Homily for Tuesday, 30 June 2015‒ Mass of the Holy Spirit

Tuesday of the 13th Week in Ordinary Time

This homily was given during a votive Mass of the Holy Spirit celebrated with faith formation and youth ministry leaders of the Diocese of Rochester at St. Bernard's School of Theology and Ministry, Rochester, NY.

Readings of the day: Isaiah 11:1-3a; Psalm 104:1, 24, 29-30, 31, 34; 1 Corinthians 12:3b-7, 12-13; Luke 4:16-21

My sisters and brothers, I feel humbled to celebrate with you, faith formation and youth ministry leaders of this Diocese of Rochester, this Mass of the Holy Spirit. Have any of us ever experienced how the Holy Spirit is beyond our words; concepts; images? We are in danger of limiting the Holy Spirit; limiting God if we try to describe the Holy Spirit by our words, concepts, and images.

And yet we are teachers; we are engaged in faith formation of our young people; sacramental preparation for confirmation. We work and live in a world of words; concepts; images. And so where do we begin in understanding something of the Holy Spirit? Or is not the Holy Spirit somebody, not something, not primarily to be understood but first a personal relationship with God that we experience?

How, then, do we experience the Holy Spirit? How are the youth we form in our parishes; the youth we form for the sacrament of confirmation experience the Holy Spirit? During my years in seminary in Toronto I ministered in children’s sacramental preparation. One of my favorite activities, when speaking of our experience of God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, was to give the children three blank sheets of paper. On one sheet, I would ask them to write or draw the first word or image in their minds when they thought of God the Father, then the same for the Son, and then the same for the Holy Spirit. Each year I received many drawings of an old, wise, and kind-looking man in the clouds to represent God the Father; a young, handsome, bearded man on land to represent the Son (the hippie Jesus?); and doves, wind lines, or occasionally fire to represent the Spirit. One year, when we were discussing our images of the Holy Spirit, one child handed me his still-blank page. “I don’t get it,” the child sighed, frustrated. To this day this child’s blank page is the best response to this activity I have ever seen!

Where do we begin with the Holy Spirit? Our readings today do not help us much. Isaiah speaks of “the Spirit of the LORD” as a series of gifts received by the prophet: Gifts “of wisdom and of understanding… of counsel and of strength… of knowledge and fear of the LORD.” These are the seven spiritual gifts listed in the Rite of Confirmation; the seven gifts of the Holy Spirit received or, perhaps better yet, intensified in us when we receive the sacrament of confirmation.

Like Isaiah, St. Paul understands the Holy Spirit as many “spiritual gifts but the same Spirit.” This is analogous to Paul’s description of our Church, Christ’s Body, as one body “though it has many parts,” or his emphasis on God as one yet inspiring in us “different forms of service”; “different workings,” all given to us “for some benefit”; for our unity as a community of faith. Unlike Isaiah, St. Paul does not even presume to list off individual gifts of God’s Spirit. Again, Paul’s emphasis is on the unity among us wrought by the Holy Spirit: “We were all baptized into one body… and we were all given to drink of one Spirit.”

The Psalmist conceives of God’s Spirit as a force for our renewal. We pray, “Lord, send out your Spirit, and renew the face of the earth.” And the high point of God’s renewal of “the face of the earth” is reached in God’s Son, Jesus Christ. In Luke’s Gospel we hear Jesus, standing before the synagogue crowd in his hometown of Nazareth, and proclaiming anew the words of Isaiah: “The Spirit of the LORD is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring glad tidings to the poor. He has sent me to bring glad tidings to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, and to proclaim a year acceptable to the LORD.”

Who is in need of the Spirit’s renewal today? Of course all of us are. But who are those especially in need of God’s Spirit: “The poor… the blind… the oppressed” among us today? It is no secret that our city; our diocese includes some of the poorest people in our nation. Even in the richest parishes, do we not encounter the materially poor; the unemployed and underemployed; the migrant; the refugee child and family? Have we not already encountered those “oppressed” by the breakdown of marriages and families; children who can become “blind” to God’s love for them by suffering; by experiences we would wish on no child; no person?

These are the people to whom the Lord sends us especially “to proclaim the Good News”: “Today the Scripture is fulfilled in your hearing.” Today God’s Holy Spirit is present among us. Today God’s Holy Spirit calls us to unity in Christ: “Many spiritual gifts” but “one body, one spirit in Christ.”

How do we proclaim this message today to those who are well-off; to those who are in stable households; to those who already have a strong faith; a strong relationship with God, and to those who do not; who are among “the poor,” the “oppressed,” and the “blind”? Today we are this living message. Today we are “the Scripture… fulfilled” in one another’s hearing; one another’s experience. Today we are sent to bear the Holy Spirit to all we meet; all we teach; all whom we form in our faith.

We may from time to time be like the child with a blank sheet of paper: “I don’t get it”! But is the Holy Spirit not less about “getting it” than living it? “The Holy Spirit is upon me.” How deeply do we believe and act by these words of Isaiah; words echoed by our Lord Jesus? If we live by kindness toward those we serve, even in the smallest ways; if we live in a way that seeks out those in special need and seeks to satisfy those needs as we are able; if we are humble enough to learn from those we teach; catechize; form; to place ourselves where they are in their experience of our faith, then we will know the Spirit more deeply than we could ever express in words or images.

We will then be able to say after our Lord: “The Spirit of the LORD” is upon me… Today this Scripture… is fulfilled in [our] hearing.” Today we are in relationship with our God of loving service as faith formators. Today God’s Holy Spirit dwells among us and is at work through us in the renewal of “the face of the earth.”

Homily for Monday, 29 June 2015‒ Solemnity of Sts. Peter and Paul

Monday of the 13th Week in Ordinary Time

Readings of the day: Acts 12:1-11; Psalm 24:2-3, 4-5, 6-7, 8-9; 2 Timothy 4:6-8, 17-18; Matthew 16:13-18

“Upon this rock I will build my Church, and the gates of the netherworld shall not prevail against it.” What do these words, first spoken by Jesus to St. Peter, mean for us today?

We live in a world of many crises, far from and near to us. Within the past week terrorist attacks have taken place in Kuwait, in Tunisia, and in France. Racism still rears its head in these United States. It has been exposed by the killing of nine people in a church in Charleston, South Carolina, and the role the Confederate flag may have as a symbol of racial hatred. We have heard this past weekend of the killing of one escaped convict and the capture of another here in New York State after a long manhunt. And with the recent Supreme Court ruling our country is once again deeply polarized over the meaning of marriage. Many, particularly some in leadership positions in the Church, have offered reasoned and nuanced reflection on this issue. I find this encouraging. But still many have forgotten due charity toward one another, especially those with whom we disagree. Many have forgotten the primacy of human dignity and Jesus’ teachings on love of God and neighbor; are in danger of forgetting Jesus’ words to Peter: “The gates of the netherworld” will not prevail against this community of faith, the Church, that Christ has instituted and safeguarded with its teaching tradition handed on from the Apostles.

“Upon this rock I will build my Church, and the gates of the netherworld shall not prevail against it.” Jesus first spoke these words to Peter in a time of crisis. Jesus went with his disciples “into the region of Caesarea Philippi.” Caesarea Philippi was built as a monument to Caesar and his puppet ruler in Israel at the time, Philip the Tetrarch, descendant of Herod. A cave outside of Caesarea Philippi is known as “the gates of the netherworld.” Animals would be thrown into this cave (a kind of magic ritual) by pagan believers to make peace with their gods. If the animal did not emerge from the other end of the cave, it meant the pagan gods were satisfied; Hades was kept at bay.

Jesus says here that these pagan rituals were useless; that our God is not an angry God placated by sacrifice but a God of mercy who sacrifices his Son out of love for us. And we as Church can have confidence in our God of love and the Church Christ has founded.

All the crises of St. Peter’s and St. Paul’s time, even death for their faith; our faith did “not prevail” against this Church. All the crises present and future will “not prevail” against us, either. How deep is our confidence; our trust in these words of Jesus? Jesus invites us to trust; to hold fast to truths handed on from the Apostles; to “run the race” and keep “the faith” as St. Paul did; to confess and live as St. Peter did that Jesus is “the Christ, the Son of the living God.”

Jesus invites us to go out into our world with confidence: “Upon this rock I will build my Church, and the gates of the netherworld shall not prevail against it.”

Homily for Saturday, 27 June 2015– Memorial of St. Cyril of Alexandria

Optional Memorial: Our Lady's Saturday

Saturday of the 12th Week in Ordinary Time

Readings of the day: Genesis 18:1-15; Responsorial Canticle: Luke 1:46-47. 48-49, 50, 53, 54-55; Matthew 8:15-17

Have you ever heard somebody laugh or be joyful when laughter or joy is unexpected? Or have you laughed or been joyful yourself in an unexpected situation? I can think of many situations in ministry when I have encountered joy and even laughter when it has been unexpected: Amid severe illness or that of a loved one, or when people share with me joyful moments they had with their loved ones who have recently passed away.

We know the healing effects laughter; a joyful spirit; smiling can have, even when we are not feeling very joyful: Relaxation; reduced heart rate and blood pressure, and so on… And laughter and joy have their place in our Scriptures.

Sarah despairs of ever conceiving a child with Abraham, despite God’s repeated promises to them of descendants. Who could blame Sarah for some despair? And so, in her despair (and with it some disbelief), Sarah laughs... at God. When I hear this story, I think of it as Biblical permission to laugh in unexpected, even difficult situations, and even to laugh at God. To laugh at God may not always be inappropriate or irreverent.

Here, God seems to reward Sarah and Abraham for finding comic relief at God’s expense. Of course, God returns Sarah’s humor even as God keeps his promise to grant her and Abraham a child. This child is named Isaac, Hebrew for “he laughs.” And so God gets the last laugh at Sarah and Abraham!

Sarah tries to deny her laughter at God today, but later in the Book of Genesis she will look back on her longing for a child with gratitude for her son Isaac, “he laughs.” “God has given me cause to laugh,” Sarah will say, “and all who hear it will laugh with me.”

The situation in our Gospel reading at first seems to be no laughing matter. A Roman centurion approaches Jesus and says, “Lord, my servant is lying at home paralyzed, suffering dreadfully.” Jesus immediately promises, and delivers on his promise, to heal the centurion’s servant: “I will come and cure him.” But before this Jesus greatly praises the centurion’s faith, which is greater than anybody “in Israel”; the centurion’s faith we echo every time we celebrate our Eucharist: “Lord, I am not worthy to have you enter under my roof. Only say the word and my servant shall be healed.”

What is so great about the centurion’s faith? Could it be his humility; his feeling of unworthiness to have the Lord “enter under” his “roof”? Could it have been his trust that Jesus could cure his beloved servant, even though the centurion was not of Jesus’ Jewish faith? Could it have been the centurion’s joyful spirit, even in the face of his servant’s illness? Could it have been all of the above?

Imagine the centurion’s joy, even though Matthew’s Gospel says nothing about how the centurion responded to Jesus’ healing of his beloved servant! The centurion’s hidden joy and Sarah’s open laughter invite us to the same joy; the same humble yet joyful faith. Our faith leaves us ample room for humor. I believe humor is even essential to a healthy life of faith. And sometimes, even amid the unexpected; even difficult situations, our faith leaves us room to laugh, even at God!

Homily for Friday, 26 June 2015– Ferial

Friday of the 12th week in Ordinary Time

Readings of the day: Genesis 17:1, 9-10, 15-22;  Psalm 128:1-2, 3, 4-5; Matthew 8:1-4

Who here has ever laughed at God? Would I be right in thinking that most of us here, myself included, would not laugh at God very often, out of reverence for God? We probably would not laugh at other people very often, either, because to laugh at other people is usually impolite. Would not many of us prefer to show other emotions to God, even anger, before we laugh at God?

But today we hear perhaps the most famous story in Scripture of somebody laughing at God. In spite of their old age, God once again promises Abraham and Sarah a child. Abraham responds to God’s promise by laughing at God! Now, I understand that God had promised a child to Abraham; had in fact promised Abraham descendants to number as the stars, and had yet to deliver on his promise, but is it not still rude and irreverent of Abraham to laugh at God? Abraham had been given many gifts from God: A loving wife, prosperity in land and herding livestock…

Could Abraham not have pleaded with God with the great trust of the leper in our Gospel reading today. Unlike Abraham, the leper is anything but rich and prosperous. He is an outcast in Israel of his and Jesus’ time. Yet this poor leper asks Jesus with great humility and trust: “Lord, if you wish, you can make me clean.” The leper does not ask Jesus, “Because I wish,” but “if you wish, you can make me clean.”

Abraham, who has everything but a child with Sarah (please, let us be sensitive to and pray for those who have difficulty conceiving children), does not ask God humbly to act according to God’s will, but laughs at God for not delivering on his promise of a child! But what happens when Abraham laughs at God? What happens when the leper in our Gospel reading asks Jesus, “If you wish, you can make me clean”? Both Abraham and the leper get what they want: Abraham and Sarah conceive a son, Isaac, and the leper is made clean.

And God gets the last laugh at Abraham. We cannot laugh at God and expect to get away with it without consequence! Can we imagine God saying to Abraham, “Fine. I’ll give you your son with Sarah as promised. But because you laughed at me, your son’s name is to be Isaac.” The name Isaac (for those of us named Isaac or who know somebody by this name) is Hebrew for “he laughs.” Abraham laughs at God, and God returns the laughter at Abraham by naming his and Sarah’s son Isaac. Importantly in this story, though, Abraham and Sarah never stop trusting in God, even if he laughs at God. Abraham is forever our “father in faith.”

And so laugh at God if we please, but may we always maintain our humility and trust in God, who wills our good ultimately. The leper in Matthew’s Gospel is an example to us of humility and trust in God: “Lord, if you wish, you can make me clean.” And Abraham also invites us to humble trust in God, if only with a small dose of humor!

Homily for Tuesday, 23 June 2015– Ferial

Tuesday of the 12th week in Ordinary Time

Readings of the day: Genesis 13:2, 12-18;  Psalm 15:2-3a, 3bc-4ab, 5; Matthew 7:6, 12-19

What is the most difficult message you have ever had to hear? Today I find our readings to be about extremely difficult but necessary messages.

Can we imagine Abram and Lot, good friends; both rich and successful in herding livestock; so successful that the land on which they have settled can no longer support both of them, so Abram and Lot must separate? It is bad enough when friends need to separate under ordinary circumstances: We move; we change schools or workplaces; we retire. Worse yet, we might experience the illness or death of a good friend. But would it not have been terrible for Abram and Lot to know that each other were still alive and well, but that they could never see each other again?

Jesus’ message in our Gospel reading is also extremely difficult but, I believe, necessary. Jesus teaches that there is a right and a wrong path; a way that leads to salvation and a way that does not, and that “those who find” the right path “are few.” What do we make of this harsh, ominous message?

Would it not be natural for us to want to soften Jesus’ message. Many do, especially in our time and culture. We know the error of relativism: That we can act as we please; we ought not to judge the beliefs or actions of one individual or culture as superior or not to the beliefs or actions of another. Salvation does not depend on accepting the Gospel of Jesus Christ or of any “organized religion,” many argue.

But this is not what Jesus teaches. Indeed our beliefs; our actions; whether we accept and practice the Gospel of Christ does matter for our salvation. But there is more. I do not wish to discourage us (and neither did Jesus), yet this is, I believe, is at the heart of Jesus’ message in Matthew’s Gospel today: Without God it is impossible for us to live fully by Christ’s Gospel; to live fully in a way that builds up human community and human dignity. Without God we cannot “enter through the narrow gate.” This is possible only by God’s grace.

And here is our hope; our encouragement: With God’s grace, if we accept this grace and live by it, will find and “enter through the narrow gate.” God is not actively trying to block our way to or through the gate; to obstruct our way to salvation. We can (and I think we are called to) hear in today’s Gospel reading that God wills the salvation of as many people; all of us if possible.

We are free to help one another or to obstruct one another from the salvation that God wills for all of us. May we help one another to salvation by kindness; by forgiveness; by works of mercy. May we avoid gossip; passive-aggression; any action or words that tear down others’ dignity; divide community; divide households; families. In our hearts; our consciences we know which actions and words lead us to salvation and which do not; which are right and which are wrong. With God’s grace, our salvation together is possible, even probable. Individually and without God, there is no salvation; no way “through the narrow gate.”

Jesus gives us this extremely difficult message today, but a message that is necessary; for our good; for our salvation.

Homily for Monday, 22 June 2015‒ Diocese of Rochester Patronal Feast of Sts. John Fisher and Thomas More

Monday of the 12th Week in Ordinary Time

Readings of the day: Genesis 12:1-9; Psalm 33:12-13, 14-15, 20, 22; Matthew 7:1-5

We pray in our Psalm today, “Blessed the people the LORD has chosen to be his own.” Have we not all been “chosen to be [God’s] own” by our baptism? But how many of us have been chosen for a task or vocation, especially when this was a great change in our lives, temporary or permanent? Maybe the point at which you were “chosen” was when you began your first job. Maybe it was when you were married (if you are or have been married) when you were chosen to be another’s “own,” in loving service to your wife or husband; to your family; to God. Maybe you experienced being “chosen to be [God’s] own” if you became Christian; Catholic as an older child or adult. Maybe it was when you were asked to care for somebody in special need, possibly sick relative or friend. Maybe you have been the person to whom your family has looked for strength in a time of loss of a loved one.

I have felt the blessing of being called God’s “own” many times. I was recently recalling having been called to serve for a few weeks in our novitiate in Colombia, with young men just beginning to discern their call to religious life and priesthood. On a Friday afternoon before Christmas, I was working quietly on my Advent Sunday homily when Fr. Morgan called from his meeting with the governing body of the Basilian order, in Toronto: “Would you be able to help for a few weeks in Colombia”? And then (somewhat less of a surprise than being asked to serve in Colombia) was my call to the priesthood. Again, I felt a deep sense of being blessed to share in Christ’s priesthood here at St. Kateri.

“Blessed the people the LORD has chosen to be his own.” Today we celebrate Abram, one of the first to have been “chosen to be [the LORD’s] own.” We hear in Genesis of how God chose Abram to “go forth from the land” of his family; from everything and everybody he knew. Long before God made good on his promises to Abram (later Abraham), Abram lived on nothing more than a promise. Abram lived on a sense that he and Sarai were blessed to be “chosen to be [God’s] own.” Abram’s trust in God’s promise of blessing made him our “father in faith.”

And today we also celebrate the feast day of St. John Fisher, patron saint of this diocese; Bishop of Rochester in England; cardinal of our Church; martyred by King Henry VIII, and St. Thomas More, Henry VIII’s Chancellor and also a martyr of Henry VIII. Both John Fisher and Thomas More had a keen sense of having been “chosen to be [God’s] own”; of serving God and following their conscience over their allegiance to the king. Perhaps St. Thomas More’s most famous line is, “I remain the king’s humble servant but God’s first.”

Sts. John Fisher and Thomas More were blessed to serve the king; blessed even more for having accepted martyrdom. They, like Abram, trusted in God’s promise of blessing, and call us to the same trust. “Blessed the people the LORD has chosen to be his own.”

Homily for Friday, 19 June 2015– Ferial

Friday of the 11th week in Ordinary Time

Optional Memorial of St. Romuald, Abbot

Readings of the day: 2 Corinthians 11:18, 21-30;  Psalm 34:2-3, 4-5, 6-7; Matthew 6:19-23

“Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth,” Jesus says, “but store up treasures in heaven… For where your treasure is, there also will your heart be.” So what or who is our greatest treasure? Where do we find our greatest treasure; the person or thing that attracts us most deeply, from the heart?

I am going to anticipate, since we are all here for Mass, many of us daily, that Christ, really present in the Eucharist, is our greatest treasure. But something is curious when we say that Christ in the Eucharist is our greatest treasure. What is it? What is curious to say and believe this is that we take something created, ordinary bread and wine (although, yes, this bread and wine mysteriously becomes for us the body and blood; the real presence of Christ), to be our greatest treasure. Does this not go against what Jesus asks us not to do in Matthew’s Gospel, which is to “store up for” ourselves “treasures on earth” and not in heaven?

Yes and no. Yes in the sense that in our Eucharist ordinary bread and wine; ordinary things of creation become our greatest treasure. But no, we do not go against Jesus’ teaching to “store up… treasures in heaven” and not “on earth” in the sense that, in our Eucharist, we are not making something created a god. Instead, God; Jesus Christ makes his home within what is created, just as he has made his home among us in human flesh, and so transforms this creation (bread and wine; us) to be Christ’s presence in our world. This is God’s work, not ours first.

This, I think, is at the heart of Jesus’ saying: “Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth… but store up treasures in heaven… For where your treasure is, there also will your heart be.” Do not make created things or people into gods, but value and, yes, treasure creation. How do we do this?

At one extreme, we see greed for earthly treasures: Some hoard the world’s resources at the expense of many poor. At another extreme, some interpret Jesus’ words against storing up “treasures on earth” as permission not to care for creation: “The end of creation; of our universe will happen sooner or later, so why protect our earth; our environment”?

Both these extremes are wrong. Jesus invites us to treasure creation not as a god but as God’s gift. At every Mass we express that we treasure creation as God’s gift: “Blessed are you God of all creation, for through your goodness we have received the bread” and “the wine we offer you…”

I am just beginning to read Pope Francis’ newest letter to all Catholics on care for our environment, Laudato si‒ “Praise be.” Pope Francis makes the same point: Treasure creation insofar as it directs us to our greatest “treasure in heaven.” Value rightly “the spiritual treasures bestowed by God upon the Church,” Pope Francis says, “not dissociated from the body or from nature or from worldly realities, but lived in and with them, in communion with all that surrounds us.”

“Praise be to you… Lord,” for creation; for our Eucharist especially, which directs us to you, our creator; our treasure “in heaven,” where our heart is.

Homily for Thursday, 18 June 2015– Ferial

Thursday of the 11th week in Ordinary Time

Readings of the day: 2 Corinthians 11:1-11;  Psalm 111:1b-2, 3-4, 7-8; Matthew 6:7-15

Have you ever encountered somebody who has said or done something foolish? Could it have been the person who made an unconvincing argument or the person who inattentively cut ahead of you in line or in traffic (I am guilty as charged on this count!)?

The Corinthians addressed by our first reading had encountered somebody they thought was foolish: Paul of Tarsus. Might we be asking, “Why be so irreverent and critical toward a great saint and apostle like St. Paul?” I love St. Paul, one of my favorite saints in Scripture, but in his second Letter to the Corinthians St. Paul even admits his own foolishness. He says to the Corinthians, “Brothers and sisters, if only you would put up with a little foolishness from me”!

What could possibly have made the great St. Paul appear foolish, at least in the Corinthians’ eyes? St. Paul admits that he is not the most gifted speaker. He admits that he is not like the philosophers in Corinth and other large pagan cities of the time who drew students to themselves and could command a fee for their teaching. “I preached the Gospel to you without charge,” St. Paul says to the Corinthians. But neither being “untrained in” speaking nor teaching “without charge” at the time would have made St. Paul appear foolish, even to the many arrogant Corinthians.

No, St. Paul is considered foolish by many Corinthians because he is in love. And we know that love is irrational; foolish even at times… St. Paul loves the Corinthians; loves and lives by the Gospel he is preaching, the Gospel of Christ crucified and risen. St. Paul is in love with the true Christ behind the Gospel message of our faith, and so the Corinthians label him as foolish!

And who is the true Christ whom St. Paul preaches in Corinth? The true Christ is the Christ of our Gospel reading; the Christ who invites us not to “babble like the pagans” but to trust in our “Father who knows what [we] need before [we] ask him.”

“Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy Kingdom come; thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” What kind of prayer is this, Jesus, in today’s world in which many do not revere God’s name; do not even know or want to know God; do not revere God in creation or in the dignity of all human life?

“Give us this day our daily bread.” What kind of prayer is this amid individualism that will not admit when we are in need; that we need God; Christ’s real presence in the “daily bread” of our Eucharist?

“Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive… and lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil.” But can we not simply deny evil and sin;  deny our need for forgiveness; our need to forgive others if only for our own peace, as many do? 

What kind of prayer is this? This is a prayer of the foolish! Yet Jesus has made himself so foolish out of love for us that he died for us! And if Christ is a fool out of love, then he invites us to be fools for him, because we love as he loves us.

Homily for Sunday, 14 June 2015

11th Sunday in Ordinary Time

Readings of the day: Ezekiel 17:22-24; Psalm 92:2-3, 13-14, 15-16; 2 Corinthians 5:6-10; Mark 4:26-34

Jesus asks us in Mark’s Gospel, “To what shall we compare the Kingdom of God”? Jesus then compares the Kingdom of God to “a mustard seed.” How does the Kingdom of God compare to a tiny mustard seed? Why did Jesus not compare the magnificence of God’s Kingdom to a larger seed or plant than a mustard seed? At least Ezekiel, in our first reading today, compares God’s Kingdom to a mighty cedar tree planted on “a high and lofty mountain” for all to see.

Why a mustard seed? Jesus succeeds here as a teacher and storyteller if only because his comparison between the Kingdom of God and a mustard seed is so unusual. Yes, the little mustard seed in Jesus’ parable grows into “the largest of plants and puts forth large branches, so that the birds of the sky can dwell in its shade.” But have you ever been in a desert; seen how mustard grows in a desert? There are more magnificent plants, especially in a desert, than mustard, which grows more as a low shrub than a tall, beautiful tree under the desert heat and in poor soil. Could Jesus’ point have been in the last line of his parable: “So that the birds of the sky can dwell in [the] shade” of the mustard plant? Could Jesus have been trying to emphasize the nurturing, sheltering qualities of the Kingdom of God; the love with which God nurtures us; cares for us in the way a mustard plant shelters birds from the desert heat?

I imagine this could have been Jesus’ intended focus of his parable of the mustard seed. After all, would our taking this focus from the parable of the mustard seed not fit with our experience; our understanding of God as all-good; as the creator who cares for and nurtures all creation; who loves and wants a relationship of love with us? In this way, Jesus’ parable of the mustard seed could easily point us toward God’s goodness. Ezekiel’s image of God’s kingdom as the cedar atop a high mountain could point us toward God’s greatness; God’s power. And can we not imagine our God and God’s Kingdom as both like the mustard seed and like the cedar; both good and great; both nurturing and powerful?

But still: Why a tiny mustard seed to describe God’s Kingdom? Is this Jesus’ unusual way of inviting us to trust in God’s wisdom; to trust in the God who can transform even the most insignificant, like the mustard seed, into something magnificent that serves our good: The mustard plant; the Kingdom of God that shelters us; nurtures us; is our eternal home; our salvation?

What would my ideal image of the Kingdom of God be, if not a mustard seed? Imagine the Kingdom of God as a tomato vine. Why a tomato vine, we may ask? Many of us know Fr. Joe as an expert gardener among the priests of St. Kateri! Just outside the back door of our rectory are Fr. Joe’s tomato vines. They are just beginning to leaf out and to climb up the tomato cages. A few days ago, Fr. Joe and I were returning home from breakfast with friends. As we were about to enter the house, Fr. Joe noticed the first tomato of the season on one of the vines: Only about the diameter of a dime; like a small marble in size and bright green. This tomato has a while to go before it can be picked and eaten. And yet I wish I could do justice in describing Fr. Joe’s joy at seeing this first tomato of the season on his plants. Fr. Joe gave emphatic thanks to God for this promise of an abundant harvest of tomatoes this summer. I could not help but share in Fr. Joe’s joy in this little green tomato!

The Kingdom of God is like a tomato vine. The gardener plants it. The day-to-day growth of the vine up the tomato cage is not noticeable to the gardener who waters it; cares for it; clears weeds from around it. One moment the gardener, if he is Fr. Joe, is praying, seated next to his beautiful garden. The next moment, looking up from his book of prayer, he shifts to a mildly threatening gaze to warn away pesky chipmunks…  One day, with great joy the gardener sees the first little green tomato on one of his vines. He gives thanks; prays to God to continue to sustain its growth.

It is only a little green tomato on a short vine. It is vulnerable to being eaten by animals or damaged by insects. It must be protected from a late frost. It is far from ripe. And yet this little green tomato is God’s promise of a fruitful harvest. By the end of the season the tomato plants will be weighed down by big, red, ripe, delicious tomatoes. They give shelter to many small creatures, including, I am sure, a few pesky chipmunks… These tomatoes will help to give yet more joy to the gardener. They will nourish him and those who live with him or are our guests at table for the work of the Kingdom of God; of service to this, our parish, and to God. These seeds that give rise to shoots, then vines, then little green tomatoes that ripen and are harvested seem insignificant. But with trust in God, love for those who will benefit and be nourished by his harvest, and hours of hard work, the gardener faithfully tends these tomato plants.

In the words of our second reading, from St. Paul’s second Letter to the Corinthians, the gardener’s work is an exercise in walking (and nurturing the plants) “by faith and not by sight.” The gardener’s work is one of patience. The gardener trusts in and becomes a source of God’s great wisdom, the gift of God’s Holy Spirit that brings about a fruitful harvest; the Kingdom of God; our salvation, all from apparently insignificant beginnings, like little green tomatoes... or mustard seeds in the desert, or mighty cedar trees on mountaintops, which themselves begin as small shoots.

“To what shall we compare the Kingdom of God”? Unlike Fr. Joe, gardening has never been my strength. Neither, maybe, is composing and speaking in parables. But whether we imagine the Kingdom of God as a mustard seed planted in the desert, a mighty cedar tree on a mountain, or a tomato vine in Irondequoit, is the point of all these parables not the same?

God invites us to trust in God’s wisdom. The wisdom of God brings about a great harvest from insignificant beginnings. God’s wisdom brings about our salvation; our experience of the fullness of the Kingdom of God. And, here and now, God loves us; wants a relationship of love with us. God gives us just enough of God’s own wisdom, here and now, that we can co-operate with God in building and nurturing God’s Kingdom.

We are called to co-operate, guided by the wisdom of God the Holy Spirit, in building and nurturing a kingdom of kindness; of patience (except perhaps with pesky chipmunks!); of joy even in the small beginnings of what we are promised will be: Fullness of the Kingdom of God; our salvation, whatever image we have of this. And all this from a tiny mustard seed, a cedar shoot or, if you will, little green tomatoes…

Homily for Friday, 12 June 2015– Solemnity of the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus

Friday of the 10th Week in Ordinary Time

Readings of the day: Hosea 11:1, 3-4, 8c-9;  Responsorial Canticle: Isaiah 12:2-3, 4, 5-6; Ephesians 3:8-12, 14-19; John 19:31-37

What does it mean for us to love God? Fr. Larry Gillick, a Jesuit priest at Creighton University, has what I find to be a helpful answer to this question. Fr. Gillick says that “to love God is to let God love us.”

This leads me to more questions, which we might take to our examination of conscience; our prayer and meditation, maybe daily. My questions are these: When have we let God love us? And when have we not let God love us and so have been in need of God’s love and mercy more than ever?

Our answer to when we have let God love us is easier than we might think. Look around at all of us who are here in God’s presence; in Christ’s presence in this Eucharistic celebration. Our presence, here to meet God’s presence, is the foremost way in which we as Christians show that we are allowing God to love us. And so we show by gathering for this Eucharist that we love God. We also show that we are willing to let God love us; that we love God by our celebration of any of the Church’s sacraments. We show this by our works of kindness and justice; of service toward one another, especially those most in need: The poor; the sick; those who have lost a loved one; those whose loved ones experience need or hardship. We show our willingness to let God love us, and so we show we love God, when we allow ourselves to be served by another’s kindness and generosity when we are in need.

God’s love for us is certain. We can be confident in and never despair of God’s love for us, no matter our need; no matter how well or how often we pray; no matter our sin. Our readings today on this feast of the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus, and the feast itself, ask the fundamental question: How much are we willing to let God love us?

The Book of the Prophet Hosea, from which our first reading is drawn, is set during an especially troublesome time in ancient Israel’s history. The kings of Israel, in the line of King David, as well as the people had become corrupt, turning to false gods and committing all forms of social injustice toward the weakest and most vulnerable. The end of the monarchy and exile into foreign nations threaten if Israel continues to be unfaithful to God and unjust to its own people. But God is willing, out of love, to forgive; not to remain angry if Israel returns to faithfulness to God. Hosea’s question to the Israelites is this: Are you willing to let God love you?

This same question is at the center of our second reading, from Ephesians. God has been present; has loved us into being from the moment of creation. God sustains creation; us out of love. God has given us himself in the person of Jesus Christ: The utmost act of love possible. And our Gospel reading speaks of the events immediately after Jesus’ death on the cross. Jesus pours forth love, shown as blood and water, from his heart, pierced by the soldiers’ lance while Jesus hangs on the cross.

Our devotion; our feast today of the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus draws us to answer this same question and, do we not believe, answers this question with a resounding “Yes”: Do we love God, and do we show our love for God by letting God love us?

Homily for Thursday, 11 June 2015‒ Memorial of St. Barnabas

Thursday of the 10th Week in Ordinary Time

Readings of the day: Acts 11:21b-26, 13:1-3; Psalm 98:1, 2-3ab, 3cd-4, 5-6; Matthew 5:20-26

Who was St. Barnabas, whose feast we celebrate today? What made St. Barnabas the apostle, the effective teacher of our faith, and the trusted partner to St. Paul that he was?

Our Scriptures give us little information about St. Barnabas, but is the short description we hear in Acts, in our first reading today, of Barnabas not key to understanding something about who Barnabas was? St. Barnabas is described as “a good man, filled with the Holy Spirit and faith.”

Because St. Barnabas was “a good man, filled with the Holy Spirit and faith,” the people he served, first in Antioch, gained confidence in him and his teaching. For the same reason, St. Barnabas was able to find Saul (later St. Paul) in Tarsus and bring him to Antioch to serve with him there. Because Barnabas was “a good man, filled with the Holy Spirit and faith,” he was able to surround himself with an important cast of “prophets and teachers” to help him to evangelize and encourage the people in Antioch. For St. Barnabas, his work was not about him, but about Christ and his Gospel.

Can we not imagine St. Barnabas as a person who took to heart and practiced Jesus’ message of reconciliation of which we hear in today’s Gospel reading, from Matthew? If Barnabas ever became angry (we can imagine that he did), can we not imagine him seeking reconciliation with the people with whom he was angry? Jesus does not say in Matthew’s Gospel that anger itself is sinful. But if we put up barriers to reconciliation; if our anger leads to gossip; to labeling and demeaning those with whom we are angry, this Jesus says is sinful. Figuratively (and with some exaggeration for effect), this deliberate failure to seek reconciliation is what Jesus considers to be like murder.

But I imagine saints like Barnabas as examples of reconciliation; of patience; of kindness to their early Christian communities. Barnabas was “a good man, filled with the Holy Spirit and faith.” This is what made St. Barnabas an authentic Apostle of Christ in whom the people he served trusted.

To what extent is the same true of us? To what extent are we “good [people], filled with the Holy Spirit and faith”? We do not celebrate St. Barnabas and the many saints like him because they are unattainable ideals of what the lives of Christians could or should be. No, we celebrate St. Barnabas because, with God’s grace, we are all invited to be like him: “Good” and “filled with the Holy Spirit and faith.” We are all called to holiness; to show this holiness to the world by the way we live, in small ways, minute-by-minute; day-by-day. And we are called to seek mercy; reconciliation with God and one another for when we fail to meet this divine calling.

We can be (and many of us are) just like St. Barnabas in this way. Not all of us are apostles like St. Barnabas or great teachers, or prophets. Yet to the extent we live by kindness; forgiveness; reconciliation; patience; joy, the world will take notice. And our God will certainly recognize us as authentic people of Christ; people who are “good” and “filled with the Holy Spirit and with faith.”

Homily for Tuesday, 9 June 2015– Ferial

Tuesday of the 10th week in Ordinary Time

Readings of the day: 2 Corinthians 1:18-22;  Psalm 119:129, 130, 131, 132, 133, 135; Matthew 5:13-16

When was the last time you said “yes” to God? I invite us to look around for a moment. Look at all of us who are here. Our first act of the morning is to be here to celebrate Christ present among us in our Eucharist. This is a resounding “yes” to God!

Some of us might ask: What about any ills of mind, body, or spirit that we bring to this celebration? What about our sins, when in St. Paul’s words to the Corinthians we have said at best “‘yes’ and ‘no’” to our God who always says “yes” to us? Once again, I say, we are here, with all our ills, our distress, our poverty of spirit if not material poverty, our distractions, our inability to focus at prayer… We are here; we have brought to this celebration all this: Our many times of saying “yes” to God through our worship, our actions of love and kindness, and our service to people in need in countless ways. And we bring our instances of saying “no” or “yes and no” to God; to one another. Nevertheless we are here.

And the more instances we bring here to this celebration of having said “yes and no”; of being in need of God’s forgiveness and healing make our “yes” by being here all the greater! We begin our Eucharistic celebration by asking for God’s mercy: “Lord, have mercy. Christ, have mercy. Lord, have mercy,” not because of the weight of our sins; our having said “yes and no” to God or (although I believe this is rare) “no” outright to God. We pray for God’s mercy because of our confidence in God’s “yes” to us. And in this prayer for mercy just as we gather before the Word of God; before the Lord’s Table, our “yes” to God receives and embraces God’s “yes” to us. And then we receive and embrace God’s ultimate “yes” to us, God’s Son Jesus Christ truly and fully present in our Eucharist; in our communion of faith with one another. The Christ we receive and embrace here then gives us the strength to be Christ to our world. “Yes,” over and over again, to God and to one another: How wonderful!

May we never despair of God’s mercy; God’s constant “yes” to us, in our Eucharist and in all the sacraments of the Church. Our “yes” back to God; our partaking in the life and sacraments of our Church takes much courage. Yet I cannot count the ways in which we, people of St. Kateri, say “yes” to God by the way we live. God is here with mercy through the Church when our “yes” is imperfect; when our “yes” needs the added strength of God. But we have already made the utmost act of courage just by being here, many of us daily. We hear the Word of God proclaimed here; the homily given. But we are, perhaps as importantly, the best homily ever given; the Word of God proclaimed among one another and in our world with conviction; with courage by the way we live: With deliberate if small acts of kindness, with joy, with patience, with gentleness, with mercy…

“Yes” to God who is always “yes” to us.

Homily for Monday, 8 June 2015– Ferial

Monday of the 10th week in Ordinary Time

Readings of the day: 2 Corinthians 1:1-7;  Psalm 34:2-3, 4-5, 6-7, 8-9; Matthew 5:1-12

Have you ever had the need to correct another person, or to speak out or write against a cultural tendency that is wrong or even sinful? If you have ever had to correct; criticize; confront another or a society’s ills, how often do we try to praise the person or society for right actions and tendencies before we offer our criticism?

I imagine St. Paul doing this at the beginning of his Second Letter to the Corinthians, which we hear today as our first reading. 2 Corinthians is often called St. Paul’s “angry letter” or is thought to be the “tearful letter” of which St. Paul speaks in 1 Corinthians. No early Christian community gave St. Paul as much trouble; tried his patience as much as the church of Corinth, in what is now Greece.

What made Corinth so troublesome to St. Paul? Corinth was ideally situated on the Mediterranean; a city with two ports. Because of this Corinth became very wealthy in a short time, at about the same time St. Paul brought the Christian faith there. Many Corinthians thought their city; their culture to be superior, even invincible. Who was this Jesus whom St. Paul preached to challenge their ways of living? Many in Corinth in Paul’s time were smug and involved in all kinds of immorality because their wealth could buy it or buy their way out of trouble.

But today we do not hear St. Paul criticize these Corinthians. Instead, he begins his Second Letter to the Corinthians with a lengthy encouragement of those trying to keep the faith in Jesus Christ that Paul has taught them. St. Paul especially encourages “those who are in any affliction.” He identifies; empathizes with their affliction and also having been encouraged in his moments of affliction; suffering.

What were the sources of “affliction” of the Corinthians whom St. Paul encourages in these first words of his letter to them? Were they external pressures: The threat of persecution under the Roman Empire or anybody opposed to the Christian faith, perhaps? The causes of suffering for faithful Corinthian Christians could also have been internal pressures to conform to the prevailing culture. They could have been pressures toward hoarding of wealth; toward excessive pleasures; toward disregard for the dignity of the human body more than toward faithfulness to Christ and his Gospel.

What are sources of “affliction” in our world; our country; our families today? Who is most in need of our “encouragement”? Could these people often be the same people in need of our firm challenge, even occasional criticism?

Drawing upon St. Paul, could our words of correction; criticism; our “angry” or “tearful letters” and words not more often be preceded by encouragement? To our children and grandchildren who no longer attend Mass: What is drawing them away from regular worship? Do they need criticism, or do they first need somebody from among us to hear them; to encourage them in ways they are living rightly? What are underlying afflictions of those who abuse their bodies with alcohol; drugs; sex? What about the poor among us?

St. Paul’s words to the Corinthians today invite us to be mindful of people who need our encouragement amid their afflictions that we may not even see.

Homily for Saturday, 6 June 2015– Ferial

Saturday of the 9th week in Ordinary Time

Optional Memorial: Our Lady's Saturday

Readings of the day: Tobit 12:1, 12-15, 20;  Responsorial Canticle: Tobit 13:2, 6efgh, 7, 8; Mark 12:38-44

Have you ever been helped or served by somebody and only after the fact found out who acted toward you with kindness? Have you ever done a hidden act of kindness for another person?

To act with kindness toward somebody without revealing to this person (at least not immediately) that you have done something kind toward her or him is difficult. I am not speaking primarily of those who boast to another that they have acted with kindness, as if to say, “Look at me! I was a great help to another person!”

Jesus cautions us in our Gospel reading against this kind of boasting. He condemns “the scribes who like to go around in long robes and accept greetings in the marketplaces, seats of honor in synagogues, and places of honor at banquets”; who “devour the houses of widows and, as a pretext, recite lengthy prayers.” Short of boasting of our kindness and seeking “greetings” and “places of honor,” are not the best acts of kindness those that are hidden? This is not to say that to keep our acts of kindness hidden is easy!

But our readings today give us examples of works of kindness in which the identity of the person acting with kindness is hidden, or at least not recognized at first. Today we near the end of the Old Testament story of Tobit and his family. Tobit’s son, Tobias, is happily married to Sarah. The angel Raphael, in disguise as a man, Azariah, sets up this wedding of Tobias and Sarah by accompanying Tobias to the home of Sarah’s parents Raguel and Edna to ask them to marry Sarah.

But Raphael does not take credit for his gift of company; friendship; even some instances of healing from illness on the journey. Until late in today’s reading; late in the Book of Tobit, Raphael does not even reveal who he is. Instead, when Tobias pays Raphael a handsome “bonus” for traveling with him, Raphael asks Tobias to thank not him but God. “Give [God] the praise and the glory. Before all the living, acknowledge the many good things [God] has done for you.”

And are not most if not all of us familiar with Jesus’ observation of the people contributing to “the temple treasury”? The “many rich people” who “put in large sums” to the temple treasury are not doing anything wrong. Yet, Jesus says, the “poor widow” who puts “in two small coins” makes the greatest contribution of all, because her contribution is hidden.

It is hidden beneath the large sums contributed by the rich who are able to give more. The widow’s contribution is hidden beneath even her poverty. “Poor” is not her true identity; “blessed by God” is. Her true identity is hidden beneath many layers: Her poverty; the wealth of the “many rich people”; cultural and religious expectations of both social classes.

Likewise, for us to be seen doing acts of kindness is not wrong. Sometimes to keep our kindness entirely hidden is difficult if impossible. So what does God ask of us? At least (after the example today of Raphael), give thanks to God for the opportunities we have to act kindly. And, if we have the opportunity to act kindly toward somebody in a hidden way, take this opportunity.

Homily for Friday, 5 June 2015‒ Memorial of St. Boniface

Friday of the 9th Week in Ordinary Time

St. Kateri School Mass

Readings of the day (alternate readings for Mass with children): 1 John 3:1, 23; Psalm 34; John 15:12-15

Is anybody here a bit sad that this is the last St. Kateri School Mass of the year? I am, just a bit, because I love being with you, our St. Kateri children; parents; teachers; staff… I’ll miss you when you’re not at school every day; when I’m not at the front door of our school to greet you almost every day!

But then how many of you love summer? What are some of the things you love most about summer?

Our readings today speak to us about love. What is love? First, who loves us so much that he calls us his own children? God loves us so much “that he lets us be called his children, as we truly are.” This is what we hear in our first reading today, from the first letter of John. Isn’t it pretty amazing that God loves us as our parents love you, their children, only more?

God could just sit up in heaven, all-powerful, and say, “I made the earth; the universe; all things and living beings in it. There you go; you’re on your own”! But God doesn’t do this. Why? God wants to be part of our lives; to be the very center of our lives because God loves us. And what did God do for us; whom did God send us to show God’s love for us? God has sent us his own Son, Jesus Christ, who lived among us and gave his life for us on a Cross and then rose again so that we could always be with the God who loves us, now and in heaven.

But there is one thing that God, who loves us more than we can even imagine, asks of us. What does God ask of us? God asks that we love one another, not only when we want to, or when the people we are asked to love are nice to us, but all the time. “God wants us to have faith in his Son Jesus Christ”; to believe that Jesus is God (and also human, like us) and loves us, “and to love one another. This is also what Jesus taught us to do,” we hear today from the first letter of John.

Is it easy to love each other? Is it easy to love, especially when others are unkind to us or irritate us? Love is often not easy. And Jesus doesn’t pretend that it is when he asks us to love one another as he loves us, as “friends,” in today’s Gospel reading.

Does anybody here remember what Jesus says in our Gospel reading is “the greatest way to show love for friends”? Jesus says, “the greatest way to show love for friends is to die for them.” This is not only difficult, but isn’t the thought of dying for somebody, even somebody good, a bit scary? This is scary to me! We know that Jesus died for us but, well, he’s God. Are we supposed to show our love exactly as Jesus says, by dying for one another? Well, yes and no.

I don’t think that Jesus means that, if we don’t literally give up our life for another person, we don’t love enough. But we can give up ourselves, our selfishness, in many little ways and so show that we love one another. We can be kind and patient with each other even when we don’t feel like it, when we’re tired, or have had a bad day. We can smile. One of the beautiful ways we show we love and care for one another we do every day here at St. Kateri. What is this way in which we show love for one another as friends? I think it’s when we hold the door open for the next person who is entering our school after us. Even if we want to run ahead, Sr. Kay sometimes reminds us, out of love and care for each other we look back to see if anybody is entering the school after us. And we hold the door for her or him. Imagine this as our practice for heaven. Only, when we get to heaven, we don’t know who will be following after us. Still, look back and hold the door open. As small an action as this is, it shows love. It is “giving up” of ourselves for another person, as Jesus asks us. And more people will get into heaven the more we love; the more we hold doors open.

I have one more story. It’s about St. Boniface, whose special day the Church celebrates today. St. Boniface lived hundreds of years ago in what is now Germany. Boniface showed love for the people among whom he lived, usually in small ways. Boniface was made a bishop of an area on the edge of what was then the Roman Empire; an area with very few people who believed in Jesus. So Boniface tried to convince the people there to believe that Jesus is God. There was a tree in his town that the people believed was protected by their god, Thor (the big strong god with the hammer!). If Boniface cut down the tree and built a church out of its wood and Thor didn’t kill him, the people said, they would believe Boniface that Jesus is God. So Boniface cut down the tree and built a church from its wood. Boniface survived, so the people believed him: Jesus is really God! And the people believed Boniface even more because he showed them the love of Jesus; of God by his patience; his service to them until he died to protect their town.

“Now I tell you to love one another,” Jesus says. This is Jesus’ example. This was the example of St. Boniface. This, children of God (“as we truly are,” says the first letter of John), is our example: If only in little ways; if only in holding doors open, love one another as God; as Jesus loves us.

Homily for Thursday, 4 June 2015– Ferial

Thursday of the 9th week in Ordinary Time

Readings of the day: Tobit 6:10-11, 7:1bcde,  9-17, 8:4-9a; Psalm 128:1-2, 3, 4-5; Mark 12:28-34

If you were able to pray for anything you could imagine, for what would you pray?

Our Gospel reading today, from Mark, centers on the most important of Jewish prayers. It is called “Shema” in Hebrew for its first words, “Shema Yisrael”: Hear, O Israel, the LORD is God and the LORD is one. “Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength.” To this commandment to love God with our entire being Jesus joins the commandment, also from the Jewish Law, to love our neighbor, one another, with our entire being, too.

We can understand these commandments, as Jesus recites them to the scribe, just as they are, as commandments. But they are also a prayer. Jesus invites the scribe, who is already “not far from the Kingdom of God,” to deepen his ownership of this prayer, the Shema, for himself. Love God and neighbor with your entire being. To pray this will help us better to practice it. Hear, O Israel, the LORD is God and the LORD is one. “Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength… Love your neighbor as yourself.”

Our first reading, from Tobit, is actually a collection of several prayers. The angel Raphael leads Tobiah to the home of Raguel. There, Tobiah asks to marry Raguel’s daughter Sarah. Our reading gives us some prior background to Tobiah’s request to marry Sarah. Raguel’s daughter Sarah has been married seven previous times and, each time, her husband has died on the night of the wedding. And so we can understand if Raguel, not to mention Raguel’s wife, Edna, Sarah and, perhaps most of all, Tobias, were afraid of the same happening to Tobias!

And so how do Raguel, Edna, Sarah, and Tobias overcome their fear? They pray. After giving Tobiah the macabre history of Sarah’s seven previous husbands, he prays for Tobiah and Sarah: “She is yours today and ever after. And tonight, son, may the Lord of heaven prosper you both. May he grant you mercy and peace.” Edna prays over Sarah, “May the Lord grant you joy in place of your grief.”

And then we hear the most  magnificent prayer of all in our first reading: The prayer of Tobiah and Sarah for each other. They acknowledge God’s will in creation for woman and man; for marriage, that they be each other’s “love and support.” “Call down your mercy on me and on her, and allow us to live together to a happy old age.”

Tobiah and Sarah, Raguel, and Edna could have prayed for anybody; for anything, and they choose to pray for a happy marriage for Tobiah and Sarah, one that pleases God and is based on love of one another. This strange reading is also meaningful to me because part of it, the prayer of Tobiah and Sarah we hear, was the first reading chosen by my sister Deanna and brother-in-law Tyler for their wedding.

The scribe in Mark’s Gospel, too, could have prayed for anything; anybody, yet Jesus invites him to pray that he might deepen his love of God and neighbor. For what or for whom are we invited to pray?

Homily for Monday, 1 June 2015‒ Memorial of St. Justin Martyr

Monday of the 9th Week in Ordinary Time

Readings of the day: Tobit 1:3, 2:1a-8; Psalm 112:1b-2, 3b-4, 5-6; Mark 12:1-12

This Mass was offered in memory of my maternal grandmother, Simone Salt. May she rest in peace.

Why do good people suffer? This question does not have an easy answer, even for us as people of faith.

Today we celebrate the feast of St. Justin, a martyr of Rome almost two hundred years before the Roman Empire tolerated Christianity and then made it its official religion. St. Justin’s goal in his teaching and beautiful writings was to convince people of other faiths (Jews and pagans alike) of the truth of the Christian faith; that Christ is the Son of God by pointing to the way Christians lived. His way of teaching by conversation is called the “moral apology” or defense of the moral rightness of Christian faith. St. Justin, a good and faithful man, a saint, suffered greatly for his gentle way of teaching and was eventually killed for his faith.

Our opening prayer of today’s Mass speaks of “the folly of the Cross” that “wondrously taught St. Justin the Martyr the surpassing knowledge of Jesus Christ.” Why do good people like St. Justin suffer? Why are there more martyrs within the last century than in all previous centuries of Christian history combined?

Might we point to questions like these and wonder at the folly of when good people suffer? These questions have no easy answers. Our readings today speak to this same question. We are introduced to Tobit, who has been exiled to Nineveh, in our first reading today. Tobit searches for one of his own people who has been murdered, so that he can give him a dignified burial.

Would we not think that Tobit’s profound act of mercy would be praised? But instead Tobit is mocked both by the Ninevites and by his own people of Israel. To contact the dead physically would bring Tobit ritual impurity. Worse yet, his own life is endangered because he dares to bury a person who has been murdered. Why do good people like Tobit suffer?

Jesus’ parable of the tenants in our Gospel reading is the ultimate example of a good person experiencing suffering. After sending several servants into a vineyard and seeing them mistreated by the vineyard’s tenants, the vineyard owner sends in his own son. Instead of respecting the vineyard owner’s son as hoped, they plot to kill him and seize the inheritance!

We know that, in Jesus’ parable, God is the vineyard owner. Jesus is the innocent Son who is killed. Why does the innocent Son, Jesus, suffer? The Swiss Reformed theologian Karl Barth once said that the only way to make sense of suffering by innocent people is that Christ suffered and died for us. And yet why do some experience extreme poverty? Why are so many in our world threatened and killed for their faith? Why natural disasters that claim many lives? Why do young children experience terrible illnesses, and their families who care for them suffer also? Why did my grandmother, Simone, for whom we pray in this Mass, suffer for years in near-silence with dementia?

We have no easy answers. But God’s promise is that, by uniting ourselves to the “folly of” Christ’s Cross, our suffering is made temporary. We gain “surpassing knowledge” of Christ’s suffering for us. And we who share in Christ’s suffering will also have a share in his resurrection.