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 Thursday, 19 March 2015– Solemnity of St. Joseph, Husband of the Blessed Virgin Mary

Readings of the day: 2 Samuel 7:4-5a, 12-14a, 16; Psalm 89:2-3, 4-5, 27, 29; Romans 4:13, 16-18, 22; Luke 2:41-51a

Who was St. Joseph? He never speaks a word in Scripture. He is traditionally said to be a carpenter. He worked hard at his trade and was a good and holy husband to Mary. He was of the family line of King David, begun with the prophecy of Nathan we hear in our first reading today from 2 Samuel. We know from Scripture that St. Joseph was a man of deep faith. Our second reading today from Romans, on this feast day of St. Joseph, remembers Abraham, whose faith “was credited to him as righteousness.” Abraham’s faith was a gift from God.

And the same could be said of Joseph: He held a deep yet humble, even silent faith that was God’s gift to him. Joseph’s faith was the faith of Abraham; God’s gift of “righteousness.” Because of how Joseph lived his faith, God gave him the remarkable, and sometimes terrifying, responsibility along with his wife Mary of raising Jesus, the Son of God made human.

But other than this, do we know much about St. Joseph? The last we hear of St. Joseph in the Bible is in today’s Gospel reading. When Jesus “was twelve years old,” Luke says, he went with Joseph and Mary to Jerusalem for the Passover. Jesus becomes separated from Joseph and Mary, who frantically search for him. Imagine the crowds in Jerusalem; having to search for a child in a city of this size during the Passover! Having been to Jerusalem, I can imagine the crowds for the Passover and Joseph’s and Mary’s distress at losing Jesus. Can any of us who have children; who have ever experienced losing a child in a crowd, imagine how terrifying this would have been for Joseph and Mary, even more clearly than I can?

And yet Joseph never says a word. He leaves the speaking to Mary: “Son, why have you done this to us? Your father and I have been looking for you with great anxiety.” Was Joseph so terrified at losing Jesus in Jerusalem? Was he so relieved at finding him in the Temple, or so “astounded” to find Jesus teaching the best teachers of the Jewish faith in the Temple about the Law and the prophets; “listening to them and asking them questions,” that Joseph was speechless? All this is possible, even probable, but we will never fully know.

We cannot know from Scripture fully who St. Joseph was: Was he really a carpenter, or what did he do to earn a living? Did St. Joseph ever take questions about his faith to prayer? Why does St. Joseph never speak in Scripture, and why is he not mentioned after Jesus is found in the Temple?

We know little about who St. Joseph was. Still, we celebrate St. Joseph with today’s feast: Faithful Joseph, husband of Mary; descendant of David; earthly father to Jesus; patron and protector of the family; of fathers; of those who are poor (whom we remember especially with our parish’s St. Joseph Tables!). We celebrate what we know of St. Joseph; what we do not know; what we hold humbly; silently as mysteries of faith.

Homily for Thursday, 12 March 2015‒ Thursday of the Third Week of Lent

Readings of the day: Jeremiah 7:23-28; Psalm 95:1-2, 6-7, 8-9; Luke 11:14-23

Have any of us ever been so frustrated with somebody else’s poor choices or bad habits that we have been close to giving up on this person?

We hear through Jeremiah in our first reading of a God who is perhaps on the cusp of giving up on God’s people; the people of Israel. Instead of following God’s commandments, “From the day that [their] fathers left the land of Egypt… they… stiffened their necks and [did] worse than their fathers.” God also says to Jeremiah that the people of Israel are so mired in evil that “they will not listen to you either.” God has all but given up on Israel. They will be left to the consequences of their evil; left under the power of other nations.

The same could be said of Jesus toward the crowds in our Gospel reading today who had seen him cast out a demon. Jesus appears to have all but given up on those who say, “By the power of Beelzebul, the prince of demons, he drives out demons.” Jesus leaves them to the consequences of their divisive, evil attitude: “Whoever is not with me is against me, and whoever does not gather with me scatters.”

I think the key words are “all but”: God all but gives up on the people of Israel in Jeremiah; Jesus all but gives up on the stubborn crowds who accuse him of channeling Satan’s power. God may all but give up on some especially wicked people in our own time, but we are promised that, as frustrated as God may become with human evil, God will never give up on us. And we are urged to act as God acts; not to give up on one another, as frustrating as another’s poor choices or habits, or even the state of our world, so full of violence and a lack of mercy, may become to us.

How can we be so confident that God never gives up on us? We can be confident in this if we listen attentively to our readings today. God has the prophet Jeremiah rebuke the people of Israel as “the nation that does not listen to the voice of the LORD, its God.” Even so, God has sent these people Jeremiah. And God will send still more prophets to them after Jeremiah. God never gives up on the people of Israel, no matter how wicked and hard-hearted they have become.

Finally, God has sent us Jesus. No matter how wicked we become (this is certainly no excuse to test God; we understand this); no matter how many times we have sinned, God sent us his only Son to live as one of us in all but sin, to die for us; to rise and to ascend to heaven for us; to save us. God will never give up on us.

God invites us, then, not to give up on one another. God invites us not to give up on ourselves and on God; not to think any of our sins are so great as to be beyond God’s mercy. Instead, God calls us to respond with hearts open to mercy; to forgiveness toward one another, toward ourselves, and toward our world.

Homily for Tuesday, 10 March 2015‒ Tuesday of the Third Week of Lent

Readings of the day: Daniel 3:25, 34-43; Psalm 25:4-5ab, 6, 7bc, 8-9; Matthew 18:21-35

Have you ever found yourself caught between wanting to forgive somebody generously, as Jesus asks of us in today’s Gospel reading, and wanting to hold this person to account? Our Christian faith, based on our Scriptures, invites us to do both: forgive generously and hold one another to account for right and wrong. But how do we both forgive generously and safeguard accountability?

Jesus says to Peter in Matthew’s Gospel: Forgive “not seven times but seventy-seven times.” In other words, mirror God’s infinite forgiveness by forgiving one another infinitely and without calculation. But does not this call to infinite forgiveness pose problems for us and for our culture?

The first problem is captured in a neat but flawed little phrase. Who here has ever heard, “Forgive and forget”? To “forgive and forget” is not God’s way. It is not the way of our Christian faith. To “forgive and forget” is not what Jesus asks of Peter in our Gospel reading and of us. Sin hurts, and so it should. Sin causes a breakdown of trust; a breakdown of relationship: Our relationships with God, with one another, and with ourselves.

Trust and relationships, once broken partially or completely by sin (the difference between venial and mortal sin), must be rebuilt and repaired. In our Church, we have the sacraments, especially Reconciliation and Eucharist, which begin the process of rebuilding and repairing the damage to relationships caused by our sin. “Through the ministry of the Church,” God absolves; God grants us “pardon and peace,” but neither God nor we forget the damage caused by sin to our relationships. “Forgive and forget” does not repair the hurt relationship; does not serve accountability. The person sinned against continues to hurt, while often the sinner feels guilty, even when the guilt is not admitted or spoken; even when told to “forget about it” and move on from the sin. Has anybody here either been sinned against or been the sinner, hurt or been hurt by another person, and so you know all too well of what I speak?

Accountability, not “forgive and forget,” is at the heart of our Church’s teaching on purgatory. Sin, even sin that has been forgiven and absolved, has still caused a break in relationship. This broken relationship must be purified; rebuilt; repaired, even if the forgiven sinner will eventually go to heaven. Purgatory’s destiny is heaven; not “hell with parole” but a Catholic understanding of accountability.

And yet we are called to pair accountability with infinitely generous forgiveness. God is not the God of “forgive and forget”; neither is God the God of the record or ledger. Neither are we, then, to keep a record of one another’s or our own wrongs. This actually destroys us more than the sinner whose records we keep with an obsessive vengeance!

“Not seven times but seventy-seven times,” Jesus says to Peter. Not “forgive and forget” or record-keeping of wrongs, but God and our Christian faith invite us to both accountability and infinitely generous forgiveness.

Homily for Thursday, 26 February 2015‒ Thursday of the First Week of Lent

Readings of the day: Esther C:12, 14-16, 23-25; Psalm 138:1-2ab, 2cde-3, 7c-8; Matthew 7:7-12

For what do we often ask of God or of other people? Perhaps ultimately we ask to be loved; respected; accepted for who we are. God naturally loves us; accepts us for who we are, while challenging us, especially through this Lenten season, to turn from sin and grow and be renewed in our love for God and for one another. God’s love for us is self-evident, even if readings like those we hear today necessarily remind us of the love of God for us. Our readings also call us to deepen our love for one another: “Do to others whatever you would have them do to you. This is the law and the prophets,” Jesus says. This is our faith’s “Golden Rule.”

We ask God and one another to love; to respect; to accept us. In faith we are invited and challenged to love; respect; to accept others and to love God in return: “Do to others whatever you would have them do to you.”

And yet our readings also encourage us to ask God and one another for what we need, and to expect confidently that our needs will be met. But what are these needs we are encouraged to ask God and one another to meet? Do not many of us have some, often healthy, aversion to asking for too much, especially of God? Should our prayer not be less of petition; of asking for things, but of gratitude and sometimes penance? Perhaps, but today’s readings show that petition to God and to one another can be effective and appropriate in many circumstances.

We hear of Queen Esther in our first reading. Esther grows up in the court of the Persian Emperor, who has turned against the people of Israel, who are under Persian rule. Esther and her people of Israel find themselves in mortal danger, and so Esther prays to God to spare her life and the lives of her people.

The cause for petition to God in Matthew is not as dire as in Esther. Jesus invites us to ask anything of God as we need it: “Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks, receives; and the one who seeks, finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened.”

But then what happens when we ask something of God, or another person, and we do not receive what we have asked or prayed for? Is God answering our prayer then? Does God care? Is it possible to pray for something wrong or untimely?

I answer yes to all three questions… But I think our readings challenge us not to view God’s answer to our prayers of petition as some kind of magic: I ask and, “Poof,” I receive! More importantly, our petition and God’s answer to it changes us; renews us. “Ask and you shall receive.” And if we allow ourselves to be changed by our petition and God’s response, we may just become more able to live by Jesus’ Golden Rule: “Do to others whatever you would have them do to you.”

Homily for Monday, 23 February 2015‒ Monday of the First Week of Lent

Readings of the day: Leviticus 19:1-2, 11-18; Psalm 19:8, 9, 10, 15; Matthew 25:31-46

How many sets of commandments do we know of in the Bible? Most if not all of us know of the Ten Commandments. In fact there are two sets; two very similar versions of the Ten Commandments in the Old Testament, one in the Book of Exodus and the other in the Book of Deuteronomy.

Are not most if not all of us familiar with Jesus’ distillation of all the Old Testament commandments, the Law and the prophets, down to two commandments: Love God and love neighbor?

Our first reading today from Leviticus presents us with a series of commandments. These commandments in Leviticus are similar in style to the Ten Commandments. We hear them as a series of laws against particular actions: “You shall not…” After every few laws is the divine emphasis: “I am the LORD.” If we love God and believe that God is the beginning and end of these commandments, we will keep these commandments.

Without changing the substance of the many Old Testament commandments or the sense that God is their beginning and end, Jesus simplifies them while framing them in a positive way: “You shall” in place of “you shall not.” We hear this simplification and positive re-framing of commandments in our Gospel reading today.

But let us not be taken off guard by the simplicity; the positive, even inviting, tone of Jesus’ words. Are there not still stark consequences to acting in favor or against what Jesus teaches? Jesus words are still commandments that we are urged to follow. They are every bit as significant as the Old Testament commands of “you shall not.”

Jesus, as in Leviticus (although perhaps more clearly than in our Old Testament reading), bases his teachings on pressing social concerns. Who are the most vulnerable in Jesus’ time; those most in need of protection? They are “the hungry… the thirsty… the stranger… the naked… the ill” and those “in prison.” The manner in which we act toward these most in need is the manner in which we act toward Christ himself.

Who are the most vulnerable; the most in need in our time? Perhaps they are the unborn; small children; the elderly; the poor person; the person working for a minimum wage that does not suffice to feed, clothe, and shelter her or his family members; the sick; the person with disabilities; the homebound.

“Whatever you did for one of these least… of mine, you did for me.” Jesus’ commandment still stands today: Protect those most in need as though they were Christ. Most if not all of us do well at heeding these teachings of Jesus. Some if not all of us have had experiences in which our actions toward those most in need, or at least our intention behind them, are in need of some purification: Am I acting for my own gain, or because I see Christ in the other person, or a bit of both?

Lent is the great time for this kind of purification of both action and intention; of praying for the strength to follow God’s commandments, especially for the benefit of “the least of [our] brothers” and sisters.