").  But then it struck me that this was not enough; and I believe, then, that the Holy Spirit inspired me with another idea.

          "Bottom line, Jennifer," I said to her, "is that Jesus wants you to know the truth about all of this.  He loves you and and he doesn't want you to be in the dark about it.  So go to him in prayer and ask him with a sincere heart to reveal to you the truth about the Eucharist: ask him, 'If it truly is your Body and Blood, then help me to know that.  If it isn't, then help me to know that, too.'  I promise you," I said to her, "Jesus will not fail to answer that prayer."  I know that must have been inspired, because it was something that she took to heart and she agreed to give it a try.

          I didn't hear anything more about this from her until a few weeks later when we were at the annual Frassati Society Young Adult Conference.  On Saturday morning, after the morning Mass, Jennifer came up to me and said, "I got it!"  "Got what?" I was thinking.  "It happened at Mass," she said.  "I had been praying, like you suggested, and today, when the priest raised up the host during the consecration, I looked up and suddenly I knew in my heart that it was Jesus really present there!"  Now in my head my first thought was, "Holy cow, that really worked!" But in the moment I, of course, praised God and shared in her joy with her.

          Now, I share this story with you today because today, the Octave Day of Easter, is also celebrated as Divine Mercy Sunday, and I think that this story is a great example of how God continues to meet us in his Mercy.  Just as Jesus returned to appear to the disciples locked in the upper room so as to dispel the doubts of Thomas, Jesus also mercifully made himself known to Jennifer, a disciple with doubts, so as to dispel her unbelief.

          This story is also a great example of the continuing power of personal witness and support that the Christian community must provide to bring others to faith.  In the account from the Acts of the Apostles, we read how the first community of believers met daily for prayer and the breaking of the bread and that they enjoyed favor among all the people; and that, through this witness, every day the Lord added to their number those who were being saved.  As a small community of believers (young adults), we gathered to break bread together and by our sharing in sincerity the truth of God's mercy, Jennifer came to a personal encounter with it when the Lord revealed himself to her in the Eucharist.

          Further still, this story is an example of the living presence of Jesus Christ in our midst.  Such an experience of the Risen Christ would not have been possible for Thomas had Jesus not risen from the dead.  Neither would such a convicted experience of the Real Presence of Jesus in the Eucharist have been possible for Jennifer without the Resurrection.  The passion, death, and resurrection of Jesus, the Son of God, is the fullest measure of God's mercy poured out for us and is the central tenet of our faith.  So powerful is it that we celebrate it for eight days straight.

          My brothers and sisters, everything that we do as Church must be centered around this truth and the joy that comes from it: that we have been saved from eternal death by the death and rising from the dead of the Son of God, Jesus our Lord.  For through him, in God's mercy, we have been "given a new birth to a living hope..." A hope we must share with others so that "every day the Lord will add to our number those who are being saved."

          In this weekend that we are also celebrating the historic "weekend of four popes" as it is being called (for we have Pope Francis, Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI, and the canonization of the Popes John XXIII and John Paul II), I think that it is fitting that we also recall what Pope Francis has taken for his papal motto "miserando atque eligendo" - "looking with mercy on him, he chose him."  My brothers and sisters, it was in mercy that we were chosen to be born again into this living hope of the Risen Jesus Christ and it is in mercy that we are given the grace of faith.  Let us not fail to live that faith "with exultation and sincerity of heart," like the first Christians, so that all may find the joy of God's mercy in the waters of baptism and in the blood poured out from this table: the very water and blood that flowed out from Jesus' side on the cross - the living fount of mercy poured out for us.

Given at All Saints Parish: Logansport, IN – April 26^th & 27^th, 2014

Jesus turns over the familiar

Greetings friends!  Here is the homily that I preached this past weekend in Jeffersonville.  I am particularly sure that the Holy Spirit was directing this one because even though I had no contact with whoever it was that wrote the Prayers of the Faithful for the parishes at least half of them matched up almost perfectly with different aspects of my homily.  Praise God for that!

As always, if you have any feedback (positive and constructive) I'm happy to hear it!
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Homily: 3^rd Sunday of Lent – Cycle B

          Familiarity breeds contempt… at least that’s what the modern proverb says.  What this saying is, well, saying is that as we come to know someone more deeply, we realize just how much we actually don’t like that person; that is that with familiarity comes knowledge not just of the person’s attractive traits, but also of their more ugly ones (and we all have them, don’t we).  I think, in a certain sense, we can all see some truth in this saying.  But there’s another aspect of this saying that also carries some truth: that is, that familiarity also breeds complacency.

          We can see this in our daily routines.  If you’ve lived in Jeffersonville for some time, the landmarks that you used to notice as you went about your daily tasks—such as taking the kids to school, or making a run to the grocery store, or even just commuting to work—after a while just kind of fade into the landscape.  After years of living in this one place, you might even find that the features of your neighborhood no longer seem to register in your consciousness.

          This can happen with people, too.  Our co-workers, classmates, close friends, brothers and sisters, and even our spouses become so familiar to us and part of our daily routine, that the appreciation of how special they are to our lives is not something that enters our daily consciousnesses.  And so, while this familiarity doesn’t necessarily breed contempt, it does often breed complacency.

          In the first reading today, we heard the recounting of the Ten Commandments.  For many of us, I suspect that listening to these being read is kind of like making our daily commute: we were conscious that we began the trip, but when we got to our destination we weren’t quite sure how we got there.  In other words, the Ten Commandments are perhaps so familiar to us that they’ve become “part of the landscape” and no longer impact our daily consciousness.

          And this is nothing new.  The ancient Jews also fell into this trap.  They had the Law for many years and most people were very familiar with it and its demands.  Thus, following the precepts of the Law had become for them like our daily routine: nothing more than part of the daily landscape through which they had to navigate.  And this to the extent that they turned what is called the “Temple Cult”—that is, the sacrifices offered in the Temple both in homage of God and as an atonement for sins—into a business for profit.

          That’s when Jesus breaks into the scene and disrupts the familiar.  He saw the way that Satan had distorted the truth that the Law represented—that is, that it was a way for God’s chosen people to remain in “right relationship” with Him—and turned it into a Law of cold demands and business transactions.  Jesus saw that this had become so familiar to the people that they simply accepted it as the conditions for living as the People of God. By turning over the tables of the familiar, Jesus was hoping to reawaken in them an awareness of the true relationship that God had called them to.

          The zeal with which Jesus desired that the Temple—his Father’s house—be free from defilement is the same zeal that he has for our hearts.  He wants to turn over the tables of the familiar in our hearts and drive out any distorted images of self, of others, of God, and of what God asks of us so that we can once again see the beauty of the relationship he has called us to: both collectively as the People of God and individually as adopted sons and daughters.  Yet, unlike the Temple, Christ cannot just burst into our hearts and start turning things over.  God created us for freedom and for him to do so would violate that dignity.  And so this Lent—as he does throughout the year, but particularly in this holy season—Jesus calls us once again to open our hearts to him and to give him permission to shed light on anything in them that is unholy, that is untrue, and thus to drive them out, so as to purify his “temples of the Holy Spirit.”

          My brothers and sisters, if all we have done this Lent is take up our old familiar practices of prayer, fasting, and almsgiving, then we have little more to hope for when we arrive at Easter Sunday than a feeling of relief for not having to maintain these disciplines any longer.  The challenge we have before us today is to make this Lent different by “opening wide the doors to Christ,” which was the clarion call of our late Holy Father, Bl. Pope John Paul II.  We do this by turning our gaze away from ourselves and towards others.  In prayer, we ask God to show us ways that we can overcome our sinful habits by turning towards our neighbor and offering a word of encouragement, a gentle correction when they need it, a helping hand in their difficulties, and a humble acknowledgement of how we’ve hurt them in the past that is accompanied by a sincere desire for forgiveness.  Then we return to God, offering him our successes and our (inevitable) failures and asking again for the grace to recognize our weaknesses and to trust in his help to overcome them.

          This work, of course, is uncomfortable.  It is uncomfortable because we have to give up our control to Christ and make ourselves vulnerable to him and to others.  But that’s ok, because, as our current Holy Father, Pope Benedict XVI has said, “the world offers you comfort, but you were not made for comfort; rather you were made for greatness.”  My brothers and sisters, this Lent cannot be just about “sticking it out” to the end, but rather it must be about achieving the greatness we were made for.  And so, let Christ—the Christ we encounter here in the sacrifice we offer and in the meal we share—turn over the familiar in your hearts.  If you do so, then you will be truly ready to encounter anew the joy of Easter.

~ Given at Saint Augustine and Sacred Heart Parishes, Jeffersonville, IN - March 10^th-11^th, 2012