Homily for Monday, 7 July 2014– Ferial

Monday of the 14th week in Ordinary Time 

Readings of the day: Hosea 2:16, 17c-18, 21-22; Psalm 145:2-3, 4-5, 6-7, 8-9; Matthew 9:18-26

Perhaps some of us who are married or have been in love would be best able to answer this: Have you (to the person you love) or has the person you love ever written a strange love letter? What was the purpose or context of this letter? Did the letter achieve its purpose?

This is what God does through the prophet Hosea in our first reading today: God writes the people of Israel, God’s beloved, a strange love letter. It begins with God saying to Israel: “I will allure her; I will lead her into the desert and speak to her heart.”

For how many of us would a trip out into a desert be our idea of a great date? I suspect most of us would prefer to see a movie, or go to a concert or a sporting event… anything but going out into a boring, bone-dry, hot desert.

The special relationship like a marriage, called a covenant, between God and Israel had been strained by the time of Hosea. The people of Israel were worshiping other gods (“baal”) instead of worshiping the one God; loving God as God loved the people of Israel. God and God’s beloved Israel need a heart-to-heart in the intimacy only the desert affords. Hosea prophecies the success of this heart-to-heart between Israel and God; their relationship will again be like that of a husband and wife who have been married for decades and have survived many “desert” moments.

She shall call me “My husband,” and never again “My baal.” In other words, Israel’s faithfulness to God will be renewed; their relationship saved and strengthened. Hosea puts much faith in the success of God’s strange love letter to Israel; in the heart-to-heart in Israel’s exile; in the desert between Israel and her God!

How many of us have ever written a love letter or received one from someone you love and/or to whom you are married? What was the purpose of this letter? Was it simply to say, “I love you,” or to express more specific feelings of joy or perhaps giving or receiving forgiveness? How did the other person (or you, if you received the letter) perceive it?

Have any of us, at prayer, ever imagined the love letter we would write to God, or that God would write to us? Perhaps God would encourage us in the love we have and already express for God and for one another as brothers and sisters in Christ. Perhaps there are areas in our lives in which we, like the people of Israel, need a timely heart-to-heart with God; when we are invited to ask God’s forgiveness for when we have not loved as God loves us.

We can be sure that God’s love letter to us will be strange, because even at our best no love is as great as God’s love for us. We can be sure that, as long as we try at minimum to love God and one another as sisters and brothers in Christ, we will be successful because God is always present to strengthen our love. Now, then, is perhaps the time for us to accept God’s invitation to that prayer date in the desert…

Homily for Sunday, 6 July 2014

14th Sunday in Ordinary TimeReadings of the day: Zechariah 9:9-10; Psalm 145:1-2, 8-9, 10-11, 13-14; Romans 8:9, 11-13; Matthew 11:25-30

This homily was given at Our Lady Queen of Peace Church in Rochester, NY, for the Basilian Fathers Missions Appeal.

If each of us were to put into words a personal mission statement, what would that mission statement be? In our readings today, we hear mission statements of prominent figures in our Scriptures. The prophet Zechariah, speaking to a nation of Israel that cannot seem to get out from under foreign rule, curiously crafts his mission statement around the theme of “dominion”; not of course the dominion of foreign nations over Israel but the peaceful, humble, and benevolent dominion of God.

Zechariah says that God’s “dominion shall be from sea to sea, and from the River to the ends of the earth.” Zechariah’s mission statement has long been one of my favorite verses in Scripture. Since I am originally from Canada, I recognize this verse immediately in Canada’s motto; a kind of mission statement of my native country: “A mari usque ad mare” in Latin, meaning “From sea to sea.”

God’s “dominion shall be from sea to sea, and from the River to the ends of the earth.” God gives to Zechariah and to all of us in baptism a mission to extend God’s dominion; to extend God’s kingdom “to the ends of the earth.” In our own time, our Church more and more explicitly understands herself as “a pilgrim Church” that “is missionary by its very nature.”[1]

This mission to cooperate with God to extend God’s “dominion… to the ends of the earth” is a mission that is outgoing as it is humble. Zechariah prophesies that God, Israel’s and our savior, will establish dominion, not with the trappings of the rich and powerful but with justice and meekness; “riding on an ass on a colt, the foal of an ass.” If we are to be co-workers with God in the establishment of this universal dominion, we are called to this same kind of outgoing yet humble mission as that of our God.

And yet, while mission in the Catholic sense involves an outgoing yet humble movement, it also includes a complementary and equally humble movement that draws inward toward its source. Who is the source of all Christian mission but Jesus Christ? Jesus invites us in our Gospel reading today, “Come to me, all you who labor and are burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am meek and humble of heart.”

“Come to” Christ; “learn from” Christ. Who among us would instinctively see this as a mission statement? I think that many if not most of us would identify Christian mission with going out to a community of people, perhaps a distant country and a foreign culture, to bring our faith to them and maybe to do humanitarian work. This outgoing aspect of mission is at best only half of what Christian mission is. Outgoing Christian mission is nothing without also its drawing inward toward its source, Jesus Christ, who invites us, “Come to me… Learn from me.”

Very early in my time with my religious community, the Basilian Fathers, I learned that Christian mission consists of these two movements. Christian mission is both outward and inward. It brings God’s kingdom “to the ends of the earth” but also must draw inward toward the source of mission; the source of all strength for ministry, Jesus Christ.

My very first assignment as a Basilian postulant was to Cali, Colombia, to teach French and English in our community’s high school there while learning Spanish. I naïvely thought then that my greatest challenges in Colombia would be to learn a new language, Spanish, and to teach in a classroom for the first time. I had a good sense of the outgoing movement of mission: Go and teach; be mindful of the poor; perhaps learn some Spanish. However, I had much to learn about the inward movement of Christian mission when I first went to Colombia. I would learn quickly that a good teacher is first a good learner. A good learner is a person who prays; for whom attentiveness to prayer is essential, otherwise the Christian missionary becomes tired and frustrated both spiritually and physically. A person who prays well is a good listener, to the people to whom one ministers; to members of one’s own religious community; to God. A good listener is a more effective missionary who responds best to needs of the people in the mission field. The Christian missionary is sent to bring God’s kingdom “to the ends of the earth” while at the same time being called to turn toward Christ who invites us, “Come to me… Learn from me.”

After twice serving as a French and English teacher in Cali, I have been taught far more about ministry; about the richness our Catholic faith into which I was baptized as an infant; about ministry; about Christian mission than I ever could teach the people in the community we Basilians serve in Cali. I have also been privileged to visit our Basilian communities in Tehuacán, Mexico and Medellín and Bogotá, Colombia. Each time, when I enter with the spirit of the Christian missionary who will help to bring God’s kingdom “to the ends of the earth,” I am taught more about the Christ who invites us, “Come to me… learn from me.” Come to and learn from your Basilian brothers; from the people among whom you have been sent to serve.

But all this speaking on Christian mission; specifically on Basilian missions abroad, may seem quite distant to us here and now at Our Lady Queen of Peace Church in Rochester. How, then, do we speak of Christian mission in a way that may not seem so distant from us?

I appeal to you today to support the ministry of the Basilian Missions in Mexico and Colombia. I ask for your prayers for Christian missionaries more broadly, many of whom risk their lives by their service. Yes, but I am asking us for more; I am asking and our Church asks us all to be missionaries wherever we are.

Our Church “is missionary by her very nature,” and so let us ask: Who are the people who most need our service; who most need Christ’s presence through our lived example as Christians? Is this person in need poor; unemployed? Do we know a friend, relative, or other loved one who struggles with her or his faith; who needs our patience; our forgiveness; our empathy; our welcome? These are opportunities for us to make an outward movement of Christian mission. This is the kind of outgoing mission that works together with God in bringing God’s “dominion”; God’s kingdom “to the ends of the earth.”

And yet let us remember as we seek out and serve those to whom we bring God’s presence; God’s kingdom, that Christian mission is both outward and inward, responding to Christ’s invitation: “Come to me… learn from me.”

What, then, would our Christian mission statement be? Perhaps it is that as Christian disciples through our baptism, we strive both to bring God’s kingdom “to the ends of the earth” and to draw inward toward the source of all Christian mission and ministry, to “come to” and to “learn from” Christ even as we bring Christ and the kingdom of God to our communities; to our parish; “to the ends of the earth.”

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[1] Second Vatican Council, Decree on the Mission Activity of the Church (Ad Gentes), 2. http:// www.vatican.va/archive/hist_councils/ii_vatican_council/documents/vat-ii_decree_19651207_ad-gentes_en.html. Accessed 4 July 2014.

Homily for Friday, 4 July 2014– Ferial

Friday of the 13th week in Ordinary Time 

Independence Day (USA)

Readings of the day: Amos 8:4-6, 9-12; Psalm 119:2, 12, 20, 30, 40, 131; Matthew 9:9-13

“One does not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes forth from the mouth of God,” we pray in our Responsorial Psalm. On this Fourth of July, what is the word “that comes forth from the mouth of God” to our ears and our hearts? How are we living by the word of God, both as individuals and as a nation? How are we being called to live better than we do by the word of God?

Jesus invites us all, whether rich or poor; powerful or not, to one mission: “Follow me.” This command to Matthew and then to all of us in our Gospel today, I think, does not mean, “Follow the way of money, social influence, military might; build an increasingly powerful nation at all costs… and then follow me.” No, Jesus says simply, “Follow me.” Following Jesus is our first priority as Jesus’ disciples.

While being as powerful and influential a nation as is the United States of America is not in itself wrong, we are invited especially today in this country to ask to what end our nation’s power and influence is directed. Is it directed toward power and influence for its own sake; toward living “by bread alone”; by power alone; by influence alone; by military might alone? Or is it directed toward the well-being of those most in need, in our world and right in our own country; in our own city; in our own communities; in our own parish? Are our hearts and ears directed toward hearing and living first “by the word of God”?

The word of God by which we are called to live is the word of a God who is “divinely obsessed” in a sense with the needs of the least well-off; a God whose priority; whose “preferential option” is “for the poor.” This God; our God calls rich and poor alike, us as individuals and as “one nation under God,” to share this same divine obsession. This obsession; this divine priority runs counter to an obsession with power, influence, and military might; to an obsession with ideological divisions that have marred our great nation and distract us from our one God-given mission.

This mission is the same mission given to the people of Israel whom the prophet Amos admonishes in our first reading: If you oppress those in need; if you are obsessed with building your own power and influence at all costs, your relationship with God will be broken. This is the same mission given to the Pharisees in our Gospel: “I desire mercy and not sacrifice.”

This mission is the same mission that Jesus gives to the tax collector-turned-apostle Matthew and now to us, as individuals and as a nation: “Follow me.” Live first so that those in greatest need may also live “by every word that comes forth from the mouth of God.”

Homily for Thursday, 3 July 2014‒ Feast of Saint Thomas the Apostle

Readings of the day: Ephesians 2:19-22; Psalm 117:1bc-2; John 20:24-29

St. Thomas the Apostle, also named Didymus or “the twin” in our Gospel reading today, is often nicknamed “Doubting Thomas,” but how often do we think of Thomas not as “Doubting Thomas” but perhaps as “Believing Thomas” or even “Trusting Thomas”?

Is not Thomas a lot like us in our faith? We, like Thomas, like certainty; not being kept wondering about what we are to believe; what beliefs or teachings are essential to our Christian faith and which are not as essential, and so forth… In icons, Thomas is often depicted holding a square measure. Thomas is the scientific thinker: Everything measured; planned; certain. “Unless I see the mark of the nails in his hands and put my finger into the nail marks and put my hand into his side, I will not believe,” Thomas says to his brother Apostles after Jesus’ resurrection.

Whenever I visit my parents’ home and walk into my father’s shop, the large square measure that hangs on Dad’s shop wall especially stands out to me. I am reminded of Thomas, one of my favorite Apostles. My father, a retired meteorologist, and I, a microbiology lab technologist before I was a Basilian, are scientific thinkers, much like St. Thomas whose icons show him holding a square measure. Dad and I have had many conversations about the need for certainty, particularly among Catholics of our more scientific mindset or among generations of us who came of age in a Church that, on the surface, was sure of itself; its teachings clear, memorable, and sometimes recitable by rote (the era of the Baltimore Catechism!).

Many of us thrive on the Church of the square measure; the Church whose certainty the Apostle Thomas sought: “Unless I see… I will not believe.” There is nothing wrong with this kind of faith; this kind of quest for certainty. In this way, many of us are as Thomas’ second name, Didymus, suggests, twins with Thomas. But if we are twins with the questioning Thomas; the Thomas who seeks certainty before he believes; the “Doubting Thomas,” we are also called to be twins with the “Believing Thomas”; the “Trusting Thomas.” We are called to be twins with the Apostle Thomas who puts his hands in the wounds of Christ. We are called to be twins with the Apostle Thomas who ultimately professes his faith in the Risen Christ in the presence of his brother Apostles: “My Lord and my God”!

The Thomas we remember on this feast day, then, is not so much the “Doubting Thomas” as the “Believing Thomas” or the “Trusting Thomas.” In our Prayer over the Offerings that we are about to hear as the bread and wine are brought to our altar, we pray that God may “keep safe [God’s] gifts in us as we honor the confession of the Apostle Saint Thomas.” We honor St. Thomas, depicted in icons with a square measure and, just as often, with a scroll, which stands for his confession of faith: “My Lord and my God”!

We are called to be twins in the spirit of Thomas. Indeed, we are called to be, like Thomas, a people of the square measure. But just as often we are called to be people of the scroll who, after St. Thomas, are unafraid even when we lack certainty; when we do not have all the answers, to confess our faith boldly and trustingly: “My Lord and my God”!

Homily for Wednesday, 2 July 2014– Ferial

Wednesday of the 13th week in Ordinary Time 

Readings of the day: Amos 5:14-15; Psalm 50:7, 8-9, 10-11, 12-13, 16bc-17; Matthew 8:28-34

Have any of us experienced a time when all was going well in our lives? In those times when all is going well, are we mindful of and grateful for the presence of God in our lives; the God who is the beginning of all that is good? Or (hopefully this is not the case with anyone among us) do we sometimes forget about God in times of prosperity; when all is going well, and seek God only in times of crisis?

This is the prophet Amos’ criticism of the people of Israel in his day. Centuries before Israel would be overrun and many of its people exiled, this nation enjoyed a time of relative prosperity. Along comes Amos, who says to the people of Israel for whom all is going well that, if they do not begin to live according to God’s way of authentic goodness; if they continue to worship other gods; if they do not work for justice especially for those who least enjoy the nation’s prosperity; if they continue to bribe God with meaningless “feasts” and “solemnities” without the ethical conduct expected of a people in covenant relationship with God, then Israel will be brought to ruin.

The people of Israel do not want to hear Amos’ message. Eventually, if we continue to read the Book of Amos, the priest of Bethel where Amos prophesies expels Amos from the city.

In our Gospel reading today from Matthew, Jesus enters the non-Jewish territory of the Gadarenes, near the Sea of Galilee. Let us imagine Gadara, a small pagan town, happily and unsuspectingly going about its business. But chaos lurks just outside of Gadara: “two demoniacs” who were “so savage that no one could travel by that road” toward the town. Jesus casts the demons from the demoniacs into a “herd of swine” who then rush over a cliff “into the sea.”

How many of us, when we hear this story, think of it as a strange if graphic account of an exorcism and nothing more? Let us envision this story from the perspective of the people of Gadara. They are enjoying a peaceful day, going about their activities, when suddenly a demon-possessed herd of swine rushes through town! Understandably, once the Gadarenes know that Jesus was behind the demon-possessed swine (not to mention that the swineherds who had just lost their swine into the sea would not have been amused!), they plead with Jesus to leave their town.

Jesus had disturbed their peace and prosperity, much like Amos had disturbed the artificial peace and prosperity of the people of Israel of his time. How grateful are we to God in times of peace; in times of prosperity; in times when our prayer life is strong and fruitful; in times when God seems to be answering our prayers? And yet how open are we to the presence of God in our lives; a presence that is always authentically good, but a presence that may disturb our peace, so to speak, especially when, on the surface, all seems to be going well?