St. Joseph Church (Cottleville)
Feast of the Holy Family of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph
December 28, 2008 - 12:15 p.m.
Gen 15:1-6; 21:1-3
Heb 11:8, 11-12, 17-19
Lk 2:22-40
I haven’t really spent any time shopping these past few days, but I’m guessing most of the stores have taken down their Christmas decorations and are returning quickly to business as usual. The Christmas music has disappeared from the radio stations that started playing it the day after Halloween, and many will soon be taking down the Christmas lights they spent long hours putting up not too long ago. But the beautiful thing for us as Catholics is that for us the celebration has just begun. The Church gives us an entire liturgical season to reflect upon the mystery of the Incarnation. She gives us a whole series of feasts that get at the meaning of this one event. And so today we come to the Feast of the Holy Family. We reflect upon the mystery of Christmas, of the birth of God as a man, from the context in which it all took place – a human family.
God became part of an ordinary human family. Today’s Gospel tells us that their life was not one of luxury and comfort. The Jewish law demanded that a woman offer a lamb and a turtledove as a sacrifice for her purification after childbirth. A lamb was a very costly sacrifice, and so the law allowed for an “Offering of the Poor.” Those who could not afford a lamb were given permission to bring another turtledove in its place. This is what Mary and Joseph brought to the Temple.
Mary, Joseph, and their child lived as any other Jewish family would have in their day. Jesus was raised as any Jewish boy would have been. His parents taught Him the history of their people. We can imagine St. Joseph taking his son outside their home in Nazareth and telling Jesus to look up at the stars. He would have told Him that when Abraham looked upon those same stars, he saw one lit for Jesus, for He was one of those innumerable children of Abraham, a child of the covenant. Jesus would have learned the trade of carpentry from St. Joseph. Our Lady certainly cared tenderly for her Son and also cared for the home, tireless spending herself out of love for her husband and her son. This family knew the great joys of life together, and it knew many trials and sufferings.
Today we look upon this ordinary human family, and we call it the Holy Family. It was holy not because of any amazing deeds performed but because God Himself dwelt in their home in the flesh. It was holy because a man and woman welcomed the Son of God into their home and spent the entirety of their lives with Him as their primary love. Because Jesus Christ dwelt in that Nazareth home with Mary and Joseph, their seemingly ordinary life became extraordinary. It became holy.
And so it is for us. Whether we live in a home of mother, father, and 12 children, alone as a widow, or anything in between, Jesus Christ wants to dwell in our homes. He wants to make our seemingly ordinary lives into something extraordinary. He wants to make our humble lives into something beautiful for His Father. This is yet another wondrous truth of the Christmas mystery. Every little thing we do, if we do it out of love for God and neighbor, becomes a source of sanctification for us. It is from our participation in Holy Mass that we gain the grace we need to live in God’s presence throughout the week. But holiness doesn’t merely mean coming to Mass every Sunday. What we do here at Mass on Sunday should extend into our homes throughout the week. Just as we begin Mass by recognizing our sinfulness, so in our families we should always be ready to forgive. Just as we listen to stories of salvation history in the Mass readings, so in our families we share our own experiences and listen to the other members of our family as they share theirs. At Mass we offer bread and wine to God the Father to be consecrated into the flesh and blood of His Son. In our homes, we should offer all of our joys and our sufferings to Him. Just as Christ gives Himself to us in Holy Communion, so should we be willing to give of ourselves totally out of love to the other members of our family.
Our homes, then, should be domestic churches. Christ should be welcome in our homes. All it takes is simple, ordinary things – praying together as a family before meals or praying the Rosary together. It means doing basic household chores – sweeping, dusting, dishes, trash – with great love for God and for the other members of our family. Every part of our home, every part of family life can be holy. The kitchen counter, the computer desk, the dining room table – all of these can become the altars of our homes, places where we offer our lives to God.
St. Therese of Lisieux knew this lesson well. The history of our Church has given us many heroic saints, saints like Thomas Aquinas, who wrote volumes of brilliant theology, saints like Maximilian Kolbe, who gave his life in a concentration camp so another could live. The list could go on. Therese desired to do something heroic. She wanted to be a missionary, an apostle, a martyr, but she died at the age of 24 after an obscure life in the convent. Almost immediately after her death, however, her fame spread as people began entrusting their prayers to her. It was because of her “Little Way.” Her life has taught us that holiness isn’t achieved from great, heroic deeds but from offering simple, ordinary things to the Lord with great love. Just this past year her parents were beatified, as the Church came to recognize her holiness of life as the fruit of her parents’ holiness. They are a modern example of a holy family, of the special grace of family life alive still in our world.
May we pour out our hearts to our Lord today around this holy altar. Then, when we return home, may we offer Him our home as His dwelling. It is only when we ask Him to sanctify our families and our homes that we will begin to see a transformation of all of society, because society is built on the family. As the family goes, so goes the world. Let us welcome Christ into our families and homes anew this Christmas and so do our part to transform the culture of death into the civilization of life and of love.
Monday, December 29, 2008
Sunday, December 21, 2008
Fiat: Let it be!
St. Joseph Church (Cottleville)
Fourth Sunday of Advent
December 20-21, 2008 - 5:00 p.m. & 7:00 a.m.
2 Sm 7:1-5, 8b-12, 14a, 16
Ps 89
Rom 16:25-27
Lk 1:26-38
On the previous two Sundays, we heard about St. John the Baptist’s mission of preparing the way for Christ. Today the Church directs our minds and hearts to the Blessed Virgin Mary, in whose womb our Lord was conceived at the Annunciation. It is interesting to compare the announcement of John’s birth to his father, Zechariah, and the announcement of Christ’s birth to His mother, Mary. The accounts of these two annunciations seem very similar. Holy fear came over both of them when they encountered the archangel, Gabriel. In each case, the angel spoke of wondrous deeds the child would do. Both of them asked how it was possible for what Gabriel had said to come about – Zechariah because of his and Elizabeth’s advanced age, Mary because she was a virgin. But there is one striking difference we can’t ignore. Zechariah is admonished. The angel takes away his ability to speak. Mary, on the other hand, is praised. “Hail, full of grace, the Lord is with you! . . . You have found favor with God.”
If both had questioned the angel’s words, asking how it was possible for his words to be fulfilled, why was Zechariah punished and Mary exalted? The answer isn’t clear from a superficial view of these annunciations. We must look deeper, to the interior attitudes of these two children of Israel. Although each had questioned the angel’s words, the attitude underlying their questions were radically different. Zechariah, it seems, was a skeptic. He questioned the angel because he doubted what had been proclaimed to him. We can almost hear him saying to the angel, “I don’t believe you. This is impossible. Don’t you see how old I am?” Mary, on the other hand, must have asked her question in faith. Hers was a marveling in wonder and awe at what had been said to her. We could paraphrase her words as well: “How can this be? What a wondrous thing the Lord wants to work in me, for I am yet a virgin.” Zechariah responds to the angel with pride and doubt, Mary in humility and faith.
Zechariah falls in line with all of humanity from the first man and woman, from the time of the fall. The sin of Adam and Eve was one of pride and doubt. They succumbed to the serpent’s suggestion that God was hiding something from them, that He had something great that He was keeping from them, that they would have to snatch for it themselves. So it was that they doubted God’s love and His goodness and in pride they disobeyed the one law they had been given and ate from the tree of knowledge of good and evil.
Mary stands in utter contrast, and it is for this reason that she is so exalted by the angel and for all generations afterward. Unlike Adam and Eve, unlike Zechariah, she has complete faith that God has her best interests in mind. She believes that by sending her His angel, God the Father is not trying to deceive her but instead to give her every good gift. Zechariah had been struck dumb by his doubt. In faith, on the other hand, Mary is able to speak the most important words spoken in the history of creation: “Behold, I am the handmaid of the Lord. May it be done to me according to your word.”
In the 2nd century, St. Irenaeus expressed very beautifully what Mary’s words meant. “The knot of Eve’s disobedience,” he says, “was untied by Mary’s obedience: what the virgin Eve bound through her disbelief, Mary loosened by her faith” (Adv. haeres.). The Catechism also states this truth beautifully: “In the faith of this humble handmaid, the Gift of God found the acceptance he had awaited from the beginning of time” (2617). After millennia of pride and doubt, God the Father, in the fullness of time, finally received the humble and faith-filled consent of one of His creatures.
We often call these history-changing words of Mary her fiat. Fiat is a Latin word. It means, “Let it be done.” This sums up the attitude of Mary in response to the will of God: “Let it be.” Mary spoke her fiat first to the Archangel Gabriel. Yet her heart spoke it again and again throughout her life to God. Even before Gabriel came to her, her life was spotless. She constantly said to God in her heart, “Fiat. Let it be.” And after the birth of Christ, she would have to speak this word again and again. As she raised the Christ-child in her home at Nazareth: Fiat. When it came time for Him to leave her so that He could begin His public ministry: Fiat. Most of all, when she watched her only Son die in agony on the cross, when her own heart was pierced: Fiat.
One modern-day saint who knew this fiat well was Blessed Teresa of Calcutta. It wasn’t until after she died that Mother Teresa’s profound interior life became well-known. Her mission of caring for the poor was firmly rooted and made sense only in the context of her deep life of prayer. So committed was she to doing the Lord’s will in her life that she took a fourth vow when she became a religious sister. Like all consecrated women, she took vows of poverty chastity and obedience. But she sought an even more radical union with Christ, so she took a private fourth vow. She describes it in this way: “I made a vow to God, binding under [pain of] mortal sin, to give God anything that He may ask, ‘Not to refuse Him anything’” (Come, Be My Light, 28). This is Mary’s fiat bearing fruit in our own time. Mother Teresa suffered much. Not only did she live in material poverty but also in spiritual poverty, with very few consolations from the Lord. And yet, throughout her life, she never went back on her vow to refuse the Lord nothing.
As Christmas draws near again this year, may our own refrain be the same. Let us say with our Blessed Mother, let us say with Blessed Teresa, “Fiat: let it be done to me according to your word, O Lord.” We must strive to renew this promise each day. We must strive each day to hand over to the Lord whatever it is that we cling to, whatever it is that we keep from Him out of pride and doubt. It can be any number of things: a teaching of the Church we can’t seem to accept, a burdensome illness we struggle to embrace, a call to make a difficult decision. Whatever we cling to, whatever we are afraid of, let us beg the Lord to give us the grace this Christmas to hand it over to Him. To speak, in union with our Lady, those words that summarize the entire Christian life: “Fiat: Let it be.” A simple warning: This word of humility and faith will likely not make our lives easier. In fact, when we submit our wills to God’s will, He often asks things of us that we would not choose for ourselves. At the same time, however, even pain and suffering become beautiful burdens, because they are carried in union with Christ, and it is that union that will lead us on the sure path to life eternal, to the vision of His glory, and to the fullness of communion with all the angels and saints in the never-ending banquet of the kingdom of heaven.
Fourth Sunday of Advent
December 20-21, 2008 - 5:00 p.m. & 7:00 a.m.
2 Sm 7:1-5, 8b-12, 14a, 16
Ps 89
Rom 16:25-27
Lk 1:26-38
On the previous two Sundays, we heard about St. John the Baptist’s mission of preparing the way for Christ. Today the Church directs our minds and hearts to the Blessed Virgin Mary, in whose womb our Lord was conceived at the Annunciation. It is interesting to compare the announcement of John’s birth to his father, Zechariah, and the announcement of Christ’s birth to His mother, Mary. The accounts of these two annunciations seem very similar. Holy fear came over both of them when they encountered the archangel, Gabriel. In each case, the angel spoke of wondrous deeds the child would do. Both of them asked how it was possible for what Gabriel had said to come about – Zechariah because of his and Elizabeth’s advanced age, Mary because she was a virgin. But there is one striking difference we can’t ignore. Zechariah is admonished. The angel takes away his ability to speak. Mary, on the other hand, is praised. “Hail, full of grace, the Lord is with you! . . . You have found favor with God.”
If both had questioned the angel’s words, asking how it was possible for his words to be fulfilled, why was Zechariah punished and Mary exalted? The answer isn’t clear from a superficial view of these annunciations. We must look deeper, to the interior attitudes of these two children of Israel. Although each had questioned the angel’s words, the attitude underlying their questions were radically different. Zechariah, it seems, was a skeptic. He questioned the angel because he doubted what had been proclaimed to him. We can almost hear him saying to the angel, “I don’t believe you. This is impossible. Don’t you see how old I am?” Mary, on the other hand, must have asked her question in faith. Hers was a marveling in wonder and awe at what had been said to her. We could paraphrase her words as well: “How can this be? What a wondrous thing the Lord wants to work in me, for I am yet a virgin.” Zechariah responds to the angel with pride and doubt, Mary in humility and faith.
Zechariah falls in line with all of humanity from the first man and woman, from the time of the fall. The sin of Adam and Eve was one of pride and doubt. They succumbed to the serpent’s suggestion that God was hiding something from them, that He had something great that He was keeping from them, that they would have to snatch for it themselves. So it was that they doubted God’s love and His goodness and in pride they disobeyed the one law they had been given and ate from the tree of knowledge of good and evil.
Mary stands in utter contrast, and it is for this reason that she is so exalted by the angel and for all generations afterward. Unlike Adam and Eve, unlike Zechariah, she has complete faith that God has her best interests in mind. She believes that by sending her His angel, God the Father is not trying to deceive her but instead to give her every good gift. Zechariah had been struck dumb by his doubt. In faith, on the other hand, Mary is able to speak the most important words spoken in the history of creation: “Behold, I am the handmaid of the Lord. May it be done to me according to your word.”
In the 2nd century, St. Irenaeus expressed very beautifully what Mary’s words meant. “The knot of Eve’s disobedience,” he says, “was untied by Mary’s obedience: what the virgin Eve bound through her disbelief, Mary loosened by her faith” (Adv. haeres.). The Catechism also states this truth beautifully: “In the faith of this humble handmaid, the Gift of God found the acceptance he had awaited from the beginning of time” (2617). After millennia of pride and doubt, God the Father, in the fullness of time, finally received the humble and faith-filled consent of one of His creatures.
We often call these history-changing words of Mary her fiat. Fiat is a Latin word. It means, “Let it be done.” This sums up the attitude of Mary in response to the will of God: “Let it be.” Mary spoke her fiat first to the Archangel Gabriel. Yet her heart spoke it again and again throughout her life to God. Even before Gabriel came to her, her life was spotless. She constantly said to God in her heart, “Fiat. Let it be.” And after the birth of Christ, she would have to speak this word again and again. As she raised the Christ-child in her home at Nazareth: Fiat. When it came time for Him to leave her so that He could begin His public ministry: Fiat. Most of all, when she watched her only Son die in agony on the cross, when her own heart was pierced: Fiat.
One modern-day saint who knew this fiat well was Blessed Teresa of Calcutta. It wasn’t until after she died that Mother Teresa’s profound interior life became well-known. Her mission of caring for the poor was firmly rooted and made sense only in the context of her deep life of prayer. So committed was she to doing the Lord’s will in her life that she took a fourth vow when she became a religious sister. Like all consecrated women, she took vows of poverty chastity and obedience. But she sought an even more radical union with Christ, so she took a private fourth vow. She describes it in this way: “I made a vow to God, binding under [pain of] mortal sin, to give God anything that He may ask, ‘Not to refuse Him anything’” (Come, Be My Light, 28). This is Mary’s fiat bearing fruit in our own time. Mother Teresa suffered much. Not only did she live in material poverty but also in spiritual poverty, with very few consolations from the Lord. And yet, throughout her life, she never went back on her vow to refuse the Lord nothing.
As Christmas draws near again this year, may our own refrain be the same. Let us say with our Blessed Mother, let us say with Blessed Teresa, “Fiat: let it be done to me according to your word, O Lord.” We must strive to renew this promise each day. We must strive each day to hand over to the Lord whatever it is that we cling to, whatever it is that we keep from Him out of pride and doubt. It can be any number of things: a teaching of the Church we can’t seem to accept, a burdensome illness we struggle to embrace, a call to make a difficult decision. Whatever we cling to, whatever we are afraid of, let us beg the Lord to give us the grace this Christmas to hand it over to Him. To speak, in union with our Lady, those words that summarize the entire Christian life: “Fiat: Let it be.” A simple warning: This word of humility and faith will likely not make our lives easier. In fact, when we submit our wills to God’s will, He often asks things of us that we would not choose for ourselves. At the same time, however, even pain and suffering become beautiful burdens, because they are carried in union with Christ, and it is that union that will lead us on the sure path to life eternal, to the vision of His glory, and to the fullness of communion with all the angels and saints in the never-ending banquet of the kingdom of heaven.
Monday, December 15, 2008
Humble John
St. Joseph Church (Cottleville)
Third Sunday of Advent
December 14, 2008 - 12:15 p.m.
Is 61:1-2a, 10-11
Lk 1 (Response)
1 Thes 5:16-24
John 1:6-8, 19-28
St. John the Baptist sure must have drawn a lot of attention to himself! Last week we heard how he appeared in the desert, seemingly out of nowhere, clothed in camel’s hair and a leather belt, eating locusts and wild honey. Today he calls himself a voice crying out. Obviously we’d all be a bit taken aback if we ran into someone like that today, but I doubt it was a common sight 2000 years ago either.
Yet despite all of these things that seem like idiosyncrasies, things that would attract attention to themselves, John the Baptist was a perfect model of humility. These things weren’t meant to draw attention to himself. His entire being and his sole purpose in life was to point the way to Christ. He got the attention of a lot of people. Crowds flocked to him to be baptized. We hear in today’s gospel how even the priests and Levites went out to him to ask who he was. Yet, whenever these crowds came to him, he always pointed their attention elsewhere. The gospel tells us, “He was not the light, but came to testify to the light.” And he says himself, “There is one coming after me, whose sandal strap I am not worthy to untie.” John understood, he had a clear picture of what was about to take place in their midst, and he called people’s attention to it. And because he had directed his entire life to proclaiming the coming of the Messiah, he recognized Him when He finally came.
John the Baptist is one of the most prominent figures of this Advent season. The Church holds him out to us as a saint we need to emulate. Obviously we’re not all supposed to go walking around in camel’s hair munching on locusts. What the Church is calling us to is the same humility. To be humble means to recognize that I am nothing without God, that everything I have and am is a gift from Him. It means so arranging our lives that we draw our attention and the attention of others not to ourselves but to God alone.
If we’re going to orient our lives radically towards Him, we need only ask a very simple question: where is He? The answer is just as simple. We know that the greatest treasure our Lord has left to His Church is His own abiding presence in the Holy Eucharist. That’s what draws us here Sunday after Sunday. We come because we know that He will be present here, that He will accept our own humble offering of ourselves and join it to His offering of Himself to the Father. We come because we need to grace He gives us in Holy Communion, when He gives us nothing short of Himself.
Our parish is blessed in a particular way by the Eucharistic adoration chapel in our church. The chapel is open 24 hours a day from 7:00 on Monday morning until 7:45 on Saturday morning. Our Lord waits there, exposed in the monstrance for our adoration, day and night. He waits to welcome anyone who would come to spend even just a few moments with Him. I would like to suggest this as a very simple practice we can adopt to foster this important virtue of humility in ourselves, a way to more perfectly direct our entire lives towards Jesus Christ. If we truly believe that Christ is present in the Eucharist, and if we truly believe that our lives are meaningless if they’re not totally directed towards Him, we should have a longing to spend time in His presence. We should crave the peace that comes to us from Christ in the Eucharist. Time in adoration is a simple way to fulfill St. Paul’s exhortation to pray always. Perhaps today, we could each reflect upon our lives. Perhaps we could make a commitment to spend some time with our Lord each week in adoration. It doesn’t have to be long. If an hour or a half hour seems like too much, give Him a few minutes. A stable was good enough for Him when He came among us the first time. If all you have to give Him now is a stable, He’ll take it.
If we find it in ourselves to make this commitment, the commitment to orient our lives more fully to our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament, we will not regret it. Our lives will begin to become more meaningful. In adoration we will come to know our God more perfectly, and so we will recognize Him more easily. We will recognize Him when we hear the priest say to us at Mass: “Behold the Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world.” We will recognize that at that moment He wants to give Himself to us totally, to be consumed by us that He might totally consume us. We will recognize Him when we meet Him in disguise throughout our day – in a spouse, a child, a sibling, in a coworker, a classmate, in the poor man who asks for a meal, in the unborn child who cries out for life.
It is one of the great paradoxes of Christianity that in humbling ourselves before the Lord we will find ourselves exalted by Him. St. Luke tells us that John was filled with the Holy Spirit. Our Lord Himself says that no one greater has ever been born. The same sorts of things will happen for us when we make Christ our all in all. We will be able to repeat confidently with the prophet Isaiah:
“The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me, because the Lord has anointed me. . . . He has clothed me with a robe of salvation and wrapped me in a mantle of justice, like a bridegroom adorned with a diadem, like a bride bedecked with her jewels.”
As we turn now to this holy altar, let us beg Him for the grace of humility – the grace to kneel humbly before Him in adoration. So may we open ourselves to be clothed with that robe and wrapped in that mantle, to welcome Him more fully into the stable of our hearts this Christmas and every day of our lives.
Third Sunday of Advent
December 14, 2008 - 12:15 p.m.
Is 61:1-2a, 10-11
Lk 1 (Response)
1 Thes 5:16-24
John 1:6-8, 19-28
St. John the Baptist sure must have drawn a lot of attention to himself! Last week we heard how he appeared in the desert, seemingly out of nowhere, clothed in camel’s hair and a leather belt, eating locusts and wild honey. Today he calls himself a voice crying out. Obviously we’d all be a bit taken aback if we ran into someone like that today, but I doubt it was a common sight 2000 years ago either.
Yet despite all of these things that seem like idiosyncrasies, things that would attract attention to themselves, John the Baptist was a perfect model of humility. These things weren’t meant to draw attention to himself. His entire being and his sole purpose in life was to point the way to Christ. He got the attention of a lot of people. Crowds flocked to him to be baptized. We hear in today’s gospel how even the priests and Levites went out to him to ask who he was. Yet, whenever these crowds came to him, he always pointed their attention elsewhere. The gospel tells us, “He was not the light, but came to testify to the light.” And he says himself, “There is one coming after me, whose sandal strap I am not worthy to untie.” John understood, he had a clear picture of what was about to take place in their midst, and he called people’s attention to it. And because he had directed his entire life to proclaiming the coming of the Messiah, he recognized Him when He finally came.
John the Baptist is one of the most prominent figures of this Advent season. The Church holds him out to us as a saint we need to emulate. Obviously we’re not all supposed to go walking around in camel’s hair munching on locusts. What the Church is calling us to is the same humility. To be humble means to recognize that I am nothing without God, that everything I have and am is a gift from Him. It means so arranging our lives that we draw our attention and the attention of others not to ourselves but to God alone.
If we’re going to orient our lives radically towards Him, we need only ask a very simple question: where is He? The answer is just as simple. We know that the greatest treasure our Lord has left to His Church is His own abiding presence in the Holy Eucharist. That’s what draws us here Sunday after Sunday. We come because we know that He will be present here, that He will accept our own humble offering of ourselves and join it to His offering of Himself to the Father. We come because we need to grace He gives us in Holy Communion, when He gives us nothing short of Himself.
Our parish is blessed in a particular way by the Eucharistic adoration chapel in our church. The chapel is open 24 hours a day from 7:00 on Monday morning until 7:45 on Saturday morning. Our Lord waits there, exposed in the monstrance for our adoration, day and night. He waits to welcome anyone who would come to spend even just a few moments with Him. I would like to suggest this as a very simple practice we can adopt to foster this important virtue of humility in ourselves, a way to more perfectly direct our entire lives towards Jesus Christ. If we truly believe that Christ is present in the Eucharist, and if we truly believe that our lives are meaningless if they’re not totally directed towards Him, we should have a longing to spend time in His presence. We should crave the peace that comes to us from Christ in the Eucharist. Time in adoration is a simple way to fulfill St. Paul’s exhortation to pray always. Perhaps today, we could each reflect upon our lives. Perhaps we could make a commitment to spend some time with our Lord each week in adoration. It doesn’t have to be long. If an hour or a half hour seems like too much, give Him a few minutes. A stable was good enough for Him when He came among us the first time. If all you have to give Him now is a stable, He’ll take it.
If we find it in ourselves to make this commitment, the commitment to orient our lives more fully to our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament, we will not regret it. Our lives will begin to become more meaningful. In adoration we will come to know our God more perfectly, and so we will recognize Him more easily. We will recognize Him when we hear the priest say to us at Mass: “Behold the Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world.” We will recognize that at that moment He wants to give Himself to us totally, to be consumed by us that He might totally consume us. We will recognize Him when we meet Him in disguise throughout our day – in a spouse, a child, a sibling, in a coworker, a classmate, in the poor man who asks for a meal, in the unborn child who cries out for life.
It is one of the great paradoxes of Christianity that in humbling ourselves before the Lord we will find ourselves exalted by Him. St. Luke tells us that John was filled with the Holy Spirit. Our Lord Himself says that no one greater has ever been born. The same sorts of things will happen for us when we make Christ our all in all. We will be able to repeat confidently with the prophet Isaiah:
“The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me, because the Lord has anointed me. . . . He has clothed me with a robe of salvation and wrapped me in a mantle of justice, like a bridegroom adorned with a diadem, like a bride bedecked with her jewels.”
As we turn now to this holy altar, let us beg Him for the grace of humility – the grace to kneel humbly before Him in adoration. So may we open ourselves to be clothed with that robe and wrapped in that mantle, to welcome Him more fully into the stable of our hearts this Christmas and every day of our lives.
Sunday, December 7, 2008
"That is Heaven for me!"
St. Joseph Church (Cottleville)
Second Sunday of Advent
December 6-7, 2008 - 5:00 p.m. & 7:00 a.m.
Is 40:1-5, 9-11
Ps 85
2 Pt 3:8-14
Mk 1:1-8
Do you ever feel worn down by life? Do you ever get so caught up in the daily routine, the monotonous succession of one day after another, that life seems to lose any sense of meaning? Does one day ever begin to look like all the others, to the point that you wonder what it’s all really about? Life can become that way for us. We can get so caught up in our daily responsibilities that we lose any sense of newness, of meaning. Even some of the saints felt this way about life. St. Therese of Lisieux, for example, used to speak of her life on earth as her exile. She longed to be freed from this life to begin to enjoy the eternal bliss that she believed awaited her in heaven. Sometimes our lives too can seem like an exile. They can seem like a lifeless desert.
I think the Jews at the time of this prophecy of Isaiah must have felt themselves to be in a dry, dead desert. They had been in exile in Babylon for 60 years. They had become accustomed to the passing of the days in that foreign land, and perhaps they began to lose hope that even a drop of water would come along to soften the parched land of their lives. In the midst of that situation, the voice of Isaiah cried out: “In the desert prepare the way of the LORD! . . . Here is your God! He comes with power. . . Like a shepherd he feeds his flock.”
I think the Jews at the time of today’s Gospel reading must have felt themselves to be in the midst of a desert. They were familiar with all the prophecies that a messiah would come to free them from the great burdens of life. Yet it had been 300 years since a prophet had said anything. For 300 years it seemed that God had been silent. In the midst of that longing for a word from God arose St. John the Baptist, the last and the greatest of the prophets. He cried out in the midst of that desert: “One mightier than I is coming after me. . . . he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit.”
I think we Christians today often feel ourselves to be in a desert. 2500 years ago, Isaiah’s prophecy came true, and the Jews were freed from bondage and allowed to return to their own land. 2000 years ago John the Baptist’s prophecy was fulfilled when the Son of God took human flesh and walked the face of the earth for 33 years. But 2000 years ago that same man promised that He would return. He assured us that He would come one final time to bring an end to sin, to all suffering and death, to bring life, peace, and happiness. He promised to shower the desert of our lives with living water.
That was 2000 years ago…and still we wait. Still we sin. Still we suffer. Still we die. Perhaps we begin to wonder if the stories of the Gospels are simply that – stories. Why has it taken our Lord so long to fulfill His promise to end suffering and death, to give happiness and life? This Advent season reminds us of His promise, and it calls us to hope. It calls us to remember that the words of the prophet Isaiah were fulfilled, that the words of John the Baptist were fulfilled. If the words of the prophets were fulfilled, how can the words of the God Himself not also be fulfilled?
And so we wait, in the midst of the desert. But we have something far greater than the Jews at the time of Isaiah, than the Jews at the time of the Baptist. Our Shepherd, though hidden and often silent, has not forgotten His flock. He carries us in His arms, leads us with care. Indeed, He feeds us. He has left us refreshment as we make our way through this desert towards Him. He has left us the true bread from heaven, the Holy Eucharist. If our hearts feel like a desert, if our lives seem monotonous and meaningless, if we are longing for our thirst to be quenched, we don’t have to wait for the glorious second coming of our Lord. He feeds us here and now, every week, every day. This may not be the ultimate fulfillment of all of His promises, yet Christ is as present in the Blessed Sacrament as He will be at the end of time. The only difference is that He remains hidden to our senses in the Eucharist, under the appearance of bread and wine. Nevertheless, the same Lord we hope to live with for all eternity in heaven lives now in the tabernacle of our church, and He lives in our hearts when we receive Him in Holy Communion. Whatever weighs on our hearts, whatever makes our lives seem like a desert, we can bring to Him in this wondrous Sacrament. He will refresh us. He will certainly sustain us as we make our way to Him.
This Advent, we can all prepare a way for the Lord in the desert, the desert of our hearts. We can prepare that way for Him by receiving Him worthily and reverently each week in Holy Communion. He is truly refreshment for tired souls. In the Holy Eucharist He gives us a foretaste of eternal glory. St. Therese of Lisieux suffered much during her short “exile” on earth. But she never lost sight of the fact that she wasn’t alone in that exile, never lost sight of the fact that Christ would sustain her on the road to eternal life. She died at the tender age of 24 on September 30, 1897. A year before her death, on June 7, 1896, she wrote a poem I would like to quote from to conclude. May these words remind us that Christ is indeed near, that the oasis for which we long in the midst of our life’s desert is no further than the nearest tabernacle:
To bear the exile of this valley of tears
I need the glance of my Divine Savior.
This glance full of love has revealed its charms to me.
It has made sense of the happiness of Heaven.
My Jesus smiles at me when I sigh to Him.
Then I no longer feel my trial of faith.
My God’s glance, His ravishing smile,
That is Heaven for me!
Heaven for me is hidden in a little Host
Where Jesus, my Spouse, is veiled for love.
I go to that Divine Furnace to draw out life,
And there my Sweet Savior listens to me night and day.
“Oh! What a happy moment when in Your tenderness
You come, my Beloved, to transform me into Yourself.
That union of love, that ineffable intoxication,
That is Heaven for me!
Second Sunday of Advent
December 6-7, 2008 - 5:00 p.m. & 7:00 a.m.
Is 40:1-5, 9-11
Ps 85
2 Pt 3:8-14
Mk 1:1-8
Do you ever feel worn down by life? Do you ever get so caught up in the daily routine, the monotonous succession of one day after another, that life seems to lose any sense of meaning? Does one day ever begin to look like all the others, to the point that you wonder what it’s all really about? Life can become that way for us. We can get so caught up in our daily responsibilities that we lose any sense of newness, of meaning. Even some of the saints felt this way about life. St. Therese of Lisieux, for example, used to speak of her life on earth as her exile. She longed to be freed from this life to begin to enjoy the eternal bliss that she believed awaited her in heaven. Sometimes our lives too can seem like an exile. They can seem like a lifeless desert.
I think the Jews at the time of this prophecy of Isaiah must have felt themselves to be in a dry, dead desert. They had been in exile in Babylon for 60 years. They had become accustomed to the passing of the days in that foreign land, and perhaps they began to lose hope that even a drop of water would come along to soften the parched land of their lives. In the midst of that situation, the voice of Isaiah cried out: “In the desert prepare the way of the LORD! . . . Here is your God! He comes with power. . . Like a shepherd he feeds his flock.”
I think the Jews at the time of today’s Gospel reading must have felt themselves to be in the midst of a desert. They were familiar with all the prophecies that a messiah would come to free them from the great burdens of life. Yet it had been 300 years since a prophet had said anything. For 300 years it seemed that God had been silent. In the midst of that longing for a word from God arose St. John the Baptist, the last and the greatest of the prophets. He cried out in the midst of that desert: “One mightier than I is coming after me. . . . he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit.”
I think we Christians today often feel ourselves to be in a desert. 2500 years ago, Isaiah’s prophecy came true, and the Jews were freed from bondage and allowed to return to their own land. 2000 years ago John the Baptist’s prophecy was fulfilled when the Son of God took human flesh and walked the face of the earth for 33 years. But 2000 years ago that same man promised that He would return. He assured us that He would come one final time to bring an end to sin, to all suffering and death, to bring life, peace, and happiness. He promised to shower the desert of our lives with living water.
That was 2000 years ago…and still we wait. Still we sin. Still we suffer. Still we die. Perhaps we begin to wonder if the stories of the Gospels are simply that – stories. Why has it taken our Lord so long to fulfill His promise to end suffering and death, to give happiness and life? This Advent season reminds us of His promise, and it calls us to hope. It calls us to remember that the words of the prophet Isaiah were fulfilled, that the words of John the Baptist were fulfilled. If the words of the prophets were fulfilled, how can the words of the God Himself not also be fulfilled?
And so we wait, in the midst of the desert. But we have something far greater than the Jews at the time of Isaiah, than the Jews at the time of the Baptist. Our Shepherd, though hidden and often silent, has not forgotten His flock. He carries us in His arms, leads us with care. Indeed, He feeds us. He has left us refreshment as we make our way through this desert towards Him. He has left us the true bread from heaven, the Holy Eucharist. If our hearts feel like a desert, if our lives seem monotonous and meaningless, if we are longing for our thirst to be quenched, we don’t have to wait for the glorious second coming of our Lord. He feeds us here and now, every week, every day. This may not be the ultimate fulfillment of all of His promises, yet Christ is as present in the Blessed Sacrament as He will be at the end of time. The only difference is that He remains hidden to our senses in the Eucharist, under the appearance of bread and wine. Nevertheless, the same Lord we hope to live with for all eternity in heaven lives now in the tabernacle of our church, and He lives in our hearts when we receive Him in Holy Communion. Whatever weighs on our hearts, whatever makes our lives seem like a desert, we can bring to Him in this wondrous Sacrament. He will refresh us. He will certainly sustain us as we make our way to Him.
This Advent, we can all prepare a way for the Lord in the desert, the desert of our hearts. We can prepare that way for Him by receiving Him worthily and reverently each week in Holy Communion. He is truly refreshment for tired souls. In the Holy Eucharist He gives us a foretaste of eternal glory. St. Therese of Lisieux suffered much during her short “exile” on earth. But she never lost sight of the fact that she wasn’t alone in that exile, never lost sight of the fact that Christ would sustain her on the road to eternal life. She died at the tender age of 24 on September 30, 1897. A year before her death, on June 7, 1896, she wrote a poem I would like to quote from to conclude. May these words remind us that Christ is indeed near, that the oasis for which we long in the midst of our life’s desert is no further than the nearest tabernacle:
To bear the exile of this valley of tears
I need the glance of my Divine Savior.
This glance full of love has revealed its charms to me.
It has made sense of the happiness of Heaven.
My Jesus smiles at me when I sigh to Him.
Then I no longer feel my trial of faith.
My God’s glance, His ravishing smile,
That is Heaven for me!
Heaven for me is hidden in a little Host
Where Jesus, my Spouse, is veiled for love.
I go to that Divine Furnace to draw out life,
And there my Sweet Savior listens to me night and day.
“Oh! What a happy moment when in Your tenderness
You come, my Beloved, to transform me into Yourself.
That union of love, that ineffable intoxication,
That is Heaven for me!
Thursday, December 4, 2008
Christ, the Guest of our Hearts
St. Joseph Church (Cottleville)
First Sunday of Advent
November 30, 2008 - 8:45 & 10:30 a.m.
Is 63:16b-17, 19b; 64:2-7
Ps 80
1 Cor 1:3-9
Mk 13:33-37
I can remember as a child how excited my siblings and I would get when Advent came. It meant that Christmas was just around the corner. Of course, we loved Christmas most of all because it meant presents left for us under the Christmas tree and a long break from school, but there were other things that were wonderful about Christmas. One of my favorite parts was that it meant that Grandma would be coming to our house on Christmas Eve to go with us to Mass and then have pizza for dinner. It was always special when Grandma came over because she would usually bring a treat for us. It was also exciting because we lived in south city and Grandma was coming all the way from “the County!”
But there was one thing I dreaded about Grandma coming over. It meant that for a number of days before Christmas my mother would be nagging me over and over to clean my room, and we’d each have assigned chores for cleaning other parts of the house. I could never understand why the house had to be clean for her. She had raised three children herself, so surely a messy house would have been no surprise. But my mother insisted that when we have guests our home should be clean and presentable.
I tell this story this morning, at the beginning of Advent, because this season which we begin today is a time of preparation for a guest who is coming. Of course the guest we are expecting at the end of these four weeks is none other than the Son of God Himself. The word Advent means “arrival” or “coming.” And His coming is twofold. At Christmas we will recall how He first came among us in a very humble, hidden way, as a tiny, poor infant lying in a manger. The readings today remind us of His second coming, His return at the end of time, when He will come not in a hidden way but in glory to bring the Kingdom of God to perfection.
I think about what it would have been like for my family if we knew Grandma was coming but we didn’t know what day she would arrive. I’m sure my mother would tell us that we had to keep our rooms clean every day, so that our home was ready when Grandma finally arrived. It’s the same way with our souls. Jesus Christ wants to be the guest of our souls when He comes, and so we must prepare our souls for His coming. We must make ourselves ready to welcome Him. We don’t know when He will come again, but we do know that He will come. And we know that already He comes to dwell in our hearts as a foretaste in Holy Communion.
Jesus Christ is a very special kind of guest, because He doesn’t expect us to make ourselves ready by ourselves. He wants to come in and clean out our hearts for us. He wants to be the one to ready our souls for His coming. It would be as if Grandma had come over the day before Christmas Eve to help us clean the house so it was ready when she came the next day. Christ does this cleaning above all in the Sacrament of Penance.
This Wednesday evening in Church this sacrament will be offered for anyone who would like to receive it. What a wonderful way to prepare ourselves for the celebration of Christmas, to come to Christ even now and humbly ask Him to forgive us our sins. I’m sure He would be especially pleased if people came to the sacrament who had been away from it for a long time, even for many years. If you have been away from the sacrament for some time, it may seem like a frightening prospect, but all you need do is simply tell the priest it has been awhile and that you might need some help knowing what to say and when to say it. I’m sure he’d be happy to assist you. How wonderful it would be if the lines at the confessionals of our church this Wednesday and on these four Saturdays of Advent were so long that our priests would have to schedule more times for confession for all those seeking to receive God’s mercy.
Sometimes, when the Church exhorts us to go to confession, she can seem like a nagging mother. Sometimes people wonder why the Church insists that we confess our sins to a priest rather than going directly to God Himself. She does so for two reasons. First, we believe that this is the only ordinary way for serious sins to be forgiven. We believe that Christ entrusted the forgiveness of sins to priests when He breathed the Holy Spirit upon His apostles and told them, “Whose sins you forgive are forgiven.” When a man is ordained a priest, He receives the power to act in the person of Christ. So, when we go to confession, we are really going directly to Christ, who is present in the priest. It is Christ who hears our confession and Christ who absolves us from our sins. This is why the priest is bound by the seal of confession never to repeat what he hears there, because it is not he who has heard it but Christ.
The second reason the Church calls us to confess our sins to a priest in this sacrament is because, as a good mother, she knows that as human beings we need to receive God’s grace in a tangible way. We need to hear the words of forgiveness spoken directly to us, to hear them with our own bodily ears. We need the certainty that comes from personal, individual attention. Pope John Paul II expressed this beautifully when he wrote:
“Although human beings live through a network of relationships and communities, the uniqueness of each person can never be lost in a shapeless mass. This explains the deep echo in our souls when we hear ourselves called by name. When we realize that we are known and accepted as we are, with our most individual traits, we feel truly alive. . . .
“Here the Good Shepherd, through the presence and voice of the priest, approaches each man and woman, entering into a personal dialogue which involves listening, counsel, comfort, and forgiveness. The love of God is such that it can focus upon each individual without overlooking the rest. All who receive sacramental absolution ought to be able to feel the warmth of this personal attention” (2002 Holy Thursday Letter, 9).
May this Advent be a time of true preparation for us. Amidst the hustle and bustle of shopping and preparing our homes for the celebration of Christmas, may we not forget to prepare our hearts as well. May we not forget to give our Lord a gift as well – a gift that cannot be bought at Walmart or Lowe’s or the jeweler – the gift of a pure heart, open to Him, ready to receive Him. If we give Him that gift, we can be sure that He will give us in return the greatest gift possible, the gift of Himself, dwelling forever in our hearts, and the gift of eternal life on the day of His Advent when we meet Him coming in glory. On that day, He will welcome us as His guest in the banquet of His kingdom for all eternity.
First Sunday of Advent
November 30, 2008 - 8:45 & 10:30 a.m.
Is 63:16b-17, 19b; 64:2-7
Ps 80
1 Cor 1:3-9
Mk 13:33-37
I can remember as a child how excited my siblings and I would get when Advent came. It meant that Christmas was just around the corner. Of course, we loved Christmas most of all because it meant presents left for us under the Christmas tree and a long break from school, but there were other things that were wonderful about Christmas. One of my favorite parts was that it meant that Grandma would be coming to our house on Christmas Eve to go with us to Mass and then have pizza for dinner. It was always special when Grandma came over because she would usually bring a treat for us. It was also exciting because we lived in south city and Grandma was coming all the way from “the County!”
But there was one thing I dreaded about Grandma coming over. It meant that for a number of days before Christmas my mother would be nagging me over and over to clean my room, and we’d each have assigned chores for cleaning other parts of the house. I could never understand why the house had to be clean for her. She had raised three children herself, so surely a messy house would have been no surprise. But my mother insisted that when we have guests our home should be clean and presentable.
I tell this story this morning, at the beginning of Advent, because this season which we begin today is a time of preparation for a guest who is coming. Of course the guest we are expecting at the end of these four weeks is none other than the Son of God Himself. The word Advent means “arrival” or “coming.” And His coming is twofold. At Christmas we will recall how He first came among us in a very humble, hidden way, as a tiny, poor infant lying in a manger. The readings today remind us of His second coming, His return at the end of time, when He will come not in a hidden way but in glory to bring the Kingdom of God to perfection.
I think about what it would have been like for my family if we knew Grandma was coming but we didn’t know what day she would arrive. I’m sure my mother would tell us that we had to keep our rooms clean every day, so that our home was ready when Grandma finally arrived. It’s the same way with our souls. Jesus Christ wants to be the guest of our souls when He comes, and so we must prepare our souls for His coming. We must make ourselves ready to welcome Him. We don’t know when He will come again, but we do know that He will come. And we know that already He comes to dwell in our hearts as a foretaste in Holy Communion.
Jesus Christ is a very special kind of guest, because He doesn’t expect us to make ourselves ready by ourselves. He wants to come in and clean out our hearts for us. He wants to be the one to ready our souls for His coming. It would be as if Grandma had come over the day before Christmas Eve to help us clean the house so it was ready when she came the next day. Christ does this cleaning above all in the Sacrament of Penance.
This Wednesday evening in Church this sacrament will be offered for anyone who would like to receive it. What a wonderful way to prepare ourselves for the celebration of Christmas, to come to Christ even now and humbly ask Him to forgive us our sins. I’m sure He would be especially pleased if people came to the sacrament who had been away from it for a long time, even for many years. If you have been away from the sacrament for some time, it may seem like a frightening prospect, but all you need do is simply tell the priest it has been awhile and that you might need some help knowing what to say and when to say it. I’m sure he’d be happy to assist you. How wonderful it would be if the lines at the confessionals of our church this Wednesday and on these four Saturdays of Advent were so long that our priests would have to schedule more times for confession for all those seeking to receive God’s mercy.
Sometimes, when the Church exhorts us to go to confession, she can seem like a nagging mother. Sometimes people wonder why the Church insists that we confess our sins to a priest rather than going directly to God Himself. She does so for two reasons. First, we believe that this is the only ordinary way for serious sins to be forgiven. We believe that Christ entrusted the forgiveness of sins to priests when He breathed the Holy Spirit upon His apostles and told them, “Whose sins you forgive are forgiven.” When a man is ordained a priest, He receives the power to act in the person of Christ. So, when we go to confession, we are really going directly to Christ, who is present in the priest. It is Christ who hears our confession and Christ who absolves us from our sins. This is why the priest is bound by the seal of confession never to repeat what he hears there, because it is not he who has heard it but Christ.
The second reason the Church calls us to confess our sins to a priest in this sacrament is because, as a good mother, she knows that as human beings we need to receive God’s grace in a tangible way. We need to hear the words of forgiveness spoken directly to us, to hear them with our own bodily ears. We need the certainty that comes from personal, individual attention. Pope John Paul II expressed this beautifully when he wrote:
“Although human beings live through a network of relationships and communities, the uniqueness of each person can never be lost in a shapeless mass. This explains the deep echo in our souls when we hear ourselves called by name. When we realize that we are known and accepted as we are, with our most individual traits, we feel truly alive. . . .
“Here the Good Shepherd, through the presence and voice of the priest, approaches each man and woman, entering into a personal dialogue which involves listening, counsel, comfort, and forgiveness. The love of God is such that it can focus upon each individual without overlooking the rest. All who receive sacramental absolution ought to be able to feel the warmth of this personal attention” (2002 Holy Thursday Letter, 9).
May this Advent be a time of true preparation for us. Amidst the hustle and bustle of shopping and preparing our homes for the celebration of Christmas, may we not forget to prepare our hearts as well. May we not forget to give our Lord a gift as well – a gift that cannot be bought at Walmart or Lowe’s or the jeweler – the gift of a pure heart, open to Him, ready to receive Him. If we give Him that gift, we can be sure that He will give us in return the greatest gift possible, the gift of Himself, dwelling forever in our hearts, and the gift of eternal life on the day of His Advent when we meet Him coming in glory. On that day, He will welcome us as His guest in the banquet of His kingdom for all eternity.
Sunday, November 16, 2008
"You are not in darkness" (1 Thes 5:4)
St. Joseph Church (Cottleville)
33rd Sunday in Ordinary Time - Year A
November 15-16, 2008 - 5:00 p.m. & 7:00 a.m.
Prv 31:10-13, 19-20, 30-31
Ps 128
1 Thes 5:1-6
Mt 25:14-30
In a few moments, we will profess the Creed together, as we do each Sunday. In professing our faith about Jesus Christ, we will say these words: “He will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead, and his kingdom will have no end.” Because we are in the final weeks of this liturgical year (Advent begins two weeks from today.), the Church is calling us to focus our attention on the last things, the end times. Our Lord came among us the first time in the Incarnation in a hidden way. Who would have known on that first Christmas night, except perhaps for His Mother, that Jesus was not merely human but also fully divine? How many could have watched Him die, rejected on the cross, and imagine that God Himself had been put on trial? But when Christ comes again, His return will not be in a hidden way. For 2000 years Christians have professed the belief that He will be recognized for who He really is – the Lord of all times and of all peoples. As the Creed says, “He will come again in glory.”
At His second coming, our Lord will establish His kingdom definitively, His kingdom for which each of us, if we are honest with ourselves, desperately longs. What will this kingdom look like? The book of Revelation presents a beautiful picture of it: “God’s dwelling [will be] with the human race. He will dwell with them and they will be his people and God himself will always be with them [as their God]. He will wipe every tear from their eyes, and there shall be no more death or mourning, wailing or pain, [for] the old order has passed away” (Rev 21:3-4). All suffering, all sorrow, even death itself will be obliterated. In place of these, we will know perfect peace, enduring joy, the fulfillment of every desire.
How wonderful this is! But we cannot forget the next part of the Creed. “He will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead.” We don’t like to think about this part of our faith. It makes us uncomfortable. We prefer to think of our God as loving and merciful, not as a judge. The fact of the matter remains, however, that the judgment of Christ is actually one more manifestation of His love and mercy. How can this be? When God created each one of us, He gave us a wondrous gift. He gave us the gift of freedom, the ability to choose for ourselves whether we would love Him back. In other words, He left the choice up to us – whether we would look to Him for happiness, or whether we’d turn our gaze in another direction, to some created thing that we hope can make us happy. It’s up to you and it’s up to me to choose for ourselves. Christ’s coming as judge, then, isn’t a vengeful God coming to inflict punishment on His people who have sinned. God is not out to get us. He’s not some sort of divine accountant watching closely to add every little sin to His list. But He does respect our free choices. When He comes as judge, He will take those with Him who have chosen to love Him, to make every decision in their lives based on Him. And He will allow those who have chosen to look elsewhere for happiness to continue to be separated from Him for all eternity. God longs for us to be in communion with Him for all eternity. He wants only our salvation. It saddens Him to see us turn away from Him, because He knows that only He can fulfill our deepest desires. But more than this, so much does He love us, that He respects our decision to seek our own good, to try to make ourselves happy, without any aid from Him.
The Church turns our attention to these last things at this time of the year because we need to be reminded to ask ourselves a very basic question: How am I living my life? Does my life accord with what I profess each week here at Mass? Am I truly living with Jesus Christ at the center of my life, or have I placed something or someone else above Him on my list of priorities? The prospect of judgment should not be a cause of terror and fear in our lives, because we know the truth, what is expected of us. We have received the truth from Christ, and it has been passed down faithfully from generation to generation in the teaching of the Church. As St. Paul wrote to the Thessalonians: “You are not in darkness. . . . For all of you are children of light and children of the day.” So we are faced again with the question: How am I living my life? Does my life look like the Catholic Church says it should look? Have I opened myself to the light of the Lord’s teaching?
The Gospel today spoke of the talents God has given us. There are some talents that every one of us have received. One of these is the gift of our intellect, the ability to come to know the truth. As Catholics, we believe that the Church is something more than a man-made institution. We believe that it is a gift from Christ Himself, the instrument through which He continues to live among us. We call the Church the Bride of Christ. If He loves her so much as to take her as His spouse, then surely He wants us also to love her. So, if there are areas of darkness in our understanding of the truth, if there are things the Church proclaims to be good news but that seem only to be great burdens to us, we must use that talent, the gift of our intellect, to seek to understand more deeply what the Church is saying to us. We must ask the Lord Jesus to come into the darkness of our ignorance with the light of His truth. Maybe I don’t understand why the Church teaches what she does about contraception. Maybe it makes no sense to me that the Church will not ordain women or that she insists that I confess my sins to a priest. Whatever it is, we must ask the Christ Himself to help us: “Come, Lord Jesus, into my confusion!” Whatever it is that stands in the way of my being in full communion with Christ, with His Church, I must beg the Lord to remove that roadblock, to help me to turn every bit of my life over to Him. At the end of time, I don’t think the Lord will outright condemn those who don’t understand the Church’s teaching, but I do think He will ask us if we opened our hearts to the Church, if we made an effort, strove to understand her, were willing to change our lives to conform them to the standard held up by His Church.
At His second coming, our Lord will establish His kingdom definitively, His kingdom for which each of us, if we are honest with ourselves, desperately longs. What will this kingdom look like? The book of Revelation presents a beautiful picture of it: “God’s dwelling [will be] with the human race. He will dwell with them and they will be his people and God himself will always be with them [as their God]. He will wipe every tear from their eyes, and there shall be no more death or mourning, wailing or pain, [for] the old order has passed away” (Rev 21:3-4). All suffering, all sorrow, even death itself will be obliterated. In place of these, we will know perfect peace, enduring joy, the fulfillment of every desire.
How wonderful this is! But we cannot forget the next part of the Creed. “He will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead.” We don’t like to think about this part of our faith. It makes us uncomfortable. We prefer to think of our God as loving and merciful, not as a judge. The fact of the matter remains, however, that the judgment of Christ is actually one more manifestation of His love and mercy. How can this be? When God created each one of us, He gave us a wondrous gift. He gave us the gift of freedom, the ability to choose for ourselves whether we would love Him back. In other words, He left the choice up to us – whether we would look to Him for happiness, or whether we’d turn our gaze in another direction, to some created thing that we hope can make us happy. It’s up to you and it’s up to me to choose for ourselves. Christ’s coming as judge, then, isn’t a vengeful God coming to inflict punishment on His people who have sinned. God is not out to get us. He’s not some sort of divine accountant watching closely to add every little sin to His list. But He does respect our free choices. When He comes as judge, He will take those with Him who have chosen to love Him, to make every decision in their lives based on Him. And He will allow those who have chosen to look elsewhere for happiness to continue to be separated from Him for all eternity. God longs for us to be in communion with Him for all eternity. He wants only our salvation. It saddens Him to see us turn away from Him, because He knows that only He can fulfill our deepest desires. But more than this, so much does He love us, that He respects our decision to seek our own good, to try to make ourselves happy, without any aid from Him.
The Church turns our attention to these last things at this time of the year because we need to be reminded to ask ourselves a very basic question: How am I living my life? Does my life accord with what I profess each week here at Mass? Am I truly living with Jesus Christ at the center of my life, or have I placed something or someone else above Him on my list of priorities? The prospect of judgment should not be a cause of terror and fear in our lives, because we know the truth, what is expected of us. We have received the truth from Christ, and it has been passed down faithfully from generation to generation in the teaching of the Church. As St. Paul wrote to the Thessalonians: “You are not in darkness. . . . For all of you are children of light and children of the day.” So we are faced again with the question: How am I living my life? Does my life look like the Catholic Church says it should look? Have I opened myself to the light of the Lord’s teaching?
The Gospel today spoke of the talents God has given us. There are some talents that every one of us have received. One of these is the gift of our intellect, the ability to come to know the truth. As Catholics, we believe that the Church is something more than a man-made institution. We believe that it is a gift from Christ Himself, the instrument through which He continues to live among us. We call the Church the Bride of Christ. If He loves her so much as to take her as His spouse, then surely He wants us also to love her. So, if there are areas of darkness in our understanding of the truth, if there are things the Church proclaims to be good news but that seem only to be great burdens to us, we must use that talent, the gift of our intellect, to seek to understand more deeply what the Church is saying to us. We must ask the Lord Jesus to come into the darkness of our ignorance with the light of His truth. Maybe I don’t understand why the Church teaches what she does about contraception. Maybe it makes no sense to me that the Church will not ordain women or that she insists that I confess my sins to a priest. Whatever it is, we must ask the Christ Himself to help us: “Come, Lord Jesus, into my confusion!” Whatever it is that stands in the way of my being in full communion with Christ, with His Church, I must beg the Lord to remove that roadblock, to help me to turn every bit of my life over to Him. At the end of time, I don’t think the Lord will outright condemn those who don’t understand the Church’s teaching, but I do think He will ask us if we opened our hearts to the Church, if we made an effort, strove to understand her, were willing to change our lives to conform them to the standard held up by His Church.
The truth of Jesus Christ is infinite. Even the most faithful of Catholics, even the most brilliant theologians, are called deeper into the mystery of God’s love. The fact that God is a mystery means not that He is incomprehensible but that there are always greater depths into which we can plunge. None of us knows how many days we will have on earth. None of us knows when we will meet our merciful Judge. This should motivate us to strive every day to deepen our knowledge of Him, while we have the time. As our knowledge grows, so too will our love. Let us today, at this Mass beg Him for this grace. Let us ask Him to pour His light into our darkened minds, so that we will come to know Him and love Him more perfectly. Then, when the day comes for us to meet Him in glory, when He turns His face towards us in all of its radiant splendor, nothing will stop us from running courageously towards Him, into His waiting arms, to hear Him say, “Well done, my good and faithful servant,” and to spend eternity with Him in the Kingdom of Heaven.
Sunday, November 9, 2008
The Temple of God
St. Joseph Church (Cottleville)
Feast of the Dedication of the Lateran Basilica
November 9, 2008 - 8:45 & 10:30 a.m.
Ez 47:1-2, 8-9, 12
Ps 46
1 Cor 3:9c-11, 16-17
Jn 2:13-22
Today seems like an odd feast to celebrate. We’re not marking a recalling in the life of our Lord of His Mother. We’re not commemorating a particular saint who has had an important part to play in the history of the Church. We are marking the anniversary of the dedication of a church in Rome. The Lateran Basilica was built by Constantine in Rome in the 4th century. You may recall that Constantine was the first Roman emperor to approve of Christianity. Before that, Christians were not allowed to practice their faith publicly, and, when they did, they were subjected to persecution and martyrdom. They would gather to celebrate Mass in secret in homes that had been set apart for the use of the community. After legalizing Christianity in the Roman Empire, Constantine had a great basilica built on the Lateran Hill in Rome. Although several disasters have led to various parts of the basilica being rebuilt and renovated, a church has stood on the site continuously for seventeen hundred years. The building of the Lateran Basilica was a sign to the world that God had come to dwell in the world in a radically new way, through His own Son who had assumed human flesh and died and rose to save us from our sin. No longer was the spread of this good news hindered by the Roman government. It became public for all to see. This is why the Church celebrates this day with such joy. This particular church building reminds us that Christ’s saving work continues in our world, that He continues to dwell among us and to lead us as one Body, His Body, into communion with His Father and the Holy Spirit.
Every church building reminds us of this same truth, that Christ continues to live and work among us. What is perhaps even more incredible is that every church building in our world is a reminder to us of what St. Paul wrote to the Corinthians nearly two thousand years ago: “Do you not know that you are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwells in you?” These are indeed incredible words. For the Jews at the time of Paul, the Temple was the holiest place on the face of the earth. It was God’s dwelling with His people. For this reason, Jews would often make pilgrimages to the Temple to enter God’s dwelling place, to know the presence of their Creator. With the coming of Jesus Christ and the sending of the Holy Spirit, that all changed. God’s holy presence was no longer bound to a particular geographic location. He came to dwell not in a building of stone and mortar but in the hearts of His people. This is what St. Paul was getting at. He was reminding the early Christians of their great dignity, which comes from the fact that the Holy Spirit was dwelling within each one of them.
This mystery continues today. Each and every Christian has become God’s temple, the dwelling place of the Holy Spirit. But how does this happen? How does God come to dwell in our hearts? It happens through the sacraments, which were given to the Church by Christ Himself as the means by which the Holy Spirit would dwell in the hearts of the faithful. It all begins at that most sacred moment of Baptism. So often we see Baptism as simply a nice ritual marking the birth of a child, simply the beginning of the journey of faith. It is so much more than this! At that moment, God truly comes to dwell in the hearts of His sons and daughters! We are made into Temples of the living God.
Our Lord knew that this new life of grace received at Baptism would need to be sustained and nourished over time, and so He gave us the gift of another sacrament – the Holy Eucharist. When we receive Holy Communion, our Lord Jesus Christ comes into our hearts in a very real way to breathe into us anew the Gift of the Holy Spirit. The Church nourishes us weekly, even daily, with this sacrament so that God’s presence within us, His temples, will abide.
Like the Jewish Temple at the time of Christ, our Lord’s temples can at times become polluted and in need of purification. When we choose sin, we bring into our hearts, which are the temple of the Holy Spirit, things that are not holy, things that should not exist in the temple of God. Our Lord foresaw this and so He gave to the Church yet another sacrament that is so essential to our Christian life – the Sacrament of Penance. In this sacrament, our Lord enters His temple no longer with a whip but with His mercy to cleanse us, to make us once again worthy dwelling places for His Holy Spirit.
This is why it is so important for us to receive the sacraments often. Baptism, we know, we receive once. After that, the grace received in Baptism is nourished and renewed in us through the Sacraments of Penance and the Holy Eucharist. So today it would be good to ask ourselves a few questions. How long has it been since I’ve been to confession? If it has been a long time, what is keeping me from approaching to receive God’s mercy? What is holding me back from allowing Him to cleanse my heart from all that pollutes it? Do I have a hard time understanding why the Church asks me to confess my sins to a priest? Do I need to study and come to better understand this sacrament? What about the Holy Eucharist? Do I come forward to receive Holy Communion out of routine, not really thinking about what it is that is being given to me? Do I ever come to receive Holy Communion when I have committed serious sin and need to go to confession first? Am I fostering a love for the Holy Eucharist through prayer before the Blessed Sacrament outside of Mass? Perhaps today, during the rest of this Mass, we could reflect upon the great gift God has given us in these sacraments and renew our resolve to receive them often and worthily.
Continually welcoming God to dwell within our hearts as His temple is important for our own eternal salvation, but that’s not all. Our world is desperately in need of God’s presence. Many words have been spoken and written these past months about the great crisis in which we find ourselves today, about the millions of lives affected by the reality of abortion, euthanasia, and other elements of the culture of death. These aren’t things that should concern us only in the days leading up to an election. They are significant every day. Our culture will only be transformed into a civilization of love, a culture of life, when we allow ourselves to be pure dwelling places for the Holy Spirit. When we allow that to happen, we will become instruments through which life-giving water will flow throughout the world. The river of God’s love will flow through us to water and soften even the hardest of hearts. Then we will begin to see a radical transformation of our society. Then we will all repeat together the words of today’s responsorial psalm: “The Lord of hosts is with us; our stronghold is the God of Jacob. Come! Behold the deeds of the Lord, the astounding things he has wrought on the earth.”
Feast of the Dedication of the Lateran Basilica
November 9, 2008 - 8:45 & 10:30 a.m.
Ez 47:1-2, 8-9, 12
Ps 46
1 Cor 3:9c-11, 16-17
Jn 2:13-22
Today seems like an odd feast to celebrate. We’re not marking a recalling in the life of our Lord of His Mother. We’re not commemorating a particular saint who has had an important part to play in the history of the Church. We are marking the anniversary of the dedication of a church in Rome. The Lateran Basilica was built by Constantine in Rome in the 4th century. You may recall that Constantine was the first Roman emperor to approve of Christianity. Before that, Christians were not allowed to practice their faith publicly, and, when they did, they were subjected to persecution and martyrdom. They would gather to celebrate Mass in secret in homes that had been set apart for the use of the community. After legalizing Christianity in the Roman Empire, Constantine had a great basilica built on the Lateran Hill in Rome. Although several disasters have led to various parts of the basilica being rebuilt and renovated, a church has stood on the site continuously for seventeen hundred years. The building of the Lateran Basilica was a sign to the world that God had come to dwell in the world in a radically new way, through His own Son who had assumed human flesh and died and rose to save us from our sin. No longer was the spread of this good news hindered by the Roman government. It became public for all to see. This is why the Church celebrates this day with such joy. This particular church building reminds us that Christ’s saving work continues in our world, that He continues to dwell among us and to lead us as one Body, His Body, into communion with His Father and the Holy Spirit.
Every church building reminds us of this same truth, that Christ continues to live and work among us. What is perhaps even more incredible is that every church building in our world is a reminder to us of what St. Paul wrote to the Corinthians nearly two thousand years ago: “Do you not know that you are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwells in you?” These are indeed incredible words. For the Jews at the time of Paul, the Temple was the holiest place on the face of the earth. It was God’s dwelling with His people. For this reason, Jews would often make pilgrimages to the Temple to enter God’s dwelling place, to know the presence of their Creator. With the coming of Jesus Christ and the sending of the Holy Spirit, that all changed. God’s holy presence was no longer bound to a particular geographic location. He came to dwell not in a building of stone and mortar but in the hearts of His people. This is what St. Paul was getting at. He was reminding the early Christians of their great dignity, which comes from the fact that the Holy Spirit was dwelling within each one of them.
This mystery continues today. Each and every Christian has become God’s temple, the dwelling place of the Holy Spirit. But how does this happen? How does God come to dwell in our hearts? It happens through the sacraments, which were given to the Church by Christ Himself as the means by which the Holy Spirit would dwell in the hearts of the faithful. It all begins at that most sacred moment of Baptism. So often we see Baptism as simply a nice ritual marking the birth of a child, simply the beginning of the journey of faith. It is so much more than this! At that moment, God truly comes to dwell in the hearts of His sons and daughters! We are made into Temples of the living God.
Our Lord knew that this new life of grace received at Baptism would need to be sustained and nourished over time, and so He gave us the gift of another sacrament – the Holy Eucharist. When we receive Holy Communion, our Lord Jesus Christ comes into our hearts in a very real way to breathe into us anew the Gift of the Holy Spirit. The Church nourishes us weekly, even daily, with this sacrament so that God’s presence within us, His temples, will abide.
Like the Jewish Temple at the time of Christ, our Lord’s temples can at times become polluted and in need of purification. When we choose sin, we bring into our hearts, which are the temple of the Holy Spirit, things that are not holy, things that should not exist in the temple of God. Our Lord foresaw this and so He gave to the Church yet another sacrament that is so essential to our Christian life – the Sacrament of Penance. In this sacrament, our Lord enters His temple no longer with a whip but with His mercy to cleanse us, to make us once again worthy dwelling places for His Holy Spirit.
This is why it is so important for us to receive the sacraments often. Baptism, we know, we receive once. After that, the grace received in Baptism is nourished and renewed in us through the Sacraments of Penance and the Holy Eucharist. So today it would be good to ask ourselves a few questions. How long has it been since I’ve been to confession? If it has been a long time, what is keeping me from approaching to receive God’s mercy? What is holding me back from allowing Him to cleanse my heart from all that pollutes it? Do I have a hard time understanding why the Church asks me to confess my sins to a priest? Do I need to study and come to better understand this sacrament? What about the Holy Eucharist? Do I come forward to receive Holy Communion out of routine, not really thinking about what it is that is being given to me? Do I ever come to receive Holy Communion when I have committed serious sin and need to go to confession first? Am I fostering a love for the Holy Eucharist through prayer before the Blessed Sacrament outside of Mass? Perhaps today, during the rest of this Mass, we could reflect upon the great gift God has given us in these sacraments and renew our resolve to receive them often and worthily.
Continually welcoming God to dwell within our hearts as His temple is important for our own eternal salvation, but that’s not all. Our world is desperately in need of God’s presence. Many words have been spoken and written these past months about the great crisis in which we find ourselves today, about the millions of lives affected by the reality of abortion, euthanasia, and other elements of the culture of death. These aren’t things that should concern us only in the days leading up to an election. They are significant every day. Our culture will only be transformed into a civilization of love, a culture of life, when we allow ourselves to be pure dwelling places for the Holy Spirit. When we allow that to happen, we will become instruments through which life-giving water will flow throughout the world. The river of God’s love will flow through us to water and soften even the hardest of hearts. Then we will begin to see a radical transformation of our society. Then we will all repeat together the words of today’s responsorial psalm: “The Lord of hosts is with us; our stronghold is the God of Jacob. Come! Behold the deeds of the Lord, the astounding things he has wrought on the earth.”
Sunday, October 26, 2008
"Let us begin."
St. Joseph Church (Cottleville)
30th Sunday in Ordinary Time – Year A
October 26, 2008 - 12:15 p.m.
Ex 22:20-26
Ps 18
1 Thes 1:5c-10
Mt 22:34-40
A few weeks ago, I had the opportunity to talk to the youth group about some of my experiences of working with the Missionaries of Charity when I studied in Washington, D.C. As you probably know, they are the religious sisters who were founded by Mother Teresa. I was constantly amazed at what I saw in these sisters. They had quite literally given up everything to embrace their call to consecrated life. Not even the clothes they wore – their habit – really belonged to them. What is most amazing about these sisters, what draws the world’s attention to them, is the reason why they have given up everything they have given up. It is to serve those who are terribly poor and sick. The home where I worked in Washington was for homeless men and women who had terminal diseases. The sisters’ job was to care for them until their death. I never had the opportunity to meet Mother Teresa, but I felt like I was with her every time I went to volunteer with her sisters. It was clear that her spirit was living on in them.
The sisters were clearly living out our Lord’s command in today’s Gospel: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” They had a secret, though, a secret that is often missed in popular accounts of Mother Teresa. A lot of people in our world admired Mother Teresa for the incredibly difficult work that she did – and rightfully so! She got her hands dirty with some of the poorest and sickest people in our world. But what the world often has failed to realize is why Mother Teresa did what she did. She wasn’t just a social worker. She did it because she understood so well the first part of our Lord’s words in today’s Gospel: “You shall love the Lord, your God, with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.” Did you know that Mother Teresa spent a minimum of two hours a day on her knees before the Blessed Sacrament? And that was apart from Mass and the Liturgy of the Hours. And I learned when I volunteered with her sisters, that their prayer continued throughout the day. I remember doing laundry with them – in a sink, by hand, mind you – and instead of simply chatting while we did it, we prayed the Rosary. Mother Teresa was so heroic – and her sisters now are so heroic – because they understood well that these two commandments given to us by Christ, the commandments upon which the whole law and the prophets depend, are intimately related to one another.
How exactly does this inter-relation play out? What linked Mother Teresa’s adoration of our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament to her loving care for the poor? I’ll let her tell you herself. She once said, “Christ is hidden under the suffering appearance of anyone who is hungry, naked, homeless, or dying. . . . There is but one love of Jesus, as there is but one person in the poor – Jesus.” Whether she was kneeling in prayer or binding the wounds of a leper, Mother Teresa was loving Christ. She saw in every person she met the image of God, for that is how each of us has been created. Every single human being on the face of the earth bears the image and likeness of God Himself. Mother Teresa didn’t miss it, because she knew the Lord so well. She became so familiar with Jesus in prayer, that she recognized Him immediately when she saw Him in someone in need. This is the fullness of love that each one of us is called to. We’re called to love God above all else. And in loving our neighbor, it is actually nothing more than an expression of the love of God, whose image each of our neighbors bear. These two commandments are linked because they are calling us to one and the same love.
What does it mean, then, for us to love our neighbor? A simple way would be to donate money to charities that help the poor and suffering. This is a good thing, a noble thing, but I don’t think this is exactly what our Lord was talking about with the Pharisees in today’s Gospel. Love isn’t just a generic gift to a group of people I don’t know. Love is particular. It is called for at particular moments in our day. We’re called to love people in our own home – fathers, mothers, spouses, brothers, sisters – people whose faults we are all too familiar with. We’re called to love that coworker or classmate who annoys us, whose idiosyncrasies drive us up the wall. We’re called to love the person who cuts us off in traffic. It is in these particular moments that this commandment to love our neighbor comes into play. In these moments, we must make a choice, for that ultimately is what love is. It’s not a feeling, but a choice – the choice to desire what is best for the other. To say, I know that God’s image is in you, even if I don’t see it now, even if you aren’t acting like it, and so I will love you. I will let go of my own desires, my own wants, and I will desire what is good for you.
We come here Sunday after Sunday because we know that here, from these Scriptures and from this holy altar, we receive what truly satisfies. We encounter One whose love for each one of us was so great, that He allowed His hands and feet to be nailed to a tree – out of love for us. Spiritual writers reflect upon this central mystery of our faith, and they tell us that our Lord’s love on the cross is for all people. He went to Calvary out of love for people of every time and place. But His love wasn’t for a generic crowd of people. It was for particular men, women, and children. If you were the only person who existed on the face of the earth, even then Jesus Christ would have taken the thorns, the nails, and the spear, just for you. As He hung on the cross, pouring forth His life, He thought of you, and He thought of me. That is love. Here, in this place, we receive Love Himself, and so we are equipped to love others.
In the end, love is the greatest gift Christianity has to offer the world. We can whine and complain to no end about the state of our society, about people who are hostile to God and to His Church, about how hard it is in our society to live out our faith. It’s important that we be realistic about the struggles we are up against in the world, but ultimately, whining and complaining gets us nowhere. If we Christians actually lived as Christians at every moment of the day, if, in every encounter of the day, we saw the image of God in our neighbor, if everyone who claims to be a follower of Christ conducted themselves constantly like the Lord, I think we would see amazing things start to happen. Love alone has the power to convert hearts. Love alone can convert a culture of death into a culture of life.
Just one more thought from Mother Teresa: “There is a terrible hunger for love. We all experience that in our lives - the pain, the loneliness. We must have the courage to recognize it. The poor you may have right in your own family. Find them. Love them. . . . Yesterday is gone. Tomorrow has not yet come. We have only today. Let us begin.”
30th Sunday in Ordinary Time – Year A
October 26, 2008 - 12:15 p.m.
Ex 22:20-26
Ps 18
1 Thes 1:5c-10
Mt 22:34-40
A few weeks ago, I had the opportunity to talk to the youth group about some of my experiences of working with the Missionaries of Charity when I studied in Washington, D.C. As you probably know, they are the religious sisters who were founded by Mother Teresa. I was constantly amazed at what I saw in these sisters. They had quite literally given up everything to embrace their call to consecrated life. Not even the clothes they wore – their habit – really belonged to them. What is most amazing about these sisters, what draws the world’s attention to them, is the reason why they have given up everything they have given up. It is to serve those who are terribly poor and sick. The home where I worked in Washington was for homeless men and women who had terminal diseases. The sisters’ job was to care for them until their death. I never had the opportunity to meet Mother Teresa, but I felt like I was with her every time I went to volunteer with her sisters. It was clear that her spirit was living on in them.
The sisters were clearly living out our Lord’s command in today’s Gospel: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” They had a secret, though, a secret that is often missed in popular accounts of Mother Teresa. A lot of people in our world admired Mother Teresa for the incredibly difficult work that she did – and rightfully so! She got her hands dirty with some of the poorest and sickest people in our world. But what the world often has failed to realize is why Mother Teresa did what she did. She wasn’t just a social worker. She did it because she understood so well the first part of our Lord’s words in today’s Gospel: “You shall love the Lord, your God, with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.” Did you know that Mother Teresa spent a minimum of two hours a day on her knees before the Blessed Sacrament? And that was apart from Mass and the Liturgy of the Hours. And I learned when I volunteered with her sisters, that their prayer continued throughout the day. I remember doing laundry with them – in a sink, by hand, mind you – and instead of simply chatting while we did it, we prayed the Rosary. Mother Teresa was so heroic – and her sisters now are so heroic – because they understood well that these two commandments given to us by Christ, the commandments upon which the whole law and the prophets depend, are intimately related to one another.
How exactly does this inter-relation play out? What linked Mother Teresa’s adoration of our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament to her loving care for the poor? I’ll let her tell you herself. She once said, “Christ is hidden under the suffering appearance of anyone who is hungry, naked, homeless, or dying. . . . There is but one love of Jesus, as there is but one person in the poor – Jesus.” Whether she was kneeling in prayer or binding the wounds of a leper, Mother Teresa was loving Christ. She saw in every person she met the image of God, for that is how each of us has been created. Every single human being on the face of the earth bears the image and likeness of God Himself. Mother Teresa didn’t miss it, because she knew the Lord so well. She became so familiar with Jesus in prayer, that she recognized Him immediately when she saw Him in someone in need. This is the fullness of love that each one of us is called to. We’re called to love God above all else. And in loving our neighbor, it is actually nothing more than an expression of the love of God, whose image each of our neighbors bear. These two commandments are linked because they are calling us to one and the same love.
What does it mean, then, for us to love our neighbor? A simple way would be to donate money to charities that help the poor and suffering. This is a good thing, a noble thing, but I don’t think this is exactly what our Lord was talking about with the Pharisees in today’s Gospel. Love isn’t just a generic gift to a group of people I don’t know. Love is particular. It is called for at particular moments in our day. We’re called to love people in our own home – fathers, mothers, spouses, brothers, sisters – people whose faults we are all too familiar with. We’re called to love that coworker or classmate who annoys us, whose idiosyncrasies drive us up the wall. We’re called to love the person who cuts us off in traffic. It is in these particular moments that this commandment to love our neighbor comes into play. In these moments, we must make a choice, for that ultimately is what love is. It’s not a feeling, but a choice – the choice to desire what is best for the other. To say, I know that God’s image is in you, even if I don’t see it now, even if you aren’t acting like it, and so I will love you. I will let go of my own desires, my own wants, and I will desire what is good for you.
We come here Sunday after Sunday because we know that here, from these Scriptures and from this holy altar, we receive what truly satisfies. We encounter One whose love for each one of us was so great, that He allowed His hands and feet to be nailed to a tree – out of love for us. Spiritual writers reflect upon this central mystery of our faith, and they tell us that our Lord’s love on the cross is for all people. He went to Calvary out of love for people of every time and place. But His love wasn’t for a generic crowd of people. It was for particular men, women, and children. If you were the only person who existed on the face of the earth, even then Jesus Christ would have taken the thorns, the nails, and the spear, just for you. As He hung on the cross, pouring forth His life, He thought of you, and He thought of me. That is love. Here, in this place, we receive Love Himself, and so we are equipped to love others.
In the end, love is the greatest gift Christianity has to offer the world. We can whine and complain to no end about the state of our society, about people who are hostile to God and to His Church, about how hard it is in our society to live out our faith. It’s important that we be realistic about the struggles we are up against in the world, but ultimately, whining and complaining gets us nowhere. If we Christians actually lived as Christians at every moment of the day, if, in every encounter of the day, we saw the image of God in our neighbor, if everyone who claims to be a follower of Christ conducted themselves constantly like the Lord, I think we would see amazing things start to happen. Love alone has the power to convert hearts. Love alone can convert a culture of death into a culture of life.
Just one more thought from Mother Teresa: “There is a terrible hunger for love. We all experience that in our lives - the pain, the loneliness. We must have the courage to recognize it. The poor you may have right in your own family. Find them. Love them. . . . Yesterday is gone. Tomorrow has not yet come. We have only today. Let us begin.”
Monday, October 20, 2008
"What belongs to God..."
St. Joseph Church (Cottleville)
29th Sunday in Ordinary Time – Year A
October 18-19, 2008 - 5:00 p.m., 7:00 & 8:45 a.m.
Is 45:1, 4-6
Ps 96
I Thes 1:1-5b
Mt 22:15-21
Thirty years ago this month, in October 1978, Karol Wojtyla was elected by the cardinals of the Church as the 263rd successor of St. Peter. At his first public Mass as pope, on October 22, John Paul II spoke words that would mark the rest of his pontificate. He said to the people of the world, “Do not be afraid. Open wide the doors for Christ. To his saving power open the boundaries of States, economic and political systems, the vast fields of culture, civilization and development. Do not be afraid” (John Paul II, “Homily for the Inauguration of his Pontificate,” 22 October 1978).
These words of the servant of God might easily come to mind today when we reflect upon the words of our Lord in the Gospel: “Repay to Caesar what belongs to Caesar and to God what belongs to God.” These familiar words probably surprised the Jews who heard them at the time of Christ. At a certain point in their history, the time of the kings, there wasn’t much of a distinction between the civil government and their practice of their religion. Kings like Saul, David, and Solomon were understood to be acting in the place of God in their rule of the nation. The people of Christ’s time awaited the return of a Messiah who they though would restore this kind of kingdom, a sort of theocracy. Christ’s words calling upon them to fulfill their obligations toward secular authority were a great challenge for them.
For us, this isn’t so difficult. We know well that we have obligations as citizens of this nation – duties like paying taxes or serving jury duty. We don’t look for our religious leaders to be the leaders of the state as well. In fact, I’m sure our bishops would be the first to say that they are not qualified to be secular rulers. Yet this passage is still very important for us. While the Jews of Jesus’ day needed to be told to fulfill their obligations to civil authorities, we often need to be reminded of the opposite. We need to be reminded of the second part of the saying: Repay “to God what belongs to God.” In our nation, so often, the separation of church and state has been interpreted to mean not a freedom for religion, so that I can practice freely the religion to which I choose to belong, but a freedom from religion. There is pressure from many directions to push faith aside, to simply make it a “private” matter. We need to be reminded that we have an obligation to repay to God what belongs to Him.
So the question is: What belongs to God? It doesn’t take us long to see that ultimately everything belongs to God. The fact that we have life, that we have air to breathe, comes from God. Everything that exists, including our very selves, ultimately belongs to God. God, then, deserves the first place in our lives. Against those who would have us push God aside in the public square, we must assert that God has the first priority in our lives. Every part of our lives should be open to Him and to how He wants to work in us. This is what Pope John Paul II was calling us to remember when he spoke those powerful words in St. Peter’s Square. So today, in calling us to render unto God what belongs to God, our Lord is asking us to open wide the doors of our lives to Him. He wants to be the Lord of every aspect of our lives, not out of a thirst for power over us but because He knows what is best for us. He knows what will bring us true happiness.
Over these past weeks, the bishops of our nation have been exhorting us time and again to repay to God what we owe to Him when we enter the voting booth on November 4th. They are asking us not to leave Christ outside when we enter to fulfill our duty. In a sense, they’re asking us to open wide the doors of the voting booth to Christ. In fact, it is by voting according to our conscience, formed by the teaching of the Church, that we will best serve our nation when we cast our ballots. Ultimately, when we do this, when we return to God what belongs to Him, we giving to the state, to Caesar, the best thing we have to offer.
Particularly, the bishops have asked us to vote in favor of life on that day. There has been much confusion among Catholics and non-Catholics alike about what can appear to be bishops meddling in affairs of the state. “How can they tell me how to vote?” we might ask. But when we really think about it, what the bishops are asking of us makes perfect sense. The Church teaches that life begins at the moment of conception. She doesn’t teach this from some special revelation from God. It is a fact of science that is taken up by the Church as proof for the sanctity of human life from the moment of conception. If we subscribe to this teaching, if we truly believe that what is conceived in the womb of a woman is a human person, then abortion suddenly becomes a chilling reality. It can be nothing other than the killing of an innocent human life, of a human person who has not even had the chance to breathe. Since the legalization of abortion 35 years ago, over 47 million lives have been ended before they could even see the light of day. 47 million… That means that for the last 35 years one out of every four children conceived in our nation have not even seen the light of day.
Here we can begin to see why the bishops are stressing life as the key issue for voting. It is true that there are many things to consider when voting. Our struggling economy is perhaps the most prominent right now. Perhaps many of us here today have felt the effects of it in our lives. There are many issues about the quality of life of people in our nation that are important, issues central to Catholic social teaching, but how can we hope to promote a quality of life when we don’t even defend the basic right to life in the first place? Mother Teresa said it well: “Any country that accepts abortion is not teaching its people to love but to use violence to get what they want. This is why the greatest destroyer of love and peace is abortion.” As people of faith, we believe that our bishops speak with the voice of the Church and that the voice of the Church is none other than the voice of Christ echoing in our world down through the centuries. Through our bishops, our Lord is crying out on behalf of the most vulnerable of our brothers and sisters, those who have no voice of their own. He is pleading with us in this election year to vote for candidates on the national, state, and local levels who will defend the dignity of human life. “If you love me,” our Lord is telling us, “listen to my voice. Choose life on November 4th.”
In the end, our Lord is asking us to trust Him. He’s asking us to trust that if we are faithful, if we do our part to defend the most vulnerable of our brothers and sisters, we cannot fail to begin to prosper again as a nation. We will see rise up in our midst a culture of life and of love. As Pope John Paul II reminded us 30 years ago, He wants us to open every aspect of our lives to Him, to His saving power. At his first public Mass as pope, Pope Benedict recalled Pope John Paul II’s words in 1978. Let us listen to the voice of our shepherd and choose here and now to open our lives anew, ever more fully, to the power of Christ at work in us who believe:
“Are we not perhaps all afraid in some way?” Pope Benedict asked. “If we let Christ enter fully into our lives, if we open ourselves totally to him, are we not afraid that He might take something away from us? Are we not perhaps afraid to give up something significant, something unique, something that makes life so beautiful? Do we not then risk ending up diminished and deprived of our freedom? And once again the Pope said: No! If we let Christ into our lives, we lose nothing, nothing, absolutely nothing of what makes life free, beautiful and great. No! Only in this friendship are the doors of life opened wide. Only in this friendship is the great potential of human existence truly revealed. Only in this friendship do we experience beauty and liberation. And so, today, with great strength and great conviction, on the basis of long personal experience of life, I say to you,…: Do not be afraid of Christ! He takes nothing away, and he gives you everything. When we give ourselves to him, we receive a hundredfold in return. Yes, open, open wide the doors to Christ – and you will find true life. Amen” (Benedict XVI, “Homily for the Inauguration of his Pontificate,” 24 April 2005).
29th Sunday in Ordinary Time – Year A
October 18-19, 2008 - 5:00 p.m., 7:00 & 8:45 a.m.
Is 45:1, 4-6
Ps 96
I Thes 1:1-5b
Mt 22:15-21
Thirty years ago this month, in October 1978, Karol Wojtyla was elected by the cardinals of the Church as the 263rd successor of St. Peter. At his first public Mass as pope, on October 22, John Paul II spoke words that would mark the rest of his pontificate. He said to the people of the world, “Do not be afraid. Open wide the doors for Christ. To his saving power open the boundaries of States, economic and political systems, the vast fields of culture, civilization and development. Do not be afraid” (John Paul II, “Homily for the Inauguration of his Pontificate,” 22 October 1978).
These words of the servant of God might easily come to mind today when we reflect upon the words of our Lord in the Gospel: “Repay to Caesar what belongs to Caesar and to God what belongs to God.” These familiar words probably surprised the Jews who heard them at the time of Christ. At a certain point in their history, the time of the kings, there wasn’t much of a distinction between the civil government and their practice of their religion. Kings like Saul, David, and Solomon were understood to be acting in the place of God in their rule of the nation. The people of Christ’s time awaited the return of a Messiah who they though would restore this kind of kingdom, a sort of theocracy. Christ’s words calling upon them to fulfill their obligations toward secular authority were a great challenge for them.
For us, this isn’t so difficult. We know well that we have obligations as citizens of this nation – duties like paying taxes or serving jury duty. We don’t look for our religious leaders to be the leaders of the state as well. In fact, I’m sure our bishops would be the first to say that they are not qualified to be secular rulers. Yet this passage is still very important for us. While the Jews of Jesus’ day needed to be told to fulfill their obligations to civil authorities, we often need to be reminded of the opposite. We need to be reminded of the second part of the saying: Repay “to God what belongs to God.” In our nation, so often, the separation of church and state has been interpreted to mean not a freedom for religion, so that I can practice freely the religion to which I choose to belong, but a freedom from religion. There is pressure from many directions to push faith aside, to simply make it a “private” matter. We need to be reminded that we have an obligation to repay to God what belongs to Him.
So the question is: What belongs to God? It doesn’t take us long to see that ultimately everything belongs to God. The fact that we have life, that we have air to breathe, comes from God. Everything that exists, including our very selves, ultimately belongs to God. God, then, deserves the first place in our lives. Against those who would have us push God aside in the public square, we must assert that God has the first priority in our lives. Every part of our lives should be open to Him and to how He wants to work in us. This is what Pope John Paul II was calling us to remember when he spoke those powerful words in St. Peter’s Square. So today, in calling us to render unto God what belongs to God, our Lord is asking us to open wide the doors of our lives to Him. He wants to be the Lord of every aspect of our lives, not out of a thirst for power over us but because He knows what is best for us. He knows what will bring us true happiness.
Over these past weeks, the bishops of our nation have been exhorting us time and again to repay to God what we owe to Him when we enter the voting booth on November 4th. They are asking us not to leave Christ outside when we enter to fulfill our duty. In a sense, they’re asking us to open wide the doors of the voting booth to Christ. In fact, it is by voting according to our conscience, formed by the teaching of the Church, that we will best serve our nation when we cast our ballots. Ultimately, when we do this, when we return to God what belongs to Him, we giving to the state, to Caesar, the best thing we have to offer.
Particularly, the bishops have asked us to vote in favor of life on that day. There has been much confusion among Catholics and non-Catholics alike about what can appear to be bishops meddling in affairs of the state. “How can they tell me how to vote?” we might ask. But when we really think about it, what the bishops are asking of us makes perfect sense. The Church teaches that life begins at the moment of conception. She doesn’t teach this from some special revelation from God. It is a fact of science that is taken up by the Church as proof for the sanctity of human life from the moment of conception. If we subscribe to this teaching, if we truly believe that what is conceived in the womb of a woman is a human person, then abortion suddenly becomes a chilling reality. It can be nothing other than the killing of an innocent human life, of a human person who has not even had the chance to breathe. Since the legalization of abortion 35 years ago, over 47 million lives have been ended before they could even see the light of day. 47 million… That means that for the last 35 years one out of every four children conceived in our nation have not even seen the light of day.
Here we can begin to see why the bishops are stressing life as the key issue for voting. It is true that there are many things to consider when voting. Our struggling economy is perhaps the most prominent right now. Perhaps many of us here today have felt the effects of it in our lives. There are many issues about the quality of life of people in our nation that are important, issues central to Catholic social teaching, but how can we hope to promote a quality of life when we don’t even defend the basic right to life in the first place? Mother Teresa said it well: “Any country that accepts abortion is not teaching its people to love but to use violence to get what they want. This is why the greatest destroyer of love and peace is abortion.” As people of faith, we believe that our bishops speak with the voice of the Church and that the voice of the Church is none other than the voice of Christ echoing in our world down through the centuries. Through our bishops, our Lord is crying out on behalf of the most vulnerable of our brothers and sisters, those who have no voice of their own. He is pleading with us in this election year to vote for candidates on the national, state, and local levels who will defend the dignity of human life. “If you love me,” our Lord is telling us, “listen to my voice. Choose life on November 4th.”
In the end, our Lord is asking us to trust Him. He’s asking us to trust that if we are faithful, if we do our part to defend the most vulnerable of our brothers and sisters, we cannot fail to begin to prosper again as a nation. We will see rise up in our midst a culture of life and of love. As Pope John Paul II reminded us 30 years ago, He wants us to open every aspect of our lives to Him, to His saving power. At his first public Mass as pope, Pope Benedict recalled Pope John Paul II’s words in 1978. Let us listen to the voice of our shepherd and choose here and now to open our lives anew, ever more fully, to the power of Christ at work in us who believe:
“Are we not perhaps all afraid in some way?” Pope Benedict asked. “If we let Christ enter fully into our lives, if we open ourselves totally to him, are we not afraid that He might take something away from us? Are we not perhaps afraid to give up something significant, something unique, something that makes life so beautiful? Do we not then risk ending up diminished and deprived of our freedom? And once again the Pope said: No! If we let Christ into our lives, we lose nothing, nothing, absolutely nothing of what makes life free, beautiful and great. No! Only in this friendship are the doors of life opened wide. Only in this friendship is the great potential of human existence truly revealed. Only in this friendship do we experience beauty and liberation. And so, today, with great strength and great conviction, on the basis of long personal experience of life, I say to you,…: Do not be afraid of Christ! He takes nothing away, and he gives you everything. When we give ourselves to him, we receive a hundredfold in return. Yes, open, open wide the doors to Christ – and you will find true life. Amen” (Benedict XVI, “Homily for the Inauguration of his Pontificate,” 24 April 2005).
Thursday, October 9, 2008
Respect Life Sunday: "The vineyard of the Lord is the house of Israel" (Is 5:7a)
St. Joseph Church (Cottleville)
27th Sunday of Ordinary Time - Year A
October 5, 2008 - 8:45 & 10:30 a.m.
Is 5:1-7
Ps 80
Phil 4:6-9
Mt 21:33-43
Today has been set aside by the Church as Respect Life Sunday, and there are any number of topics that would be good for our meditation this morning. We could reflect upon the sad reality of abortion-on-demand and the more than 45 million innocent lives that it has silenced over the last 35 years. At this time in our country, it would be especially appropriate to reflect upon our duty in a democratic nation to defend the sanctity of life by how we vote in national, state, and local elections. On these issues, I would refer you especially to Msgr. Callahan’s article in today’s bulletin and especially to the pastoral letter he references from the bishops of Kansas City. You will find there a very clear explanation of the Church’s teaching with regard to forming our consciences and exercising our duty to vote in accord with our conscience.
Indeed, it would be well and good to reflect upon these matters, but I want instead to take a step back and reflect more generally with you upon life itself. What do we mean when we use the word “life?” St. Irenaeus, a father of the Church, said that “the glory of God is man fully alive.” What does it mean for a human person to be fully alive?
On a natural level, it is clear that there can be no life without a man and a woman, a father and a mother. Life comes about as the fruit of their physical intimacy, and they share the responsibility for nourishing the life of their children as they grow and mature. I would like to suggest that this very basic understanding of human life is ultimately a kind of parable, a sign of something greater. By looking to human fathers and mothers, we learn something deeper about life. Each of us lives not only on the natural plane but also on the supernatural plane. We have natural life from our fathers and mothers, but they cannot in themselves give us supernatural life. They have a great responsibility to help us to come to receive supernatural life, but it is not something they can give in themselves.
To receive supernatural life, which means nothing other than communion with God, we must have God and God alone as our Father. Christ became man to reveal this to us, that God is truly our Father, our loving, caring Father, who wants to pour His life into our hearts. He wants us to live in communion with Him and to receive from Him everything for which our souls long. But then the question remains: if our natural parents are signs for us of what is also true on the supernatural level, and if, on the supernatural level, we have God as our Father, who is our mother? After all, we believe in one God. There cannot be a God who is our Father and a goddess who is our mother.
It didn’t take long after the death of Christ for Christians to figure out the answer to this question. St. Cyprian of Carthage lived from 190-258 A.D. Two centuries after the life of Christ, he wrote these words in his “Treatise on Unity”: “He cannot have God for his Father, who has not the Church for his mother.” It is in union with Mother Church that God our Father pours His divine life into our souls. In her we find the source of grace opened for us above all in the sacraments. Just as we are born from the womb of our mother, so the Church gives birth to supernatural life in us when we are born from her womb, the font of Baptism. Just as our earthly mother nourishes us with physical sustenance, so the Church nourishes us with the spiritual sustenance of the Eucharist. Just as our natural mother forgives us when we rebel against her, so does the Church give us pardon in the Sacrament of Penance.
It is this life, supernatural life, that St. Paul is talking about in his letter to the Philippians. God’s life, poured out into our souls, is what is most true, most honorable, most just. It is pure, lovely, gracious, excellent, worthy of praise. It is this above all that we are called to think about. This is what should give meaning to our lives. This is what should shape every word we speak, every decision we make, every action we do. This is precisely why the Church tirelessly fights for the right to natural life, why she fights against abortion, embryonic stem cell research, euthanasia. As St. Thomas put it, grace perfects nature, the supernatural is built upon the natural. The Church wants to give to every human person the supernatural life of God our Father, but to do so, the right to natural life must first be preserved. That is the foundation for the supernatural life. The Church wants the unborn to be born and the lives of the elderly to be preserved so that she can give them the greatest gift of all, God’s very own life.
This life only comes to us in its fullness when we willingly make ourselves children of the Church, our mother. So often, when our mother the Church speaks to us, as we believe she does through the Pope and the bishops throughout the world, we listen to her with adolescent ears. We hear her like a rebellious teenager whose doesn’t understand the love that lies behind what his mother tells him. The Church speaks to us, and all we hear is “no!” Mother Church says, “The unborn child deserves to live,” and we hear, “No – a woman does not have the right to choose.” Mother Church says, “A human embryo is a life and not material for medical research,” and we hear, “No – you may not look for a cure for your debilitating disease.” Mother Church says, “When you go to the polls, choose life,” and we hear, “No – you may not vote for so-and-so.” Our mother, the Church, loves us with the love of God. She wants only what is good for us and for our society and world.
But we struggle to see the Church as a gift of God to the world. We struggle to put aside our own wants and our own opinions in order to receive life and truth from our loving mother. And yet, as St. Cyprian told us, if we refuse to take the Church as our mother, we cannot have God as our Father, for He has chosen to unite Himself to the Church and through her to pour out His abundant life upon the world. The Church is the vineyard of today’s readings into which we must be planted in order to see fruit borne into our own lives and into our world.
Let us now turn our hearts toward this holy altar, upon which the sacrifice of Christ on Calvary will again become present. From this sacrifice comes every good and perfect gift. Let us beg our Lord today for the grace to love our mother, the Church, more perfectly, to let go of whatever lies we cling to and to allow ourselves to be embraced by the arms of the Church. Let us open ourselves today to receive from her in Holy Commuion Him Who is Life Himself – our Lord Jesus Christ. Then, in union with Him, will we have the courage to foster in our society a respect for the sanctity and dignity of every human life.
27th Sunday of Ordinary Time - Year A
October 5, 2008 - 8:45 & 10:30 a.m.
Is 5:1-7
Ps 80
Phil 4:6-9
Mt 21:33-43
Today has been set aside by the Church as Respect Life Sunday, and there are any number of topics that would be good for our meditation this morning. We could reflect upon the sad reality of abortion-on-demand and the more than 45 million innocent lives that it has silenced over the last 35 years. At this time in our country, it would be especially appropriate to reflect upon our duty in a democratic nation to defend the sanctity of life by how we vote in national, state, and local elections. On these issues, I would refer you especially to Msgr. Callahan’s article in today’s bulletin and especially to the pastoral letter he references from the bishops of Kansas City. You will find there a very clear explanation of the Church’s teaching with regard to forming our consciences and exercising our duty to vote in accord with our conscience.
Indeed, it would be well and good to reflect upon these matters, but I want instead to take a step back and reflect more generally with you upon life itself. What do we mean when we use the word “life?” St. Irenaeus, a father of the Church, said that “the glory of God is man fully alive.” What does it mean for a human person to be fully alive?
On a natural level, it is clear that there can be no life without a man and a woman, a father and a mother. Life comes about as the fruit of their physical intimacy, and they share the responsibility for nourishing the life of their children as they grow and mature. I would like to suggest that this very basic understanding of human life is ultimately a kind of parable, a sign of something greater. By looking to human fathers and mothers, we learn something deeper about life. Each of us lives not only on the natural plane but also on the supernatural plane. We have natural life from our fathers and mothers, but they cannot in themselves give us supernatural life. They have a great responsibility to help us to come to receive supernatural life, but it is not something they can give in themselves.
To receive supernatural life, which means nothing other than communion with God, we must have God and God alone as our Father. Christ became man to reveal this to us, that God is truly our Father, our loving, caring Father, who wants to pour His life into our hearts. He wants us to live in communion with Him and to receive from Him everything for which our souls long. But then the question remains: if our natural parents are signs for us of what is also true on the supernatural level, and if, on the supernatural level, we have God as our Father, who is our mother? After all, we believe in one God. There cannot be a God who is our Father and a goddess who is our mother.
It didn’t take long after the death of Christ for Christians to figure out the answer to this question. St. Cyprian of Carthage lived from 190-258 A.D. Two centuries after the life of Christ, he wrote these words in his “Treatise on Unity”: “He cannot have God for his Father, who has not the Church for his mother.” It is in union with Mother Church that God our Father pours His divine life into our souls. In her we find the source of grace opened for us above all in the sacraments. Just as we are born from the womb of our mother, so the Church gives birth to supernatural life in us when we are born from her womb, the font of Baptism. Just as our earthly mother nourishes us with physical sustenance, so the Church nourishes us with the spiritual sustenance of the Eucharist. Just as our natural mother forgives us when we rebel against her, so does the Church give us pardon in the Sacrament of Penance.
It is this life, supernatural life, that St. Paul is talking about in his letter to the Philippians. God’s life, poured out into our souls, is what is most true, most honorable, most just. It is pure, lovely, gracious, excellent, worthy of praise. It is this above all that we are called to think about. This is what should give meaning to our lives. This is what should shape every word we speak, every decision we make, every action we do. This is precisely why the Church tirelessly fights for the right to natural life, why she fights against abortion, embryonic stem cell research, euthanasia. As St. Thomas put it, grace perfects nature, the supernatural is built upon the natural. The Church wants to give to every human person the supernatural life of God our Father, but to do so, the right to natural life must first be preserved. That is the foundation for the supernatural life. The Church wants the unborn to be born and the lives of the elderly to be preserved so that she can give them the greatest gift of all, God’s very own life.
This life only comes to us in its fullness when we willingly make ourselves children of the Church, our mother. So often, when our mother the Church speaks to us, as we believe she does through the Pope and the bishops throughout the world, we listen to her with adolescent ears. We hear her like a rebellious teenager whose doesn’t understand the love that lies behind what his mother tells him. The Church speaks to us, and all we hear is “no!” Mother Church says, “The unborn child deserves to live,” and we hear, “No – a woman does not have the right to choose.” Mother Church says, “A human embryo is a life and not material for medical research,” and we hear, “No – you may not look for a cure for your debilitating disease.” Mother Church says, “When you go to the polls, choose life,” and we hear, “No – you may not vote for so-and-so.” Our mother, the Church, loves us with the love of God. She wants only what is good for us and for our society and world.
But we struggle to see the Church as a gift of God to the world. We struggle to put aside our own wants and our own opinions in order to receive life and truth from our loving mother. And yet, as St. Cyprian told us, if we refuse to take the Church as our mother, we cannot have God as our Father, for He has chosen to unite Himself to the Church and through her to pour out His abundant life upon the world. The Church is the vineyard of today’s readings into which we must be planted in order to see fruit borne into our own lives and into our world.
Let us now turn our hearts toward this holy altar, upon which the sacrifice of Christ on Calvary will again become present. From this sacrifice comes every good and perfect gift. Let us beg our Lord today for the grace to love our mother, the Church, more perfectly, to let go of whatever lies we cling to and to allow ourselves to be embraced by the arms of the Church. Let us open ourselves today to receive from her in Holy Commuion Him Who is Life Himself – our Lord Jesus Christ. Then, in union with Him, will we have the courage to foster in our society a respect for the sanctity and dignity of every human life.
First Friday Homily
Kenrick-Glennon Seminary
Friday of the 26th Week of Ordinary Time - Year II
October 3, 2008 (First Friday)
Jb 38:1, 12-21; 40:3-5
Ps 139
Lk 10:13-16
I’m sure we all heard with great sadness the recent news of the professor from the University of Minnesota who issued an appeal, asking for someone to send him a consecrated host which he could desecrate. We know that he carried out this act and then posted pictures of it on the Internet for all to see. This professor made the Catholic news again this week because he has been promoting a series of YouTube videos posted by someone else who has also carried out similar acts of desecration. This news disturbs and saddens us. We can perhaps hear our Lord addressing these people with the words he addressed to Chorazin, Bethsaida, and Capernaum in today’s Gospel: “Woe to you…” It is tragic that, like those towns of Jesus’ day, people see great signs worked in their midst, the great sign of the Holy Eucharist, and yet they reject Him.
Today being a First Friday, we recall our Lord’s request of St. Margaret Mary, that His people make reparation for such sins against His Sacred Heart, present in the Holy Eucharist. So much does our Lord love us, so much does our Lord love even those who would reject Him, that He allows us to make reparation for their sins. So, today, let us do so by such things as praying the Act of Reparation to the Sacred Heart or by making sacrifices for this intention. Of course, the greatest act of reparation we could make would be to humbly adore Him in this Mass and to approach to receive Him worthily.
This First Friday, however, is not only a call to make reparation for the sins of others. It is also an opportunity to examine our own attitude towards the Eucharist. Surely the thought of desecrating the Blessed Sacrament would not even enter into our thoughts, but we do offend our Lord in more subtle ways. For instance, what sort of language do we use to speak of the Blessed Sacrament in our conversations with others? How often do we come to Mass half-asleep, simply going through the motions and speaking the words thoughtlessly? How often do we approach to receive our Lord in Holy Communion while our minds and hearts are focused on the obligations that lie ahead of us that day?
For us who meet our Lord in this chapel day in and day out, the greatest temptation is to complacency. We can easily fall into a routine and fail to be fully engaged in what we say and do here. Today, let us beg the Lord for the grace to always come before Him with the attitude that Job had when faced with the wondrous presence of God, an attitude of humility and awe.
Tonight, throughout the world, Franciscans will be marking their founder’s Transitus, the crossing of St. Francis from this life to the next. Francis was a man burning with love for our Lord and for the Eucharist. He wrote to his brothers, encouraging them to approach the Holy Eucharist humbly. May these words of his inspire us to a more profound humility and more ardent love for our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament:
“Let everyone be struck with fear, let the whole world tremble, and let the heavens exult when Christ, the Son of the living God, is present on the altar in the hands of a priest! O wonderful loftiness and stupendous dignity! O sublime humility! O humble sublimity! The Lord of the universe, God and the Son of God, so humbles Himself that for our salvation He hides Himself under an ordinary piece of bread! Brothers, look at the humility of God, and pour out your hearts before Him! Humble yourselves that you may be exalted by Him! Hold back nothing of yourselves for yourselves, that He Who gives Himself totally to you may receive you totally in return” (Letter to the Entire Order, 1225-1226)!
Friday of the 26th Week of Ordinary Time - Year II
October 3, 2008 (First Friday)
Jb 38:1, 12-21; 40:3-5
Ps 139
Lk 10:13-16
I’m sure we all heard with great sadness the recent news of the professor from the University of Minnesota who issued an appeal, asking for someone to send him a consecrated host which he could desecrate. We know that he carried out this act and then posted pictures of it on the Internet for all to see. This professor made the Catholic news again this week because he has been promoting a series of YouTube videos posted by someone else who has also carried out similar acts of desecration. This news disturbs and saddens us. We can perhaps hear our Lord addressing these people with the words he addressed to Chorazin, Bethsaida, and Capernaum in today’s Gospel: “Woe to you…” It is tragic that, like those towns of Jesus’ day, people see great signs worked in their midst, the great sign of the Holy Eucharist, and yet they reject Him.
Today being a First Friday, we recall our Lord’s request of St. Margaret Mary, that His people make reparation for such sins against His Sacred Heart, present in the Holy Eucharist. So much does our Lord love us, so much does our Lord love even those who would reject Him, that He allows us to make reparation for their sins. So, today, let us do so by such things as praying the Act of Reparation to the Sacred Heart or by making sacrifices for this intention. Of course, the greatest act of reparation we could make would be to humbly adore Him in this Mass and to approach to receive Him worthily.
This First Friday, however, is not only a call to make reparation for the sins of others. It is also an opportunity to examine our own attitude towards the Eucharist. Surely the thought of desecrating the Blessed Sacrament would not even enter into our thoughts, but we do offend our Lord in more subtle ways. For instance, what sort of language do we use to speak of the Blessed Sacrament in our conversations with others? How often do we come to Mass half-asleep, simply going through the motions and speaking the words thoughtlessly? How often do we approach to receive our Lord in Holy Communion while our minds and hearts are focused on the obligations that lie ahead of us that day?
For us who meet our Lord in this chapel day in and day out, the greatest temptation is to complacency. We can easily fall into a routine and fail to be fully engaged in what we say and do here. Today, let us beg the Lord for the grace to always come before Him with the attitude that Job had when faced with the wondrous presence of God, an attitude of humility and awe.
Tonight, throughout the world, Franciscans will be marking their founder’s Transitus, the crossing of St. Francis from this life to the next. Francis was a man burning with love for our Lord and for the Eucharist. He wrote to his brothers, encouraging them to approach the Holy Eucharist humbly. May these words of his inspire us to a more profound humility and more ardent love for our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament:
“Let everyone be struck with fear, let the whole world tremble, and let the heavens exult when Christ, the Son of the living God, is present on the altar in the hands of a priest! O wonderful loftiness and stupendous dignity! O sublime humility! O humble sublimity! The Lord of the universe, God and the Son of God, so humbles Himself that for our salvation He hides Himself under an ordinary piece of bread! Brothers, look at the humility of God, and pour out your hearts before Him! Humble yourselves that you may be exalted by Him! Hold back nothing of yourselves for yourselves, that He Who gives Himself totally to you may receive you totally in return” (Letter to the Entire Order, 1225-1226)!
Welcome
Welcome to my brand new blog. I must confess that I never had a desire to maintain a blog of my own, but, since I was ordained a transitional deacon this past March 15 and began preaching, people from time to time have asked me for written copies of my homilies. I figure that this will be an easy way to share them with those who are interested. For now, this will be the primary purpose of this blog. We'll see where it goes from there...
I chose the title for this blog from this passage from the Book of Revelation: "The Spirit and the Bride say, 'Come.'" In our modern society, it is imperative for us Christians to open our lives in new and more perfect ways to the coming of Jesus Christ. He is the fullness of God's revelation, and He alone can give ultimate meaning to our lives. We must open our own hearts, our homes, our workplaces, and all of society to Him. This openness to Christ can only be done in union with His Bride, Holy Mother Church, who was born from the blood and water that poured forth from His Pierced Heart upon the cross.
I invite you to read and respond to what I post here. Together may we all respond faithfully to our Lord's call to further the spread of His Kingdom on earth, unto the fullness of its perfection in Heaven.
I chose the title for this blog from this passage from the Book of Revelation: "The Spirit and the Bride say, 'Come.'" In our modern society, it is imperative for us Christians to open our lives in new and more perfect ways to the coming of Jesus Christ. He is the fullness of God's revelation, and He alone can give ultimate meaning to our lives. We must open our own hearts, our homes, our workplaces, and all of society to Him. This openness to Christ can only be done in union with His Bride, Holy Mother Church, who was born from the blood and water that poured forth from His Pierced Heart upon the cross.
I invite you to read and respond to what I post here. Together may we all respond faithfully to our Lord's call to further the spread of His Kingdom on earth, unto the fullness of its perfection in Heaven.
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