Homily for Sunday, 23 June 2019– The Solemnity of the Most Holy Body and Blood of Christ (Corpus Christi)

Readings of the day: Genesis 14:18-20; Psalm 110:1, 2, 3, 4; 1 Corinthians 11:23-26; Luke 9:11b-17

This homily was given at the Hermance Family Chapel of St. Basil the Great at St. John Fisher College, Rochester, NY.

Have any of us ever received a gift from somebody, or has somebody ever done a good deed for us that we felt we could never possibly repay adequately?

This would happen regularly when I ministered in Colombia, among the poor of Cali and Santa Marta, where the Basilians have a parish and school and had a novitiate house. The people would be so grateful for any good deed or anything we could give them, and even simply for our presence as Basilians among them, that they would often say to us, to mean that they did not have anything to offer us in return for what we had given them, “Dios te pague” (“May God repay you”). More recently, Fr. Paul English, my brother Basilian and a graduate of St. John Fisher College (with whom some of us may be familiar), who knows several Colombian seminarians, both our own Basilian brothers and seminarians of dioceses in which he has served, has occasionally added humorously to his hello or goodbye greetings to these seminarians: “Dios te pegue” (“May God smack you”)!

Our reading this morning from the Book of Genesis places both the king of Salem, Melchizedek, and Abram (later Abraham) in a Dios te pague moment. In Genesis, just before the reading we hear today, four kings who were Abram’s enemies had been making war against kings who were Abram’s allies, including Melchizedek. Even Abram’s nephew, Lot, had been taken captive by one of the enemy kings. Abram pursues Lot’s captors until he is victorious in favor of Melchizedek and his other allied kings, ending the war and recovering Lot and the other captives. Interestingly, the name of Salem, Melchizedek’s kingdom, derives from the same Hebrew root as does shalom. Like many words in ancient languages, shalom, which is usually translated to English as “peace”—so we could think of Melchizedek as a figure representing peace who, in our first reading today, has in fact just won victory and peace, ending a disastrous war—has a greater range of meaning than we often realize. Shalom can mean peace, but also wholeness or completeness, harmony, or prosperity. It may also take on the meaning of a simpler greeting like hello or goodbye. If we were to translate shalom in this idiomatic greeting sense into Spanish, we might say, Dios te pague (“May God repay you”), although hopefully not, unless with good humor, Dios te pegue (“May God smack you”)!

Our reading today from Genesis places us on the scene of a meeting of two representatives of shalom, Melchizedek, king of Salem (or perhaps, appropriately, king of “shalom”), and Abram. This meeting between Melchizedek and Abram, after which Abram has returned goods and prisoners taken by their enemies in the war they have just won, is a shalom moment; a Dios te pague moment.

To thank Abram, what does Melchizedek offer him but simple bread and wine? Melchizedek realizes quickly that he is unable to offer Abram any appropriate gift for having saved his kingdom and his people from the enemy kings who had attacked him and taken his goods and people captive. So Melchizedek offers Abram simple bread and wine, accompanied by a blessing of these gifts. Melchizedek’s offering to Abram of bread and wine, with a blessing, may call to our minds what we do every time we celebrate Mass; every time we celebrate our Eucharist (a Greek-derived word that means “thanksgiving”), especially on this feast focusing on the gifts of the Eucharist, the Solemnity of the Body and Blood of Christ.

Like Melchizedek, we offer bread and wine because we can offer no more. When we bring bread and wine to the altar during our Eucharist, we bless it. The priest blesses the bread and wine with a prayer that is often silent, especially at Sunday Mass, but a prayer that hearkens back to Jewish table blessing prayers: “Blessed are you, Lord God of all creation, for through your goodness we have received the bread we offer you: Fruit of the earth and work of human hands, it will become for us the bread of life… Blessed are you, Lord God of all creation, for through your goodness we have received the wine we offer you: Fruit of the vine and work of human hands, it will become our spiritual drink.”

And then, through our Eucharistic celebration, our offering of bread and wine to God because nothing we might offer to God measures up to God’s goodness to us, something altogether miraculous happens before our eyes: This blessed bread and wine, our all-too-little gift to God, becomes “for us the Body and Blood of our Lord Jesus Christ.” God chooses this simple bread and wine, “work of human hands,” as the sacramental means by which God offers himself, God’s Son, really, truly, and fully to us. This becomes our Dios te pague moment: “May God repay you.”

More than we could ever repay God, God “pays” us with his very self, really, truly, and fully, in our Eucharist, under the form of simple bread and wine. God’s Son Jesus Christ has been offering himself really, truly, and fully since the night he freely accepted being “handed over” in an act of betrayal by one of his own apostles; an act of denial by another; an act of fearful fleeing from Jesus’ passion and death by still others. On that night, Jesus offered us his very self really, truly, and fully: “This is my body that is for you. Do this in remembrance of me… This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me.” This deepens our Dios te pague moment and projects it into our history, as it becomes our Church’s celebration “in remembrance” of Christ’s passion and death, until he returns at the end of time.

But this first Dios te pague moment in which Jesus hands himself to us; this Dios te pague moment now projected into our history as Church, did not happen without any previous sign to prepare us for the moment when Christ gave himself to us under the form of bread and wine. This preparatory sign of Christ’s real, true, and full self-offering to us first at the Last Supper is recounted to us in the Gospel we hear today from Luke.

Any sign, any miracle, properly-speaking, is not only a nature-defying action of God, but it involves our action. At the Last Supper, Jesus said to his Apostles as he handed himself over to them, to us, really, truly, and fully: “Do this in memory of me.” What, then, are we to do in memory of him? What could we do; what could we offer God that could measure up to God’s real, true, and full gift to us of his very self?

Nothing we could offer could ever measure up to God’s offering of God’s very self to us: This is precisely the point of the Last Supper. This is precisely the point of Jesus’ miracle of the multiplication of the loaves and fishes of which we hear from Luke today. Still, Jesus says to the Twelve, who have asked him to “dismiss the crowd” following them to buy themselves some much-needed rest and quiet: “Give them some food yourselves.”

This, without a doubt, would have caught Jesus’ disciples off guard. They were unprepared to “give them some food” themselves, out of the little they had to offer; out of their own poverty. For the Twelve, this was not only their Dios te pague moment—“May God repay you”—but, with all the due gentleness and good humor of the Son of God, it was Jesus’ Apostles’ Dios te pegue moment: “May God smack you.”

“Give them some food yourselves.” In other words, Jesus says to us, offer what you are able out of your poverty, and I will multiply it beyond your wildest imagination. But I will wait to multiply your gift; I will wait to work a miracle until you are confronted with your poverty, your inadequacy in offering any gift that could possibly measure up to God’s real, true, and full offering of self. I will wait until you are confronted, “smacked,” with having to bless and offer simple bread and wine, or five loaves and two fish for five thousand people.

I will wait until your Dios te pague moment meets a Dios te pegue moment. Give one another and the world “some food yourselves.” “Do this in remembrance of me.” Offer this world shalom, and only then will I multiply your “work of human hands” beyond your wildest imagination.

Homily for Thursday, 8 June 2017– 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

How many of us enjoy reading novels? I am more of a non-fiction than fiction reader, even when reading for pleasure, outside of studies or spiritual reading. And yet one of my brother Basilian priests I have lived with in community will often announce, as he is going to bed at night, that he will go and enjoy some of his “trashy novel” before falling asleep. Whether he is actually about to read a novel or the quality of the novel are irrelevant; the humorous effect of the “trashy novel” announcement is what matters.

The Book of Tobit is among a few legend or “novelette”-type books of the Bible. And, if I dare say, although I am no expert on Tobit, the more I read and pray with Tobit, the more this book fascinates me. Certainly Tobit is no “trashy novel”; it is a legendary yet profound story of love, of suffering, of mercy, and of God’s presence in all these events surrounding Tobit, his family, and his people of Israel who are in exile in Babylon.

Today, within the Book of Tobit, we are treated to what I think is one of the Bible’s most beautiful prayers: That of Sarah, daughter of Edna and Raguel, and Tobiah, son of Tobit, as they are about to go to bed on the night of their wedding. If we follow Tobit, we know that Sarah’s and Tobiah’s wedding night was no time for either of them to read themselves to sleep with a “trashy novel.” Sarah had been married seven times before marrying Tobiah. Each time, her husbands had been killed on their wedding night by the “demon Asmodeus.” And so, instead of reading themselves to sleep with novels of dubious quality (or, if this had taken place today, would they have watched television or been surfing the internet on their laptops, tablets, or smartphones?), Sarah and Tobiah pray together. “The angel Raphael,” whose name incidentally means, “God heals,” has already promised to protect Tobiah from meeting the same end as Sarah’s previous seven husbands.

Of course,  I have a special reason to love the prayer of Sarah and Tobiah that we hear today. A week from Saturday my sister Deanna and brother-in-law Tyler will celebrate ten years of marriage. The first reading they chose for their wedding celebration included the prayer of Sarah and Tobiah we hear today.

And so, especially for the married couples, future married couples, and everybody among us still discerning prayerfully a possible vocation to marriage, please let me echo the prayer of Sarah and Tobiah for you, perhaps several times between now and when I go to bed tonight. And I suggest that you pray this prayer for one another: “Blessed are you, O God of our fathers, praised be your name forever and ever.” May our God “who made Adam and… gave him his wife Eve to be his help and support” bless and keep our married couples and those who are engaged or discerning marriage. May they be strengthened and kept healthy and happy for the “noble purpose” of reflecting your face; your mercy; your love to one another in a world that often leaves our married and discerning couples feeling “alone,” against your will for your people, O Lord. “Call down your mercy upon” our current and future married couples, “and allow [them] to live together to a happy old age.”

“Amen, amen.”

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, 26 May 2015– Memorial of St. Philip Neri

Tuesday of the 8th Week in Ordinary Time

Readings of the day: Acts 22:30, 23:6-11; Psalm 60:1-2a, 5, 7-8, 9-10, 11; John 17:20-26

After hearing our Gospel reading today, do any of us feel a bit sorry for Jesus’ disciples? Peter, discouraged, says to Jesus: “We have given up everything and followed you.”

What precedes Peter’s discouragement? Our Gospel reading today, I think, requires some context for us to understand Peter’s reaction and then Jesus’ reply to Peter: “Amen, I say to you, there is no one who has given up” everything for me and for “the Gospel who will not receive a hundred times more.”

Jesus has encountered a rich young man in Mark’s Gospel just before the reading we hear today. How well do we remember this conversation between the rich young man and Jesus? The rich young man asks Jesus how he might enter eternal life. After all, he has “observed all” God’s commandments “from [his] youth.” Still, Jesus sends him away sad, saying, “You are lacking in one thing. Go, sell what you have and give to the poor… Then come, follow me.”

Jesus does not turn the rich young man away primarily because of his excess wealth. But he lacks something more critical to his salvation than literally giving away his material possessions. What does the rich young man lack? What do Peter and the other disciples also lack? The rich young man, like Peter and the other disciples in today’s Gospel and like us, follow God’s law as faithfully as we can. We are here at Mass earlier than most people are awake, many of us daily. And then so many of us here at St. Kateri go forth from worship here to serve our communities our families by wonderful works of mercy; kindness; generosity of all kinds. I am almost sure that this is all God can ask of us!

Our first reading, from the Book of Sirach, praises people who “keep the law”; the commandments of God. To those who obey God’s commandments, Sirach says, “the LORD will give back… sevenfold.” And our Psalm assures us: “To the upright I will show the saving power of God.” And so to obey God’s law; God’s commandments is excellent and a significant starting point toward eternal life.

But there is more to entering eternal life than following a set of commandments. But what? How many of us know somebody who is almost obsessive about following rules perfectly? This kind of obsession can destroy a person spiritually and perhaps physically and mentally.

God invites us to obey his commandments. And yet, more importantly, God asks us to live God’s law with joy and perhaps a sense of humor. St. Philip Neri, whose feast we celebrate today, is known as a patron saint of humor, which he often directed at himself. A man once asked St. Philip Neri if, as a penance, he should wear a hair shirt. St. Philip allowed him to wear the hair shirt, if only outside his other clothing!

St. Philip Neri shows in episodes like this how to be obedient to God’s law with joy and humor. His example is an echo of the central point of our readings today: Live God’s law; the Gospel of Jesus Christ, not with obsessive perfectionism but with joy, and this will bring us to eternal life.

Homily for Thursday, 14 May 2015– Solemnity of the Ascension of the Lord

Readings of the day: Acts 1:1-11; Psalm 47:2-3, 6-7, 8-9; Ephesians 4:1-13, Mark 16:15-20

This Mass was offered graciously by the staff of St. Kateri Tekakwitha Parish, Irondequoit, NY, in memory of my maternal grandparents, Frank and Simone Salt.

What is the significance for us of this Solemnity of the Lord’s Ascension that we celebrate today? Our readings today focus, I think, on two related aspects of the meaning for us of the Ascension to heaven of our Lord Jesus Christ: Future promise and present mission.

The beginning of the Acts of the Apostles, which we hear today, focuses primarily on future promise. The Apostles have been instructed by Jesus to wait in Jerusalem for “the promise of the Father,” the Holy Spirit. But once they receive the Holy Spirit, Jesus says, they are to witness to him by their works and words “to the ends of the earth.” And so here in Acts we also have the beginning of present mission of the Apostles; of the Church.

Mark’s Gospel emphasizes this aspect of present mission. As he ascends to heaven, Jesus says this to his disciples: “Go into the whole world and proclaim the Gospel to every creature.” And in the Letter to the Ephesians these aspects of future promise of the Holy Spirit; future promise from God of ascension to heaven ourselves and present mission converge in a great statement of identity of our Church. We are united as Church in future promise and in present mission: “with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another through love, striving to preserve the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace: one body and one Spirit… one Lord, one faith, one baptism; one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all.”

But might the sheer grandiosity of this present mission as Church given us by the risen and ascended Christ not scare some of us? How are we to “proclaim the Gospel to every creature”? What about the times (and we all have them) when we have not lived “with all humility and patience [and] love,” and promoted peace, not only in the world but in our own relationships, as Ephesians asks of us? We understand future promise. At least I hope, and I have confidence in this because we are here, that we all hope in the future promise of heaven. We hope to rise to eternal life; to ascend to heaven after our Lord one day. We hope, closer to the present, to receive more and more God’s gift of the Holy Spirit, whom we already receive in the sacraments of the Church; in baptism and confirmation; through one another.

We understand future promise; I think we might have more trouble with present mission. So what is our present mission as Church, so that we might better accomplish it? Many of us do not leave our city, our communities, or even our homes very often, let alone go “to every creature” the world over to work and preach in the name of Jesus. So what can we do to live out our Christian mission?

Since the intention for this Mass is for my maternal grandparents, Frank and Simone Salt, who went to be with God this past January, I look often to their example of how to live out both present mission and hope of future promise. When I first announced to my grandfather that I felt a call to the priesthood, he reminded me: “Live your faith with a sense of humor. If you aren’t living your faith with a sense of humor, you aren’t living your faith.” In their waning years, but while they were still living in their own house, Grandma and Grandpa would still walk every day to the new church that was being built in their neighborhood to unlock it before the construction workers arrived.

Late in their lives, Grandma and Grandpa were still “unlockers” of the Church. They lived by the future promise of resurrection; ascension to heaven; of having received the Holy Spirit. They lived by present mission, all within a few blocks of their home: Humility; patience; gentleness; love; unity; peace and, yes, a sense of humor. Their example is an excellent one for all of us: Show one another the love of God; the peace and good humor that derives from the Holy Spirit.

We do not need to travel great distances to do this. Unlock the Church; open the Church to all who seek God! In (usually) small ways, we are all called to live this present mission, even as we hope in future promise given us by the resurrection and ascension of Christ and the dwelling of God’s Holy Spirit in each and every one of us.