Homily for Wednesday, 12 July 2017– Ferial

Wednesday of the 14th week in Ordinary Time

Readings of the day: Genesis 41:55-57, 42:5-7a, 17-24a; Psalm 33:2-3, 10-11, 18-19; Matthew 10:1-7

Has anybody here ever seen a real shepherd? Today as well as yesterday, in Matthew’s Gospel we hear Jesus using the image of a shepherd to describe his own ministry; his activity, as well as, in the case of today’s Gospel reading, that of his Apostles. After choosing his twelve Apostles by name, Jesus sends them out with these instructions: “Do not go into pagan territory or enter a Samaritan town. Go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.”

Living and worshipping as we are in the middle of a major city like Edmonton, the image of a shepherd that Jesus offers of himself and his Apostles may not resonate with us, unless we have had past experience on a farm with sheep or other livestock. Few of us have likely had this experience.

Yet we still speak fairly commonly in English in shepherding metaphors. We have phrases like “the black sheep” to describe somebody who does not fit into a community, a family, or other social group. And in our Gospel reading today Jesus speaks of “the lost sheep of the house of Israel.”

Why does Jesus, according to Matthew, restrict his Apostles from ministering among the pagans or Samaritans, asking them to “go… to the lost sheep of Israel” only? This is hard to say. I speculate that perhaps Jesus knows the risk of his Apostles; those who minister in his name taking on more in their ministry than they could reasonably handle. Jesus asks his Apostles; asks us to remain focused in our mission. This mission we are given is to contribute to God’s work of salvation in our little corner of the universe, and to trust that our contribution, small though it may be, means something, and that ultimately it is Jesus Christ, not us, who is the Saviour of this universe.

To minister among “the lost sheep of the house of Israel” is still a fairly daunting mission, though, even if we stay focused on our little part of God’s universal mission of salvation as Jesus asks us to do. Who are “the lost sheep of the house of Israel”; of our communities, our households, our Church today? Are each of us not in part shepherds after Jesus Christ and his Apostles, and also at times “the lost sheep”?

Could we not all think of somebody we know, if not ourselves, who struggle with their faith? Perhaps we know somebody does not believe or does not even understand well in order to live a difficult moral teaching of our faith. These are the people whom Jesus asks us to find and, in Pope Francis’ oft-used words, to accompany. May we not shut sinners out of the Church and out of access to God’s grace through the sacraments!

“Go rather to the lost sheep.” In a beautiful reflection on the Fall event in Genesis 3, Jean Vanier once remarked that God’s first words to Adam and Eve after they eat the forbidden fruit are not, “You’re bad,” but “Where are you”? Our mission to find and accompany the lost sheep means to ask this same question of one another that God has been asking us since the beginning, “Where are you”? It is in answering this question, in finding and accompanying the lost sheep, that we will be saved.

Homily for Sunday, 18 June 2017‒ Solemnity of the Most Holy Body and Blood of Christ (Corpus Christi)

Readings of the day: Deuteronomy 8:2-3, 14b-16a; Psalm 147:12-13, 14-15, 19-20; 1 Corinthians 10:16-17; John 6:51-58

What is the Body and Blood of Christ? What do we mean when we speak of the Real Presence of Christ, Eucharist, the Feast of the Lord’s Table or the Lord’s Supper, of Mass, or of communion? These are just a few of the names we give to today’s celebration, officially the Solemnity of the Body and Blood of Christ, and to a reality that we Catholics celebrate every Sunday and may celebrate nearly every day of the year.

Also today Bishop Salvatore Matano has declared the beginning of a Year of the Eucharist in the Diocese of Rochester, and so we have not only today to celebrate this reality of many names, but a whole year to celebrate it, through to June 3, 2018, next year’s date of the Solemnity of the Body and Blood of Christ. And so, as we begin this year-long celebration; our Year of the Eucharist, might it be worthwhile to ask ourselves this question once again: What is it?

“What is it” is the very question that has been asked since the people of Israel, returning home to their land from slavery in Egypt, first asked it. When the people of Israel were hungry in the desert, God sent them a strange, dewy substance to satisfy their hunger. As the people of Israel figured out that they could eat this substance, that it filled them, and that it tasted perhaps better than they would have thought, they looked at it cross-eyed, maybe (parents, you know better than I do) as a picky child eyes something like broccoli, and asked, “Manna”?

Yes, “manna” is actually a question, before it became the name given to this strange, dewy substance God gave the people of Israel in the desert. In the Hebrew of the Book of Deuteronomy from which we hear today, as well as in many other ancient languages of what are now Northeast Africa and the Middle East, “manna” means, “What is it”?

We still ask this question today. We still celebrate, as the people of ancient Israel did, “a food unknown to [our] fathers”; to our ancestors. We call it the Body and Blood of Christ, the Real Presence of Christ, the Eucharist, the Feast of the Lord’s Table, the Lord’s Supper, the Mass, or communion. But might we as well ask, “Manna” ‒ “What is it”?

In his pastoral letter announcing this Year of the Eucharist, which is in the Catholic Courier (I will have a brief further announcement about this letter in a few moments before we leave here today), Bishop Matano laments the “high percentage of Catholics who,” according to polls, “do not understand or who have not been taught” about, or “simply do not believe in” the Real Presence of Christ in the Eucharist. In many ways our bishop is right to be concerned about faltering practice and understanding of our faith among so many of our brothers and sisters under his pastoral care in this diocese.

At the same time, though, we are here at this celebration. I am confident that I am speaking in front of people who are here now because we at least recognize that something extraordinary, in fact a miracle, is taking place before our eyes. It is taking place in a way we are able to sense: To see here and soon to taste, touch, and smell in the form of bread and wine from the altar; to hear in the form of one another joining together in worship, from the prayers of our Mass, to the singing of hymns, to the cooing of small children, to perhaps more unexpected sounds that echo through this place. The miracle we witness here is so extraordinary, even though it remains always sensible, that we, like the people of Israel in the time of Moses and people since then, are right to ask an eternal question: “Manna” ‒ “What is it”?

Yet is the answer to this question not given to us in a beautiful way especially in the Word of God we hear this evening [morning] from St. Paul’s First Letter to the Corinthians? St. Paul asks, “Brothers and sisters, the cup of blessing that we bless, is it not a participation in the blood of Christ? The bread that we break, is it not a participation in the body of Christ”?

A major difficulty of what we celebrate here is that it is possible for us to place our focus on many different aspects of the celebration. Is the Eucharist, the Body and Blood of Christ, the bread and wine on the altar in which Christ miraculously becomes really, truly, and fully present without changing what that bread and wine looks, tastes, smells, and feels like? Is the Eucharist centered on the prayer to the Holy Spirit to “make holy these gifts” of bread and wine, “that they may become the body and blood of [God’s] Son, our Lord Jesus Christ”? Is the Eucharist centered on the whole of the Eucharistic Prayer, which extends from my invitation, “The Lord be with you,” to, “Through him, with him, and in him”… and that I will pray with you in a few moments? Is the Eucharist centered on a second prayer to the Holy Spirit within this Eucharistic Prayer, in which we pray not only that the bread and wine be made holy and transformed to take in the real, true, and full presence of Christ, but that we, too, may be so transformed: “Grant that we, who are nourished by the Body and Blood of your Son, and filled with his Holy Spirit, may become one body, one spirit in Christ”? Is our Eucharist centered on what is on the altar; the whole of this celebration we often call the Mass; the priest who leads the celebration; all of us gathered in community, in communion, with one another?

Let me offer a too-easy answer to the long list of questions I have asked just now: “Yes.” Indeed, the Eucharist, the Body and Blood of Christ we celebrate, is all of this and more. It is no wonder, then, that even the most faithful Catholic Christian might become easily confused by this celebration of many names and many faces. It is no wonder that the question we may be most drawn to ask is, well, then, “What is it”?

What is the Body and Blood of Christ; the Real Presence of Christ; Eucharist; the Feast of the Lord’s Table; the Lord’s Supper; Mass; communion? As I say to children I have taught when they look at me sheepishly, thinking they have asked what they are not sure is the right or on-topic question, “That’s an excellent question”! Our next step with this question about the Eucharist, “Manna ‒ What is it,” though, must be to turn this into no longer a “What” question but a “Who” question: “Who is it”?

And so “Who is it”? In some ways more fully than others, my experience is that most Christians know that Jesus Christ is present in the Eucharist and that our salvation, our living “forever” with God, depends on this fact. We know that, as we hear Jesus himself proclaim in our Gospel reading, from John, “Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life… For my flesh is true food, and my blood is true drink.”

“Jesus Christ” is our best answer to our question that has become, “Who is it”? Depending upon how fully some people actually believe Jesus Christ is present in the Eucharist or how literally (or not) to interpret his words in our Gospel, some may be confused our outright scandalized in thinking about how Jesus could offer us his body and blood to eat and drink. I go no further, because my understanding here is at its limit.

And yet, I think, what could be even more challenging for us than to believe that Jesus Christ offers himself really, truly, and fully in flesh and blood; all that he is in this celebration in his memory, is to believe that Jesus Christ has chosen to offer himself to our world through us; that we are the first place from which Jesus Christ shows himself to our world really, truly, and fully through our flesh and blood; that we are part of the answer to the question, “Who is it”?

And from the moment we go forth from this celebration; our witness here to a miracle of Christ really, truly, and fully in flesh and blood, we are entrusted with working out together, in communion, in our world by how we act as Christ in our world the answer to our eternal question about our Eucharist: “Who is it”?

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 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 Sunday, 3 May 2015– Fifth Sunday of Easter

Readings of the day: Acts 9:26-31; Psalm 22:26-27, 28, 30, 31-32; 1 John 3:18-24; John 15:1-8

What does it mean to be connected to something or to somebody? Back in 2001, I went to study in France for the first time. Fourteen years ago, the flip phone was the latest in cellular technology, an increasingly portable way to remain connected. The communications company Nokia ran an English ad in France for its flip phones. At the end of the commercial, a child announced the Nokia slogan proudly in a French accent: “Connecting people”!

Nowadays, what are our ways of “connecting people”? Flip phones have led to smart phones. E-mail has led to Messenger. We have Facebook; Twitter; Linked-In for the more professionally-inclined… Technology has afforded us more ways than ever to be connected to one another. I communicate regularly with my family in Edmonton over Skype, and I am able to “Skype into” faith and Scripture sharing meetings with my brother Basilian priests from as far away as France and Colombia! Social media have become an indispensible tool for ministry, as long as they do not replace physically meeting people we serve.

But with all this electronic technology, is something not still lacking insofar as being connected? Some of us may ask, “What is lacking”? In John’s Gospel today we hear Jesus encourage us to rise to a new standard of being connected. All this technology is good. Actually to meet and speak with other people is better than technology. But Jesus speaks to us about the best way to be connected. What is the best way to be connected both to one another and to God; to Christ?

Jesus says, “I am the true vine, and my Father is the vine grower… I am the vine, you are the branches. Whoever remains in me and I in him will bear much fruit.” What does Jesus mean by all this: “I am the true vine, and my Father is the vine grower”? What does it mean to “remain in” Christ and for Christ to “remain in” us? How is Jesus asking us to “bear much fruit”?

We do not need to live on a vineyard to understand well enough what Jesus is saying here. We do not need to leave behind all of our electronic technology that helps us to stay connected to one another in order to gain a better sense of Jesus’ words, although “remain in me and I in” you may sound strange to our ears. No, Jesus speaks to us of how best to live in relationship with one another and with God.

And do we not all understand at least something about relationships? How many of us have a best friend, or a few very good friends? How many of us are married; belong to a religious community; have ever been in love? How many of us have brothers; sisters; parents; extended family whom we love dearly? This past week, speaking of relationships, my parents celebrated their thirty-ninth wedding anniversary. Their relationship of love is a model for me; for my priesthood; for my relationship of love with all of us, the Church, which I try to live out daily.

We understand a lot about relationships already. We are here to celebrate this Eucharist, Jesus Christ really present among and in us. And so we already understand something sacramentally about the greatest of all relationships: Our relationship with Jesus Christ. Our God has given himself to us as a human being, Jesus Christ, one like us in all but sin. Jesus lived among us, died for us, is risen for us, ascended to heaven for us, and now gives himself to us under the form of bread and wine: “This is my body… This is my blood…”

Many of our children here at St. Kateri Parish will receive their first communion; this sacrament of Eucharist for the first time today and over the next few weeks. Children of St. Kateri: Who are you receiving when you receive communion? You receive Jesus Christ. And so you already understand something about relationship with Jesus; with God.

Relationship is like being connected to somebody, but even better. Technology and information help us to stay connected, but being in relationship means something more. Relationship means to love one another. It means to want the best for one another, in the way that God wants the best for us. God wants us to be with him forever. This is why God gave us God’s only Son, Jesus Christ, now still with us in the Eucharist. “Whoever remains in me and I in him will bear much fruit.”

But this “remaining in” relationship with God; Jesus Christ and with one another is hard work. All the technology we have only goes so far. It keeps us connected without necessarily keeping us in relationship. Imagine this: “You have reached Big White Phone Communications Customer Service. For service in English, please press one. For service in Aramaic, please hold the line…”

Relationship, what Jesus asks of us in our Gospel reading today, is more than simply “connecting people”; more than being connected with God. To be in relationship means to keep a delicate balance between forgiveness and accountability. This, I think, is behind Jesus’ talk of pruning his disciples as a vine is pruned; trimmed of its branches that are unhealthy and no longer open to nourishment from the vine. Might pruning away the unhealthy branches seem harsh to us when we compare it to remaining in relationship with God as disciples of Christ? Jesus gives us a harsh saying here. And yet Jesus invites us to be mindful that both forgiveness and accountability; both the health of the branches nourished by the vine and the pruning of the vine require strong relationships; a strong and united community of Christian faith.

Unity; our comm-unity as Christians; as a parish; as a Church leaves no room for a silo mentality in which we become closed off in our own ministries. Christian community leaves no room for gossip. Christian community is not “I-God”; “I-Jesus” but all of us, together, in a relationship of love with one another and with our Lord that bears fruit in a great range of good works. The sacraments all depend on Christian community. They are sacraments of the Church; of community. We are brought into a community of faith by baptism and confirmation. We receive the Lord and become Christ to our world in community through our Eucharist. We are instruments of healing, and forgiveness in community through reconciliation and the anointing of the sick. In community we love and serve through the vocations of marriage and holy orders.

Community is not uniformity; all having the same ideas and never disagreeing with one another. Like the branches that “remain in” Jesus the vine, we might imagine ourselves as grafted onto the vine. Each branch joined or grafted onto the vine and receiving its nourishment contributes different useful characteristics to the plant: Better fruit; resistance to disease… So it is true with our community of faith. Is it not remarkable in our first reading from Acts that, as “the brothers” began to accept Paul after his conversion; as they had already accepted Barnabas (a very different personality with different gifts than Paul), the Church “was being built up and walked in [awe] of the Lord, and with the consolation of the Holy Spirit it grew in numbers”?

Christian community, we hear from the First Letter of John, depends on our keeping God’s commandments together. Who enjoys being commanded to do something? Not many of us like to be commanded to do something. But God gives us only two commandments in 1 John: “Believe in the name of his Son, Jesus Christ” and show the world (together) that we believe by how we act in Jesus’ name: “Love one another just as [Jesus] commanded us.”

“Believe” and “love.” These are whole community actions. “Believe” and “love,” and “remain”: Take in Jesus in the Eucharist and in our other sacraments of the Church; act for one another’s good in the world as Jesus has for us. This is community. This is relationship, not only “connecting people” but being at the heart of the Christian discipleship that Jesus asks of us: “Whoever remains in me and I in him will bear much fruit.”

Homily for Thursday, 2 April 2015– Holy Thursday, Evening Mass of the Lord's Supper

Readings of the day: Exodus 12:1-8, 11-14; Psalm 116:1-13, 15-16bc, 17-18; 1 Corinthians 11:24-26; John 13:1-15

When have we ever felt vulnerable; at the mercy of one or more other people? How many of us, if we think for a moment, realize that we enter the world as vulnerable; at another’s mercy? We begin in our mother’s womb, and we are born weak and totally dependent on others’ care. Who here has held a newborn child, and so knows very well of what I speak? We grow from newborns to older children, and then we become… teenagers: Again, an extremely vulnerable time!

And then who here remembers their first love? Who here is married? When you were married, you made yourself vulnerable; put yourself at the mercy of a person you love, for life. Other sacraments and rituals of our Church also celebrate our making ourselves vulnerable to others; to God. At baptism, we were entrusted to a community of faith, the Church, and to our parents and godparents to be examples to us of the love of Jesus Christ for us. Who here has been confirmed, “sealed with the gift of the Holy Spirit” by sacred Chrism oil; made vulnerable to the love of the Holy Spirit? If we think of confirmation in this way, is this not almost scary? My sisters and brothers in religious life; my brother priests and deacon here tonight, who have received the sacrament of orders: Do we not all have stories of being made vulnerable; having to trust other members of our religious communities; priests; families; God at critical times?

Who here has been anointed with the oil of the sick? Illness and age again put us at the mercy of others; at the mercy of God. Who here has received the sacrament of reconciliation? We entrust our darkest moments; our suffering; our sins to a priest, a human being, standing in place of God and the Church, yes, but still a frail, vulnerable human being; a sinner. Is this not making ourselves deeply vulnerable? Are not the sacraments and rituals of our Church all profound acts of courage; of making ourselves vulnerable to another?

Tonight’s celebration of the Mass of the Lord’s Supper, Holy Thursday, is a celebration of this most profound vulnerability. Only it is God; the Son of God, Jesus Christ, making himself vulnerable; entrusting himself completely to us. “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.”

St. Paul’s First Letter to the Corinthians and our Gospel reading, from John, celebrate two different instances of Jesus Christ making himself completely vulnerable to us. First Corinthians speaks of Jesus giving himself to us under the form of bread and wine, now Christ’s body and blood, our “new covenant” in “remembrance of” him. And John speaks of Jesus’ washing the feet of his own Apostles and then asking us to do the same: Wash one another’s feet; make yourselves vulnerable to one another. Put yourselves completely at one another’s mercy, as I have done for you, Jesus says.

And so we will, in just a few moments, remember and follow Jesus’ “new model” for us, a “model” of action that makes us vulnerable; perhaps unsettles us. This was an act of humiliation for Jesus, even before his ultimate humiliation for us on the cross. The washing of the feet was so unbecoming of the Son of God; the Savior of the world, that Jesus’ first Apostles, led by Peter, the Church’s “rock,” protested: “You will never wash my feet”! And yet tonight we will witness the washing of feet of twelve people chosen from among us, in remembrance of that first act of complete vulnerability by our Lord.

But why would Peter and the Apostles have been so unsettled by Jesus’ washing of their feet? Why would Jesus, God’s Son, choose willingly to wash their feet, as a slave would do for a master? In short, Jesus did this out of love. And Jesus’ Apostles were unsettled at this act because they had never quite experienced this depth of love before.

Jesus “loved his own who were in the world, and he loved them to the end.” In the words of John’s Gospel, this is why Jesus chose to put himself at his Apostles’ and our mercy in this way. This is why Jesus gave himself to us the night before he suffered and died for us, saying, “This is my body… This… is the new covenant in my blood. Do this… in remembrance of me.”

“He loved his own who were in the world, and he loved them to the end.” Indeed, God has loved us, “his own… in the world,” from the very beginning. God has loved us into being. We are all here because of an act of God’s love for us. God’s chosen people were brought out of slavery in Egypt. They were assured safe passage that first Passover if they marked the doorposts of their houses with lamb’s blood, we hear tonight from the Book of Exodus. All this was made possible because God loves us. God loved us from the beginning and will love us “to the end.” Still, the first Passover was without doubt an unsettling experience for God’s people in the Egyptian desert under Moses, an encounter with God’s love deeper than they had ever experienced before.

And then Jesus washes our feet. And he places himself completely at our mercy in this Last Supper: “This is my body… This… is the new covenant in my blood.” This is no longer lamb’s blood, but the blood of Christ; the body and blood of God made every bit as human as we are.

This kind of love; this kind of intimacy with us is unsettling. Are we willing to let Jesus enter into every aspect of our lives: To share in our joys and sorrows; our wellness and our illness; our prosperity and also our poverty? Are we willing to let Jesus be the very source of “all that is good” in us, but also to take upon himself our sins and have them nailed to a cross? Are we willing to allow Jesus to be both meal and sacrifice in this celebration? Are we willing to let Jesus wash our feet: All the grit, sweat, and stink (since I do not believe pedicures were readily available in Jesus’ time)? Are we willing to be loved more deeply than we have ever been loved before?

If not, Jesus’ answer to us is stark: “Unless I wash you, you will have no inheritance with me.” But, if so, we are invited to do as Christ does: Put ourselves at one another’s mercy; make ourselves completely vulnerable to one another out of love; sacrifice ourselves in daily, small ways, out of love. Love one another “to the end”; love one another more deeply than we have ever been loved before.

Homily for Sunday, 22 February 2015

1st Sunday in Lent

Readings of the day: Genesis 9:8-15; Psalm 25:4-5, 6-7, 8-9; 1 Peter 3:18-22; Mark 1:12-15

What are some of the things we do during Lent? Maybe Lent is a time for us to focus more deeply on prayer. Maybe during Lent we might commit more intently to ministry to and with the poor; the sick; the elderly; the homeless; the homebound; others in need. Maybe the Lenten discipline of abstaining especially from meat on Fridays may help us to grow spiritually. Then again, meat-free Lenten Fridays are a light penance for me. I look forward in particular to our parish’s Fish Fry every Friday during Lent. I like fish, but even more I enjoy meeting and being with all of us, the people of St. Kateri Parish. And I enjoy supporting our parish’s Boy Scouts by whose generosity we have our Fish Fry every Friday during Lent.

Maybe during Lent we might give up something other than just meat on Fridays, like sweets, coffee, or social media… One year, before I became a Basilian, my roommates suggested that I give up puns for Lent. This was a heavy penance for me; my roommates probably lamented that it was only for forty days!

All these Lenten activities are excellent, especially if they help to deepen our relationships with one another and with God: Works of mercy and justice; increased commitment to prayer; abstaining from meat on Fridays during Lent, and possibly giving up something else we enjoy but that is not essential to us. But, even if we do all these activities during Lent, what if we were to focus simply on remembering more profoundly God’s loving kindness; God’s saving, sustaining presence in our everyday lives?

The people of ancient Israel; the people of the Bible had a special word for God’s loving, kind action toward us and our responsibility, in light of God’s loving kindness toward us, to act with loving kindness toward one another. This word is “covenant.” 

Several times we hear this word, “covenant,” in our first reading today from the Book of Genesis. God calls “Noah and… his sons” out of the ark after the Great Flood, and then immediately makes a covenant with them and “every living creature” that has survived the flood. “I will establish my covenant with you,” God says to all who were on the ark. The rainbow will be “the sign… for all ages to come of the covenant between” God and Noah “and every living creature” for all time. Nothing, especially no flood, will ever destroy this new covenant God has made with all creation. “I will recall the covenant I have made,” God promises.

But what is a covenant? Is it some kind of contract? Perhaps we might understand a covenant as a contract. Many of the Biblical covenants between God and the people are written like contracts: God makes a promise to bless and to save the people; the people are responsible for keeping God’s commandments; for remaining faithful to their end of the bargain with God in return. If the people fail to remain faithful to God, they may incur a curse or destruction, like a forty-day flood!

But a covenant is more than just a contract. Imagine us signing on a line for the following: Divine parts and labor: Salvation of humankind and all creation. Cost: Infinity dollars, plus applicable taxes and unwavering faithfulness to God’s commandments; ark building materials sold separately; available while supplies last.

Fortunately for us, a covenant is more than this. But what is a covenant, among ourselves or between us and God, if not merely a contract? We might look to the sacraments as signs of what covenant means, especially for us as Christians. Sacraments are signs to us, much like the rainbow was to Noah, of God’s loving and kind presence to us; God’s saving and sustaining care for all of creation.

Do any of us remember when, a few years ago, concern about legal re-definition of marriage and the rate of marriage breakdown in this country led our sisters and brothers in some Protestant traditions to enter into so-called “covenant marriages”? Their concern was that our society understands marriage too much as a limited, breakable legal contract and not enough as an unbreakable covenant bond; a sign of something even more than wife and husband give to one another in a marriage. We might call this “something more” God’s presence; sustenance; strength; grace; loving kindness. “Covenant marriages” (I think rightly) struck at our social reduction of marriage to a mere contract. My concern is that they fell into this same trap of reducing marriage to a mere contract and so have not really solved this ongoing social problem.

Is not marriage a covenant relationship, not only a one-time contract offer on the wedding day but lived throughout a married couple’s life together? The same might be said of all our Church’s sacraments: They are visible signs of our relationship with God and with one another. Our sacraments are visible signs of God’s present, loving, and saving kindness toward us and all creation. Here we celebrate together one of these visible signs of God’s presence and loving kindness; of covenant relationship, our Eucharist.

In the same way, our second reading from the First Letter of Peter speaks to us of baptism in terms of covenant. “A few persons… were saved by water”; by the flood in Noah’s time. Now we are all offered salvation in Jesus Christ by baptism into Christ’s suffering, death, and resurrection. Baptism is not just a one-time contract with God. It is our entrance into covenant relationship with God and with one another, the Church. It is our entrance into the life of “the Kingdom of God” that our Gospel reading today says is “at hand,” here and now. We enter into this relationship with God and with one another in baptism and in every sacrament; a relationship through which God’s loving kindness is made present through our community of faith.

Baptism, like any sacrament, is not a mere contract. It is more than a contract. Indeed, I think a covenant relationship is more difficult for us to maintain, let alone to understand, than an ordinary contract. All is well if we honor the terms of a contract. And if we do not honor the terms of a contract, we may pay a penalty. In Biblical terms, we might (although I believe instances of this are rare) be cursed or destroyed. 

Try as we might, we cannot break the covenant we have now with God; the covenant God has made with all of creation. But what can we do to honor this covenant relationship with God and with one another? What does God invite us to do to honor this covenant?

God invites us simply to remember our covenant relationship with him and with one another; to remember that God is always faithful to this relationship: “I will recall the covenant I have made,” God promises. God invites us to remember and to be confident in God’s mercy for the times we fail to live up to the same covenant.

This remembrance of covenant is the high point of our Mass. We hear the words of Jesus in our Eucharistic Prayer: “Do this in remembrance of me.” And then our Eucharistic Prayer continues in remembrance of “the saving Passion of [God’s] Son, his wondrous Resurrection and Ascension into heaven” and our looking “forward to his second coming.”

We remember covenant, not a mere contract. We remember; we celebrate; we live this covenant with God and as one community of faith. We remember especially through our sacraments: Visible signs of covenant; visible signs of God’s loving kindness; of God’s sustaining, caring, saving presence to us and to all of creation.