Homily for Wednesday, 20 August 2014– Memorial of St. Bernard of Clairvaux

Wednesday of the 20th Week in Ordinary Time

Readings of the day: Ezekiel 34:1=11; Psalm 23:1-3a, 3b-4, 5, 6; Matthew 20:1-16

How fair would it be if somebody were to arrive at work on time or early every day without fail, and then if somebody else were to arrive late consistently or not at all many days? What if, on pay day, the employer were to give the same wage and bonuses to both employees? I do not think this would be very fair of the employer.

Now, what if this employer were God? Our God may be exceedingly generous with the late-arriving employee to the vineyard in today’s Gospel, but unless God intends to stir up anger in the workplace, to give the same wage to the late arrival as to the employee who has worked all day is not a very fair employment practice!

“The last will be first, and the first will be last.” Would not the workers in the vineyard who have worked all day be justified in complaining about the late arrivals receiving the same daily wage as they do? And yet does not our Gospel reading today remind us not only of God’s generosity, but first and foremost to ask ourselves: What have we already received from God’s generosity; God’s mercy; God’s grace?

Our competitive social environment does not do well with “the last will be first, and the first will be last.” Competition in a society can be positive. Our society glorifies “the last” who rise to be “the first.” We call this “the American dream”: that anyone who works hard, at least ideally, can reap the prosperity of our land. But we do not regard well those who are prosperous seemingly with little effort of their own.

How does this affect our Christian faith? Let us take the example of the person who comes into our faith; our Church late in life, or the person who has lived a dissolute lifestyle who repents late in life? Are these people not to receive the same eternal life as all of us are promised; the same wage as those who have worked in the vineyard all day, to use the metaphor of our Gospel reading today?

“The last will be first, and the first will be last,” precisely because we cannot earn entry into God’s Kingdom. Our God is more generous than we could ever be through our generosity in return. Christ died and rose so that “the first” and “the last” would inherit God’s Kingdom together.

St. Bernard of Clairvaux, whose feast we celebrate today, once said that many people want to be canals of God’s grace when it would be better if we thought of ourselves as reservoirs. Water, like God’s grace, flows through a canal; it is not allowed to build up as in a reservoir. When the reservoir becomes full, it overflows. So it is with God’s saving grace to the world if we let it fill us to overflowing. Once we are full, we cannot lose anything; we remain full while the overflow enriches the world.

God’s generosity; God’s grace saves us; fills us to overflowing if we let ourselves be reservoirs of this generosity; this grace. And so “the last will be first, and the first will be last,” with no distinction among the faithful in God’s vineyard; God’s Kingdom.

Homily for Monday, 11 August 2014– Memorial of St. Clare

Monday of the 19th Week in Ordinary Time

Readings of the day: Ezekiel 1:2-5, 24-28c; Psalm 148:1-2, 11-12, 13-14; Matthew 17:22-27

This homily was given at St. Stanislaus Kostka Parish, Rochester, NY.

What does it mean for us to stand with the people who are least powerful among us; who are persecuted; who are poor?

Our Gospel reading today presents us with two seemingly disconnected sections: Jesus’ prediction of his own Passion and death, followed by a strange fish story. In neither of these stories does Jesus say to his disciples what they want to hear. But it is what they, and perhaps we, need to hear. If Jesus’ disciples were hoping to be among the powerful; the elites of the day, Jesus invites them, and us, instead to partake of his own Passion. Jesus invites us to self-denial; to die to what is not of God; to die to competition for power and prestige at others’ expense, a significant ill of our own society today, perhaps more even than of Jesus’ time. In response to Jesus’ invitation to partake of his Passion; to stand with the least powerful; to deny ourselves, Matthew says that his disciples “were overwhelmed with grief.”

What in our world today overwhelms us “with grief”? Perhaps it is the plight of persecuted Christians in Iraq. Perhaps it is the bloodshed in the Holy Land. Perhaps it is the migrant and refugee crisis occurring in our own country. Perhaps it is the ineffective if not muted response to evil; persecution; injustice both in this country and abroad by governments of the most powerful nations. Perhaps it is the ideological polarization of our own society. For me, it is the violence and poverty in our city that I do not need to go far from my own parish to see.

Grief can be a good reaction to injustice; to evil if it leads us at least to want to right these wrongs. However, as Pope Francis warned especially in his letter late last year on “The Joy of the Gospel,” there is the kind of grief that is concerned more with stock market failures than with the poor, hungry, and homeless in our streets. This is the kind of grief that is self-centered; power-centered that Jesus, too, invites us to deny ourselves. The more we live in power and prosperity, the more this kind of self-denial becomes our cross.

So how does our Gospel story today of the fish and the coin for the temple tax relate to self-denial; to our partaking in Christ’s Passion? It does so because, in this parable, we are “the subjects” or, even better understood, the daughters and sons of the King, Jesus Christ, and of his Kingdom. We are among the free; among the powerful. But Jesus invites us, as he invites Peter by asking him to pay the temple tax from the coin in the fish’s mouth, to stand with “the foreigners” who owe the temple tax; with the powerless; with the poor.

Are we willing to accept Jesus’ invitation? Jesus challenges us to take up our cross; Christ’s cross; to stand with and to empower the poor; the persecuted, even if we are among the free; the powerful. Jesus’ words may overwhelm some “with grief.” They may not be words that all want to hear, but I believe they are words we need to hear.

Homily for Wednesday, 18 June 2014– Ferial

Wednesday of the 11th week in Ordinary Time 

Readings of the day: 2 Kings 2:1, 6-14; Psalm 31:20, 21, 24; Matthew 6:1-6, 16-18

Has anyone here, in moments of excitement over our accomplishments, ever listed off these accomplishments to another person in conversation? Then, has anyone here stopped momentarily and then added a phrase like (one of my favorites I admit), “I don’t mean to boast, but…”?

To be aware of and even to speak with joy about our accomplishments and our talents to other people and in prayer to God are not necessarily bad things. There is no shame in taking some pride in our accomplishments and talents, even aloud, as long as we first give thanks to God who gives us these talents; who gives the ability to accomplish sometimes extraordinary deeds.

And yet how often do we reflect that we live in a competitive social environment that encourages us to take credit for our accomplishments; our talents, often without giving due credit and glory to God, the source of these gifts; accomplishments; talents; of everything that is good?

“I don’t mean to boast, but I give alms, I pray regularly, and I fast.” Can we not imagine the early followers of Jesus addressed in Matthew speaking these words? Have we ever spoken similar words? Jesus’ response to them and to us is, “Take care not to perform righteous deeds in order that people may see them… Your Father who sees in secret”; “who sees what is hidden will repay you.”

We have and we will have opportunities “to perform righteous deeds” in public, where other “people may see them.” I imagine that we have and we will have opportunities in which it is appropriate to be proud of our righteous actions and even to give voice to this pride when speaking with other people. This, in and of itself, is not wrong.

But Jesus reminds us in our Gospel reading today of the great grace in doing quietly, “in secret,” what is right; what is God-like. We are encouraged perhaps to perform a so-called “random act of kindness” toward another; a deed that the other person to whom we are intentionally kind does not expect; cannot repay, or does not even know who did it. We are encouraged by Jesus to run counter to our culture that puts pride for accomplishments and talents; that puts competitiveness on display, even to excess. We are encouraged to give glory to God by the witness of our lives; our quiet acts of kindness and mercy especially.

I don’t mean to boast, but I think that, in light of today’s Gospel, Jesus would allow us to boast with quiet gratitude in our God who is good to us, who repays our acts of kindness toward one another in due time, and who makes possible all that we do that is good.

Homily for Saturday, 11 January 2014– Saturday after Epiphany

Readings of the day: 1 John 5:14-21; Psalm 149:1-2, 3-4, 5-6a, 9b; John 3:22-30

How many of us can admit to having a competitive tendency from time to time? This tendency is not bad, in and of itself. Competition is, to some extent, embedded in our culture. We want to better ourselves; we want to achieve that promotion; we want increased wealth and social status. Many of us even challenge ourselves to be more faithful or prayerful, or to be involved in more ministry activities in our parish.

Some degree of competition can be healthy. However, today we hear in John’s Gospel a challenge against the kind of competition that inhibits us from Christ and Christ’s Gospel.

Our Gospel reading says that a “dispute” developed between “the disciples of John” the Baptist “and a Jew,” but how many of us recognize the many small but important details of this Gospel’s setting of the scene? The reading begins by describing the place where John was baptizing as having “an abundance of water”; a place to which “people came to be baptized.” An abundance of water and an abundance of people: John the Baptist recognizes that this abundance is not his own but a gift from God.

Then John the Baptist’s role is described like that of “the best man,” the one in a wedding whose role is to bring together the bride and the bridegroom, in this case Christ and the faithful. In this gift from God John rejoices. No gift is greater than to bring the faithful to Christ. “So this joy of mine has been made complete,” John says. There is no greater honor on earth; no greater joy; nothing greater for which we can compete than to be a people of God and to bring yet more people to Christ.

Yet we, like John, are not the Christ. We receive our abundance; our joy; our love; our Christian baptism not from ourselves but from God. Our task, like that of John, the task that will bring us the greatest joy, is to make Christ, not primarily ourselves, known by our actions and words. God, not we, “must increase.”

In a culture that too often tempts us to compete for the greatest honor, the greatest wealth, and the greatest status, sometimes at the expense of other people, we are invited to make the Baptist’s last words in John’s Gospel our own prayer:  In Christ, “this joy of mine has been made complete. He must increase. I must decrease.”