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

Monday of the 19th Week in Ordinary Time

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Homily for Sunday, 10 August 2014

19th Sunday in Ordinary Time

Readings of the day: 1 Kings 19:9a, 11-13a; Psalm 85:9, 10, 11-12, 13-14; Romans 9:1-5; Matthew 14:22-33

Who here has ever been awakened at three o’clock in the morning and then has tried in vain to get back to sleep? Perhaps except for those of us who are night shift workers, to be awake at three o’clock in the morning is not usually good. Three o’clock in the morning and those who are awakened at this hour have historically been associated with immoral behaviour, guilt, or (probably closer to the true diagnosis if someone is regularly awake at this time) simply insomnia. A phone call or knock at the door at three o’clock in the morning causes us to worry: Would this not rightly cause us to fear the worst? Often people who are wandering the streets at three o’clock in the morning are up to no good. And if illness or sadness is keeping us up at three o’clock in the morning, is not the illness or sadness usually made worse by not being able to sleep?

Why do I emphasize three o’clock in the morning? What is so remarkable about this time? In our Gospel reading, we hear that the boat in which Jesus’ disciples were encounters a strong headwind and high waves “during the fourth watch of the night,” or at about three o’clock in the morning.

I do not know what Jesus’ disciples were doing in a boat “a few miles offshore” at three o’clock in the morning! All we know from our Gospel reading is that Jesus had left them there while he went to pray alone. Then, in the wee hours of the morning, the disciples in the boat encounter bad weather, and it is at this point when Jesus comes walking toward them on the water…

Having been in the Holy Land; having stood on the shore of the Sea of Galilee just last summer, I can relate to the predicament in which Jesus’ disciples must have found themselves that night in the boat. For what is not a very large lake, the Sea of Galilee is renowned for rapid changes in weather. In seemingly just a few minutes, the wind can whip calm water up into white-capped waves, as I saw on the day I visited the Sea of Galilee. This Sea of Galilee brought life and a sufficient living from its abundant fish; it could also bring death and destruction if one were caught out on it when the weather changed as quickly as it does there. And so we can empathize with Jesus’ disciples fear when the sea turned stormy the night Jesus walked toward them on water at three o’clock in the morning.

What about the story of Elijah that we hear in our first reading? Elijah, too, was experiencing fear for his life. He had just killed the false prophets of the false gods worshipped by Jezebel, the wife of Israel’s King Ahab. Jezebel wants Elijah killed in turn, and so Elijah escapes to a cave on Mount Horeb where, in fear and despair for his life, he waits for God. And Elijah encounters God on Horeb, but not as Elijah would have expected to encounter God.

I ask if, in his fear and despair, Elijah might have thought: Maybe a rock-crushing wind would not be such a bad idea; or maybe an earthquake; or maybe a fire… “God, I am in such deep despair as not to want to live,” Elijah might have prayed. A few verses earlier in 1 Kings, Elijah makes precisely this prayer: “Enough, LORD! Take my life, for I am no better than my ancestors.” Can we relate, perhaps if we have known anyone to be in such deep distress as to despair of life itself, or if some of us have experienced this despair or depression ourselves?

God, though, encourages Elijah; calls him forth from the cave: God calls Elijah forth not from a strong wind; not from an earthquake; not from a fire, but with “a tiny whispering sound.” In the depths of his despair and fear, perhaps at three o’clock in the morning when Elijah could not sleep (although we cannot know from our first reading at what time of day Elijah encountered God on Horeb), Elijah encounters the powerful gentleness of God. Elijah encounters God as a calm whisper, as if to say quietly, “I have a purpose for you yet. Entrust your life to me and be my prophet. All will be well.”

Parents with small children: Have you ever consoled your children when they could not sleep at night by cradling them in your arms and whispering into their ears? Often, when I am presiding at Mass, I look out and see parents whispering to their children to keep them calm. I see children whisper back to their parents, and then occasionally look up at me with a facial expression of, “Oops! Father sees me talking during Mass.” I have to smile at these moments. These whispered conversations between parents and children, whether at Mass or at three o’clock in the morning when the children cannot sleep: This is how God speaks with us, I am sure.

Our God is not in the wind, in the earthquake, or in the fire. Our God is in the silence; in the consoling whispered conversations between parents and children. Never is God more powerful than in God’s gentleness: “I have a purpose for you yet. Trust in me. All will be well.”

This is the gentleness with which God encounters Elijah. And this is the gentleness with which Jesus encounters his disciples at three o’clock in the morning, quietly walking toward them on water: “Take courage, it is I; do not be afraid.”

To his credit, Peter recognizes God’s gentle presence in Jesus walking on the water. Peter is open to being taught this way of gentleness; this way of trust in God: “Lord, if it is you, command me to come to you on the water.” And Jesus says to Peter, “Come.” Jesus not only walks gently toward his disciples on water; not only calms our storms of weak faith; weak trust, but calls us to walk on water as he does, with whatever “little faith” we already have. Jesus calls us to encounter one another; to serve one another; to love one another; to encourage and to console one another with God-like gentleness. And when we fail; when we are sinking; when we sin, Jesus stretches out a hand to save us: “O you of little faith, why did you doubt”?

When we despair; when we are sad; when we are unsure of God’s presence in our lives; when we experience sometimes sudden storms in our lives or relationships; when it is three o’clock in the morning and we cannot sleep, God meets us in a calm whisper. God whispers to us, as a parent to a child: “Take courage, it is I; do not be afraid.” When we call back to God, in the words of St. Peter, “Lord, save me,” we can be sure that God hears us and whispers back: “I am not in the wind. I am not in the storm at sea. I am not in the earthquake. I am not in the fire. I am not in whatever is keeping you awake at three o’clock in the morning. I am in the ‘tiny whispering sound’ that you hear if you listen carefully. I have a purpose for you, my beloved. Trust in me. All will be well.”

Homily for Friday, 8 August 2014– Memorial of St. Dominic

Friday of the 18th Week in Ordinary Time

Readings of the day: Nahum 2:1, 3, 3:1-3, 6-7; Responsorial Canticle: Deuteronomy 32:35cd-36ab, 39abcd, 41; Matthew 16:24-28

Are not the questions Jesus asks us in today’s Gospel reading strange? He asks, “What profit would there be for one to gain the whole world and forfeit his life? Or what can one give in exchange for his life?”

We are led to answer “none” and “nothing” to these strange rhetorical questions. But then, in answering that there would be, of course, no profit in gaining “the whole world” and losing one’s life, or that nothing can possibly be given in exchange for life, we are led to examine our thinking.

As a parish community and as individuals we do countless great acts of love; acts of kindness; acts of witness to the Christian faith we profess. And yet, when we perform these good works, how many of us have ever thought, even subconsciously, “What will I gain from doing this? What is ‘in it’ for me?” Maybe more insidious even is to do good only because we should; because this will please God and others while perhaps giving ourselves a sense of accomplishment.

To please God and the people we serve, and even to gain enjoyment, praise, or wealth out of our service, are of themselves right motivations, and yet Jesus invites us to think beyond our own personal gain; to think even beyond doing right simply because we should.

We were created to do good works; to serve God through service toward one another, especially those most in need. To do good works is within our very nature as creatures made in the image and likeness of God. For us to understand this; to make this our motive for doing good instead of lesser motivations such as personal gain or even pleasing others or even God, takes a radical reset in ethical priorities.

We call this reset conversion. This conversion, for most of us, is not instantaneous but a lifelong process. This conversion will sustain us in times when doing good works, doing what is both God-like and befitting our human dignity as created in God’s image and likeness, does not bring us worldly gain; when instead it brings ridicule; when it involves being counter-cultural (not for the sake of being counter-cultural but because we come to know in our hearts that it is right; it is of God); when doing right means accepting suffering; our crosses in life.

“What profit would there be for one to gain the whole world and forfeit his life? Or what can one give in exchange for his life?” Our answers to these questions, of course, are “none” and “nothing.” Jesus’ invitation to faith; to discipleship; to self-denial; to “take up [our] cross and follow” Christ is more than profit and exchange, as good as these worldly priorities can be. Jesus’ invitation to us is one of conversion; of resetting our ethical priorities: Not just because we should, but because of who we are, created in God’s image and likeness and baptized into fellowship with and in Christ. 

Homily for Thursday, 7 August 2014– Ferial

Thursday of the 18th week in Ordinary Time

Readings of the day: Jeremiah 31:31-34; Psalm 51:12-13, 14-15, 18-19; Matthew 16:13-23

Jesus asks his disciples in today’s Gospel reading from Matthew, “Who do people say the Son of Man is”? And “who do you say that I am”? These are good questions for us. Who do we say Jesus is? Who do we say God is?

The prophet Jeremiah gives us a good idea of who God is in the last verse of our first reading. Jeremiah says to the people of Israel that God “will forgive their evildoing and remember their sin no more.” In God’s mercy, God does not stop at forgiving our sins; God remembers our “sin no more.”

This distinction is crucial, and yet how many of us understand it? How many of us, when we ask forgiveness from somebody for a wrong action we have done, or even when we confess our sins in the Sacrament of Reconciliation, think of God as able and willing to forgive our wrongdoing through these encounters? If we do think of God in this way, this is correct, because God is a forgiving God. No sin is too great to forgive, except perhaps the sin of not even asking for forgiveness. And yet God does not stop at forgiving our sin. God, as Jeremiah puts it, remembers our “sin no more.”

God, in the words of our Responsorial Psalm, does more than forgive our sin. We pray to God, “Create a new heart in me.” In similar words, the Colombian Blessed Laura Montoya Upegui, who worked with indigenous people deep in the jungles of Colombia, once prayed: “Lord, destroy me and, upon my ruins, build a monument to your glory.”

Lord, destroy what leads me away from you; destroy my sin; remember my sin no more. This is what absolution is about: “Create a new heart in me”; a heart after your glory; a heart after your own heart.

If we understand that God is more than forgiving; that God’s will is to destroy our sin and to re-create us fully in God’s image, does this not radically re-orient our understanding of God? Does it not radically re-orient how we identify Jesus Christ when he asks us, “Who do you say that I am”?

This might radically re-orient how we understand the effect of the Sacrament of Reconciliation, or even our Penitential Rite during Mass. Reconciliation becomes more than just confessing a list of sins and being assigned a formula to pray as a penance.

Our sins are not just forgiven, but destroyed and their void filled with God’s own presence. This is not only radical; but may be (and perhaps should be) scary to us! I say scary because, when we are reconciled with one another and with God; when we not only “do” penance but live penitentially, we are invited to let something die within us; to let go of our sin; to let God destroy our sin so that God can fill its void. “Get behind me, Satan.” God, remember our sin no more. “Create a new heart in” us. Destroy what keeps us from you and build within us “a monument to your glory.”