A Lenten Reality Check

Homily: 5^th Sunday in Lent – Cycle A

          My brothers and sisters, today’s gospel reading provides us with a little “Lenten reality check”, of sorts.  Perhaps we’ve been doing well in our Lenten practices—and perhaps we feel that we have made great progress in restoring our relationship with God in preparation for celebrating Easter.  If so, that’s great!  God created us to be in relationship with him so that he might share his life of unity, peace, and joy with his creation and so your work to restore your relationship with him—especially if that has already taken the form of making a good confession sometime in the last four weeks—is surely in conformance with his will for your life.  The “reality check” that today’s Gospel reading provides us, however, is a reminder that friendship with God is no guarantee of protection from calamity, suffering, or pain.

          Martha, Mary, and Lazarus were close friends of Jesus.  The Gospel tells us that “Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus”.  Because of this close friendship, the three of them had come to acknowledge Jesus as the Messiah and they put their faith in his ability to heal even mortal sicknesses.  And so, when Lazarus fell ill, Martha quickly sent word to Jesus, hoping that he’d come to save her brother from this illness.  Jesus didn’t come right away, however, and Lazarus died.  In fact, by the time Jesus had arrived, Lazarus had already been in the tomb four days.

          Because of this, Martha and Mary both confront Jesus, saying: “If you had been here, my brother would not have died!”  They are hurt because Jesus did not appear to respond as quickly as they, because of their friendship, expected that he would.  Jesus, in spite of already knowing what he was going to do, nonetheless displays the fullness of his humanity when, confronted by the sorrow being experienced by these sisters whom he dearly loved, he himself weeps.  It’s a touching moment that we would do well to consider any time that we experience a loss in our own lives.  But let’s imagine for a moment that the story ended there: Jesus weeping while Lazarus remains dead in the grave.  If that were the case, he’d be a great teacher, prophet, consoler, and even, perhaps, friend, but he wouldn’t be God.

          Thus, when we hear Jesus tell Martha plainly, “I am the resurrection and the life”, we hear something different.  With these words, Jesus is telling her that it isn’t just his belief that Lazarus will rise, but rather it is his concrete knowledge of who he is and of what he is capable.  Friendship with God, she discovers, is not divine protection from pain, suffering, or even death, but rather a guarantee that, in that pain, suffering, and even death, God will be with us.  When Jesus weeps, we see the most touching, but telling evidence that he, indeed, is with us, in the fullness of our humanity.  When he calls Lazarus from the grave, however, we see the still greater evidence that not only is Jesus with us—the great teacher, prophet, consoler, and friend—but that Jesus is, indeed, God: and that, in Jesus, God himself is truly with us.

          Thus, in Jesus, the words of the prophet Ezekiel have been fulfilled.  When Jesus called Lazarus from the grave he brought new light to the rebirth foreshadowed in his promise to bring back his chosen people from exile.  Those people thought themselves dead because they had lost the land from which they took their identity.  Thus, when the Lord “brought them back to the land of Israel”, they truly felt reborn.  Little did they know, however, that one day God himself would take on human nature and walk among them and would, literally, open the graves of the dead and have the dead rise from them.  Notice that the ancient Israelites were not prevented from experiencing exile because of their friendship with him.  Rather, it was because of their friendship that they were eventually restored to their land and given “new life”.  So it is now that our friendship with God will be no guarantee that we will not experience sadness, difficulty, or pain, but rather a promise that God will lift us from that sadness, difficulty, or pain, if we remain faithful to our friendship with him.

          This is the promise that those who are preparing to receive the Easter Sacraments are hoping to receive.  They acknowledge that they have been dead in their sin and they acknowledge that it is only through friendship with God, obtained by making a definitive act of faith in Jesus, that they will be freed from this death to walk in newness of life.  This final scrutiny invites them to acknowledge this truth and to pray for the grace to persevere in their commitment to leave sin in the past.  Finally, it invites us to support them with our prayers.

          My brothers and sisters, the scrutiny is a reminder to each of us that sin, especially mortal sin, separates us from God and our friendship with him.  If we have not yet turned from our sin this Lent, then we must begin this necessary work today because God—even though he never gives up on us—will not save us from death—that is, eternal death—if we do not first seek to be reconciled to him.  It also reminds us, however, that friendship with him is no guarantee that we will be spared pain, suffering, or even death in this world.  It is, rather, a guarantee that we will never be abandoned to eternal death: a promise which the raising of Lazarus—and, more poignantly, Jesus’ own resurrection—demonstrates for us.

          And so, as we draw close to the Lord around this altar, let us ask for the strength of faith to trust in the victory over death won for us by Jesus—and, thus, to place all of our hope in him, like Martha and Mary did—so that we, too, along with our elect, will be ready to receive the grace of new life: the new and glorious life in Jesus that we receive under sacramental signs, here in this Holy Eucharist.

Given at All Saints Parish: Logansport, IN – April 1^st & 2^nd, 2017

Jesus saves us from the zombie apocalypse

          I preached for the third scrutiny today and the readings centering around the Gospel reading of the Raising of Lazarus.  Enjoy!

Image from the scene of "Hungry Eyes" shot in Logansport 

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

          A couple of years ago, I was home visiting my folks and we were in the car going out to dinner when I noticed on the back windows of a couple of cars stickers that referenced a coming “Zombie Apocalypse”.  The one I remember clearly said: “Zombie Apocalypse Survival Vehicle”.  I turned to ask my sister if this was something I was imagining or if people really were worried about a zombie apocalypse and she told me that was kind of a “thing” that people were into.  Since then I’ve noticed that there seems to be a fascination with zombies: the TV series, “The Walking Dead”, the 2011 film “Zombie Apocalypse”, and the 2013 film “World War Z” all testify to this.

          In fact, poor Fr. Clayton received an awkward first impression of Logansport when, on the first day of his assignment here, as I was taking him out to dinner, we passed by a group of people who were all made-up like zombies for the filming of that scene of the film “Hungry Eyes” that was filmed here in Logansport.  I recall distinctly that he responded with what has now become his quite commonplace response: “Where am I?”

          So, why have we become so fascinated with zombies?  Well, that I can’t really answer.  As a subject for entertainment, however—that is, for those who are entertained by these type of gory thrillers—I can propose a few thoughts.  First, of course, is that they are “thrillers”—that is, they get our blood pumping—and in this way, they are kind of like roller coasters; which, if they don’t make us sick, are a lot of fun.  Second is that there is something about this idea of dead bodies coming back to life: only this time without any rational soul and with an insatiable desire to consume human flesh.  I mean, it’s our worst nightmare, right?  Every other threat to our lives we can stop by killing it, ultimately.  But what about those who are already dead?  How do you kill what’s already dead?  And how do you stop something that doesn’t seem to need food to survive, but nonetheless has an insatiable need to eat?  Yes, it’s our worst nightmare, but it is just far enough removed from any reality that we know that we’re not traumatized by seeing it portrayed on a screen.

          If we take a step back and reflect for a moment, however, we may realize that this nightmare is something that we are more ready to embrace and to face.  You see, in an era in which more and more people are turning away from the idea that there can be new life after death, anything that “re-animates” after having died will assuredly be monstrous: the idea of resurrection (that is, that life is renewed or reborn, not just resuscitated) is thought of as absurd.

          You see, death is a reality that we all must face.  For those of us in the Judeo-Christian tradition, death is a result of sin and the decay associated with death is the evidence that, separated from God, no life can be sustained.  We believe that God has the power to restore us to life, however, and so when Ezekiel says “Thus says the Lord God: O my people, I will open your graves and have you rise from them;” we don’t think of the zombie apocalypse (though, perhaps, now you will), rather we think about being resurrected to new life.  In a very real way, this is exactly what Jesus proved when he raised Lazarus from the dead and, more poignantly, when he himself rose from the dead.

          For those who have abandoned this tradition, however, death is simply the final part of life and the decay associated with death is simply the natural breakdown of the material body once the animating power no longer exists.  In this there is no power to restore life: only nightmarish concepts of bodies rising from graves by some unknowable power only to suck the lives out of those who are still living.  And so we see that, in a world in which God is denied (or simply ignored)—that is, a world without the resurrection of Christ—any concept of life after death can’t be anything more than the zombie apocalypse.  By acknowledging Christ’s resurrection, however, we come to realize that life after death isn’t something monstrous; rather it is something new and glorious and to be sought after.

          Eight of our brothers and sisters have acknowledged Christ’s resurrection and so have come to realize that God offers us something beautiful after this life is through.  Their desire is to be united to that offer (like the rest of us have been) through Baptism at the Easter Vigil.  To help them prepare, we have spent the last weeks scrutinizing them: calling them to turn away from sin and towards new life in Christ and today is our final scrutiny, in which we will remind them that only Jesus can save us from the death that sin has imposed upon us and ask God once again to free them from any and every attachment to sin to which they might still be clinging.

          And, of course, this message is also for all of us: a reminder of the necessity to remain vigilant against any attachment to sin that may creep into our lives.  One of the best ways that we do this, of course, is to make frequent use of the sacrament of reconciliation.  By making good and sincere confessions regularly throughout the year, we keep tabs on which sins in our lives have become habitual—and, thus, have become an attachment to our lives—so that we can take steps to remove these sinful habits and replace them with virtuous ones.

          My brothers and sisters, Jesus Christ, Emmanuel, God with us, has proven to us that, while death will still touch all of us, life after death will not be a nightmarish zombie apocalypse: at least not for those who have been united to him in a death like his through Baptism.  Rather, it will be new and glorious if only we remain faithful to him throughout our short time here in this world.  Let us pray, then, for our brothers and sisters, the elect—and let us pray also for ourselves—that, strengthened by our celebration of this Holy Eucharist, we may come to the realization of that glorious new life that awaits us: the eternal Easter of heaven.

Given at All Saints Parish: Logansport, IN – March 13^th, 2016

Let there be (children of the) light.

          Another great weekend!  My parents visited from Illinois and a lot of folks from All Saints were able to meet and greet them (good both for my parents and our parishioners!).  If any of you remember my old (original) blog, it was titled "Searching for Blindness", which was a play off of today's Gospel reading.  Jesus says that "if you were blind, then you would have no sin."  I didn't want to have sin, so I thought I should be "searching for blindness".  Anyway, it is a powerful story of what happens when we allow our self-righteousness (Pharisees) get ahead of seeking an authentic relationship with Jesus.  We're halfway through Lent!  Time to double-up our efforts!  Verso l'alto!

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Homily: 4^th Sunday of Lent – Cycle A

          As many of you know I grew up in a Catholic household.  My parents practiced their faith and taught their children to do so also.  My siblings and I all spent eight years in Catholic grade school (well, nine, I guess, if you count Kindergarten) and three of the four of us spent an additional four years in Catholic high school (it was still segregated between boys and girls when my oldest brother went, which didn’t sit well with him, so he went to the public high school).  Thus, when I went off to college I felt pretty confident that I knew what it meant to be Catholic: Go to church, don’t eat meat on Fridays, be kind and generous to people.  This is what I did.  I followed all of the rules (well, most of them, anyway) and otherwise I pretty much did whatever I wanted to do.

          A couple of years after I graduated from college, this system fell apart on me.  I wasn’t happy with my job or my decision to move to Indiana, my relationship with my girlfriend of nearly three years ended disastrously, and those thirteen years of Catholic schooling didn’t seem to leave me any answers for why I ended up so unhappy.  It was then, of course, that I had an encounter with Jesus.

          In this spiritual encounter that I had with Jesus he showed me how blind I had become to my sin (that is, how blind I had become because of my own self-righteousness).  “I’m a good person”, I used to say.  “I’ve never really hurt anyone intentionally, so I’m ok.”  While this latter part was somewhat true, Jesus opened my eyes to see how I had actually hurt many people through my selfishness and self-righteousness.  Although he didn’t directly command me to do so, I knew what I had to do next: I had to go and wash in the “pool of reconciliation” by making a good confession.

          From there I began a journey, not unlike the blind man who was given sight in today’s Gospel reading.  At first, all I could do was say “Jesus healed me.”  When others would ask me, “Who is this Jesus? point him out to us”, I couldn’t.  I had encountered him, but I was still getting to know him.  As I more intentionally engaged all of the practices that I had before—going to Mass, giving up meat on Fridays, being kind and generous to people—as well as taking up new practices—giving time to daily prayer, studying the Bible, and volunteering in my parish and the community—the answer to the question “Who is Jesus?” started to become clearer for me until the point that I could see him clearly and, thus, worship him in truth.

          Of course, the man in the Gospel reading today had a much more profound experience.  In many ways, his story is a baptism story: one that highlights the “re-creation” aspect of the sacrament that we celebrate.  This man was born without sight.  In other words, he was born broken: “damaged goods” if you will.  Jesus confirms for his disciples that this was not caused by any particular sin either by the man himself or by his parents.  Thus, in a sense, his blindness is a result of a legacy of brokenness that man has inherited.  Does that sound like a description “Original Sin” to anyone?  Well, it should!

          What Jesus does next is very symbolic.  He makes clay using his saliva.  (I know, it sounds gross, but back then they believed that saliva had healing properties.)  Think for a moment about some other time that God used the dirt of the ground to do something important…  In the book of Genesis, right?  “Then the LORD God formed the man out of the dust of the ground…”  So Jesus uses the dust of the ground to make clay and places it on the man where there should be sight, although there never was…  Interesting.  Then he tells the man to do what?  To go wash in the pool of water!  And what does that remind us of?  Baptism! of course!  So the man is baptized and washes the stuff of creation off of his eyes and, voila!¸ the sight has been created in the man.  (Suddenly this doesn’t look like the same old story anymore, does it?)

          Thus, this man’s faith journey begins.  At first he doesn’t have much to say about this Jesus that gave him sight.  He knows the name of the man who gave him sight and, because of what he did, that this man must, therefore, be a prophet and a man of God, but he didn’t know much else about him.  When he then sees Jesus for the first time, he is open and ready to make a profession of faith.  “Do you believe in the Son of Man?” Jesus asks him.  “Sure!  Just tell me who he is, that I may believe in him”, replied the man.  He trusted Jesus so completely—because of what Jesus did for him—that he put his complete confidence in whomever it would be that Jesus would identify.  When Jesus reveals himself to the man—“the one speaking with you is he”—the man then professes his faith in Jesus and bows down in worship before him.

          In many ways, the Elect—those who will be baptized at the Easter Vigil—are having this same experience.  This Sunday we will scrutinize them again and call them to acknowledge their blindness because of sin; and, in a way, to imagine Jesus putting the healing, creating clay on their eyes.  We will then send them forward towards Easter to be washed in the pool of Baptism, where their blindness caused by sin will be washed away; and, re-created, they will walk as “children of the light”.  As their brothers and sisters in light, we walk with them on their journey towards re-creation.  Thus, Lent is also our call to scrutinize our own lives and to identify how sin has increasingly made us blind to our selfishness and self-righteousness; and, thus, to the needs of the poor and those living on the margins around us that we have been ignoring.

          My brothers and sisters, Jesus wants to meet us there, in our acknowledgement of our blindness, and he wants to place the healing clay on our eyes.  He will then send us to the pool to wash—that is, the sacrament of reconciliation—so that we too can have our sight restored.  In this time of preparation for the great celebration of Easter, let us not be afraid to approach him in this sacrament and to let him do this great work for us.  For when we do, we will truly know what it is to worship him; just as that man in the Gospel did; and just as we are invited to do every Sunday here at this altar.

Given at All Saints Parish: Logansport, IN – March 29^th & 30^th, 2014

Just leave the water jar and walk away...

          Ok, it has been a bit of a blessed/rough week for me.  A couple of funerals (with one still coming up on Monday) and covering the weekend by myself.  Thus, the homily is not nearly as polished as I might normally do.  That's life in ministry, though!  God bless your week!

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Homily: 3^rd Sunday of Lent – Cycle A

          So here we are at the end of the second full week of Lent.  In many ways, if we have been engaging the work of Lent well, we are settling into this season and perhaps even starting to see the fruits of what this season calls us to do.  Nevertheless, perhaps many of you have been struggling to “get into” what Lent is all about and are ready to disengage from the whole project (or perhaps you already have).  Thus, a word of reminder might be good here.

          Lent is a time of preparation.  Did you hear that?  I said “a time of preparation.”  I know most of you heard me say “a time of penance”, but I didn’t say that.  Lent is a time of preparation.  And preparation for what?  Well, for the celebration of Easter, of course!  And why do we need to prepare to celebrate Easter?  Why can’t we just celebrate it?  Well, because celebrating the greatest mystery of our salvation is something much deeper and more profound than, say, celebrating somebody’s birthday (though we do prepare to celebrate those, don’t we?).  Easter is not just a day of remembrance, but it is also a day of renewal: the remembrance of our definitive rebirth in Christ at our baptism and the renewal of our commitment to live that life to its fullest.

          You know that the word “renew” is synonymous with the word “renovate”, right?  And we all know that to renovate something is to take something that is old and used and to make it like new again.  We do this with houses and cars, churches and office buildings, and perhaps even our wardrobes from time to time.  What’s the first thing that any renovation project has to tackle?  Cleaning out the old junk, of course!  In other words, the first part of any renovation project is to prepare the space by cleaning out the old, useless stuff.

          Thus, if we are to be renewed—that is, renovated—by our celebration of Easter, then we need first to take some time to prepare our space by cleaning out the old junk from our hearts.  Lent is our time of preparation.  By fasting we detach ourselves from the things that keep us from living the new life that we have received in Christ through baptism.  By almsgiving we take up the practice of sharing the fruits of that new life with others.  And by prayer, we deeply reconnect with the one who called us out of our darkness and into his perfect light.

          It is in prayer, then, that we also remember.  Each of our journeys is unique.  Each of us, at some point in our lives, has had to come to terms with where it was that we were and where it is that God wanted us to be.  And each of us had to make a decision about whether we would follow Jesus towards where God wanted us to be or remain where we were.  My guess is that, since you are here, all of you have decided to follow Jesus to where God wants you to be.  If so, then part of our preparation for the renovating celebration of Easter is our remembrance of that experience of God meeting us where we were and inviting us to where he wants us to be: for part of our celebration is the renovation of our commitment to arrive at that place where God is leading us.

          If not, then perhaps this time of preparation could be a time for you to experience that encounter with God that will help you to come to terms with your life: that is, to see clearly where it is that you are and to experience God meeting you there and inviting you to journey towards the place where he wants you to be.  This is exactly what the Samaritan woman experienced in our Gospel reading.  From the place where she was—a life full of broken relationships which left her marginalized even among her own people—Jesus meets her and invites her to come to terms with her life.  He then invites her to move from where she is to where it is that he wants her to be: a place where her thirsts no longer find only temporary satisfaction, but rather become infinitely satisfied.

          At first, she tries to deflect this invitation: introducing a debate about the proper place of worship and then declaring her belief in the coming Messiah.  When Jesus, however, reveals himself to her completely (“I am he, the one speaking with you”) something in her changes.  She drops her guard, recognizes him for who he is, and… what?  She leaves her water jar to announce to all the townspeople who it is that she has encountered.  She left the water jar—representative of her life—that could be filled at one moment but would always become empty again, because she had found the spring of living water—Jesus—and so she no longer needed it.

          My brothers and sisters, 12 of our brothers and sisters in this community are on a journey towards their definitive rebirth in Christ through baptism at the Easter Vigil.  Lent, at its core, is for them as they make their final preparations for this “ultimate” renovation of their lives at Easter.  In these three weeks we will intentionally scrutinize them, asking them to come to terms with their lives, to recognize in Jesus the spring of living water, and thus to leave their water jars behind.  We, as their brothers and sisters in faith, journey with them so as to be renewed in our baptism at the Easter celebration.

          Let us, then, scrutinize our lives during this Lenten season so as to come to terms with them.  And let us seek to remember (or discover for the first time) how Jesus has shown us to be the only source that can satisfy our deepest thirsts.  Then, renewed in the grace of our baptism, we, too, will be inspired—like the Samaritan woman at the well—to take this great message out to the world and to invite all those around us to “come and see”, and to be filled by Jesus’ life-giving water.

Given at All Saints Parish: Logansport, IN – March 22^nd & 23^rd, 2014

Searching for blindness

Just returned from another week at Saint Meinrad beginning the "Good Leaders, Good Shepherds" program.  What an awesome program!  Super well-researched and put together and the leaders were incredibly knowledgeable and prepared for the program.  One of the best all-around programs that I've every experienced... and this was just the opening module!

I have a busy couple of weeks ahead leading up to Holy Week.  Nevertheless, you know that I'll be watching closely to hear from our new Pope (whenever he's elected)!  Please keep praying for the Cardinal Electors!

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Homily: 4th Sunday of Lent – Cycle A (Scrutinies)

Some of you may be familiar with the story of Alice and Mark.  Alice, as the story goes, was blind, and she hated everyone.  Being blind, as we can all imagine, is a pretty heavy cross to carry and for Alice, that took its toll on her relationships with others.  Mark, however, was a patient man and he loved Alice deeply.  He was always there for her and she felt that he was someone that she could rely on.  One day she told Mark, “If I could see, I would marry you.”

Not long after that, Alice was notified that someone had donated a pair of eyes to her.  So she had the surgery and, after a week or so of recovery, when the bandages came off, she was able to see Mark for the first time.  Almost immediately, Mark smiled at her and asked her: “Now that you can see, will you marry me?”  Alice, however, was speechless.  You see, Mark was blind.  Immediately she knew that looking at his closed eyes would be a constant reminder of the blindness that she so longed to leave in her past and she wanted so badly to leave that memory in the past that she refused his proposal.  Alice’s blindness, it seems, went much deeper than physical sight.

In our Gospel reading today, the Pharisees are suffering from a similar type of blindness.  As we hear in the Gospels over and over again, these religious leaders were intensely focused on preserving the Mosaic Law and on ensuring that it was carefully observed by all Jews.  Being so “in tune” with the Law that God had given them, they were certain that they also knew what the Messiah, whom God had promised to send them, would look like.  He would emerge from an important family of obvious heritage to their great king, King David.  Jesus, however, didn’t fit that mold.  Remember that the history of Jesus’ birth in Bethlehem, and the great signs that accompanied it, was unknown to the general public while Jesus was still walking on earth.  Rather, all that people knew about him was that he was a carpenter’s son from Nazareth, who was generating a lot of buzz with his teaching and through his works.

No, Jesus’ heritage didn’t jive with what the Pharisees were looking from the Messiah.  Thus, although he was performing the works of God—healing the sick, raising the dead, driving out demons (and, in this case, curing the blind)—the Pharisees were blinded by their preconceived notions of the Messiah and couldn’t see him for who he was.  Like Alice, whose preconceived notion of what Mark would look like prevented her from seeing the Mark that she knew—the patient, caring man who had been with her all this time, the Pharisees’ preconceived notion of what the Messiah would look like prevented them from seeing that the Messiah was actually right there in their midst.

The man who was cured of his blindness, however, had none of these preconceived notions.  So much so that when the Pharisees question him his only response was to say “I know nothing about this man.  I just know that I was blind and now I can see.”  And when pressed by the Pharisees to make a judgment about Jesus, he doesn’t call him the Messiah, but rather a prophet.  What he is doing is speaking from the truth of his experience.  “I was blind, but now I see, which is a good thing.  And if it is a good thing, then it must be from God.  Therefore, this man must be from God.  And so the best that I can say about him is that he seems to me to be a prophet.”  Notice that he doesn’t try to push Jesus into being what he wants him to be, but simply speaks of him according to the truth of his experience of him.

The Elect, those who are preparing to be baptized this Easter, are kind of like this man.  They, like all of us, have been born blind, but, through an encounter with Christ in prayer, in his Word, and through the witness of this community, they have had their eyes opened to the truth of his love and now stand before us to ask for our prayers as they make their final preparations for their Baptism.  They ask for our prayers so that they may be cured of every spiritual blindness and so become like us, “children of light.”

And so to the Elect I have this to offer: the foundation of our faith is acknowledging the truth about our encounters with Christ.  Just like the man born blind—and the Samaritan woman from last week’s Gospel reading—we are called first and foremost to witness to the truth of our encounter with him.  “I can’t tell you if he is a sinner,” the man born blind states, “All I know is that I was blind and now I can see.”  “Come, see the man who told me everything about myself,” the Samaritan woman exclaims, “Could he be the Messiah?”  The scrutinies that the Elect are undergoing are about getting clear.  Just like Lent, for the rest of us, is about getting clear.  In other words, it is about eliminating all of our preconceived notions about God, religion, and what Church ought to be, and getting clear about our experience of Jesus, so that we, too, can worship him, like that man in the reading today, when we see him in his truest, glorified self—his resurrected self—on Easter Sunday.

After Alice’s rejection, Mark left feeling completely destroyed.  A few days later, she received a note from him that said simply, “Take good care of your eyes, my friend, because before they were yours, they were mine.”  Alice could finally see, but then sin—her desire for worldly satisfaction through her eyes—blinded her heart and she rejected Mark’s Christ-like love.  Mark, on the other hand, through making himself blind, truly died to his self and thus to sin.  As a result, he was able to see the sad truth about Alice.  May our Lenten observances blind us to the world—and, thus, to sin—so that we can truly see the love that Christ offers each one of us.

Given at All Saints Parish: Logansport, IN – March 9th & 10th, 2013