Homily for Wednesday, 10 August 2016‒ Feast of St. Lawrence

Wednesday of the 19th Week in Ordinary Time

Readings of the day: 2 Corinthians 9:6-10; Psalm 112:1-2, 5-6, 7-8, 9; John 12:24-26

This homily was given at the chapel of Kateri House Women's Residence of St. Joseph's College, University of Alberta, Edmonton, AB, Canada.

“God loves a cheerful giver,” St. Paul says in his second letter to the Corinthians. And Jesus says “to his disciples” in John’s Gospel, “Whoever serves me, the Father will honour.”

Who here is able to name “a cheerful giver,” somebody who is known for generous service to others; to our Church; to the world? When I think of a generous, “cheerful giver,” I think of a person like Mother Teresa, who founded the Missionaries of Charity to serve the poor around the world. Here in our own country, and longer ago than Mother Teresa, we might include Canada’s saints: Marie de l’Incarnation, who  established the Ursuline Sisters in Québec; Marguerite d’Youville, founder of the Grey Nuns; the Canadian Martyrs; many missionaries; more recently André Bessette… We may think of philanthropists who have given to their communities.

But so many “cheerful,” generous servants and saints are unheralded. Although he is named (many, even, I imagine, the vast majority of saints are not even known by name), we might consider St. Lawrence, whose feast we celebrate today, among these unheralded cheerful and generous servants. Most of what we know about St. Lawrence is legend or at least second-hand. Tradition back to the Acts of the Apostles was to appoint seven deacons to help the pope in Rome to serve those in need in the city. Under Pope Sixtus II, also a saint and martyr, St. Lawrence was one of these seven deacons during the reign of the Roman Emperor Valerian.

We might be familiar with St. Ambrose’s humorous, if graphic, account of The Martyrdom of St. Lawrence: As St. Lawrence was being burned to death, he asked his executioners: “Would you turn me over? I’m not done yet on the other side”!

Dark humour aside, I think another story from the same work by St. Ambrose even more beautifully captures the spirit of St. Lawrence, the kind of “cheerful giver” and generous servant of God whom Jesus promises “the Father will honour.” After Pope Sixtus was led to his death, three days before Lawrence was martyred, Valerian demanded the treasures of the Church of Rome be brought to him. On the day he was executed, Lawrence (we might imagine tongue-in-cheek) brought with him a delegation of the suffering, the poor, the sick, and the crippled of Rome, and announced to a furious Valerian, “Here are the treasures of the Church”!

Who are the cheerful givers; the servants among us whom “the Father will honour”? Who will present before God “the treasures of the Church”: The people of God most in need of our service; the people whose dignity is most vulnerable to being exploited? Perhaps the better question is to ask ourselves to what extent we are prepared to be servants ourselves; to recognize the suffering, the poor, the sick; people with disabilities; the unborn; the elderly as “the treasures” of our Church; of our world; of God’s creation.

We will most likely not be martyred for our efforts as St. Lawrence was. We may not even gain a name for ourselves, except before God. And yet, if we serve not for our own glory but glorifying God, we can be sure that God will love and honour the cheerful givers; those who serve generously.    

Homily for Sunday, 7 August 2016

19th Sunday in Ordinary Time

Readings of the day: Wisdom 18:6-9; Psalm 33:1, 12, 18-19, 20-22; Hebrews 11:1-2, 8-12; Luke 12:32-48

This homily was given at Our Lady of Perpetual Help Parish in Sherwood Park, AB, Canada.

Imagine if you were stranded on a faraway island. You have all you need to survive for the time you will be on the island: Water, food, shelter, warm clothing, and so forth. You have your family and closest loved ones with you. But on top of these minimal necessities to survive, you are only able to keep with you one thing. What is this one thing you would keep with you? What is your greatest treasure; the thing your heart most desires?

Jesus says this in our Gospel reading this evening [morning] from Luke about our greatest treasure; the thing our hearts most desire: “For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.” And so what is our greatest treasure; the one thing we would keep with us on this faraway island?

Children, maybe the treasure you would keep with you would be a favourite toy, or maybe a favourite children’s book, or video game, or equipment needed to play your favourite sport. For older children, teenagers, and adults, maybe our treasures would include what we need for our favourite hobbies: Craft material, a musical instrument, a good novel, unless you’re into non-fiction… Some of us might want to bring a television, or your dream sports car. Some of us who are handy might want to bring along our best power tool; after all, the shelter provided on the island is good enough for survival, but could always use some upgrades. For many of us, thinking more of spiritual survival, maybe we would bring a rosary or a Bible…

These (and others I have not mentioned) would all be great treasures we might consider bringing to a faraway island if we were only able to take one thing there with us. But in Luke’s Gospel Jesus is asking us to consider something more as our greatest treasure: The Kingdom of God. Jesus says “to his disciples…, ‘It is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the Kingdom.’”

We have only a small problem: Would it not be a bit far-fetched to fit the entire Kingdom of God on one faraway island? It would have to be a very large island! This is where we need to use our imagination… After all, if we were stranded on a faraway island, God would have had to make the island. God, as maker of the island, makes the rules as to the one thing, our hearts’ greatest desire, which we could bring to this faraway island. And so God could make this island as large as he wants, even large enough as to fit the whole Kingdom of God on it.

Trust me on this or, better yet, as God invites us, trust him! God constantly invites us to have faith in him; to accept this gift of the Kingdom of God that Jesus says the Father wants to give us. This treasure, God’s Kingdom, is worth selling “our possessions” and giving of our time; our talent; our treasure to help people who are poor, sick, troubled, or otherwise in need. If we had God’s Kingdom we would be ready for anything, on that island or here at home. And is this not what Jesus asks of us? “Be dressed for action and have your lamps lit… You also must be ready, for the Son of Man is coming at an unexpected hour,” Jesus says.

How many of us are still not convinced; still trying to imagine the great big Kingdom of God somehow fitting on this little faraway island? Fair enough; the Kingdom of God is enormous and the island is probably tiny. And so God does not give us his whole Kingdom all at once. We will only have and be in the fullness of the Kingdom of God at the end of time, when there will be no worry about having to cram the entire Kingdom of God onto a little (imaginary) faraway island.

For now, God gives us small yet important (not imaginary, but real) signs of the future fullness of God’s Kingdom. What are these signs? First, God gives us the sign of his being with us in history. This history is spoken of especially in our readings today from Wisdom and the letter to the Hebrews. God was with God’s people, making freedom, “deliverance from Egypt” under Moses, possible. God shows himself in our history, the events of our world, as great and powerful, destroying Israel’s “enemies” in the time of Moses, but also as good and merciful, calling Israel; calling us “to himself,” back to the glory of our creation, when God made us and called us “very good.”

God then gives us the gift of faith; the faith God first gave Abraham; the faith or “conviction of things not seen.” Faith is especially important. Let us be honest: Can it not be difficult to perceive signs of God’s Kingdom; of God’s presence in our world through acts of violence and of terror; through brokenness of human relationships that many of us experience; through the suffering of innocent people? How many of us know somebody with the faith of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob, and then some, through sometimes the most awful situations in their lives? This faith God gives us is a sign of God’s “promise,” a sign that God is working in our world to bring us the fullness of God’s Kingdom; God’s reign of mercy and peace over our world, even when God’s action is not easily seen through our world’s events.

God gives us the gift of faith. God is with us in our world and its history; in our story; our lives. Even better, God has personally become a part of our world’s history. God has shown himself to us as human in every way we are human except without sin, in the person of Jesus Christ. This is God’s greatest sign yet of the Kingdom. And this greatest of signs, God made human, Jesus Christ, asks only one thing of us in today’s Gospel: “Be ready.” Be ready for the fullness of God’s Kingdom.

But how can we be ready for the fullness of God’s Kingdom, a reality of peace; of goodness; of mercy; a treasure that surpasses even our wildest desires or imagination? It is absurd enough to imagine ourselves stranded on a faraway island, able to keep only one thing with us. The fullness of the Kingdom of God is still more beyond our understanding; we have never experienced anything like it. Yet it is real. It is Jesus’; God’s promise to us.

God gives us signs that point us to the “treasure” of the Kingdom of God: God’s actions in our world (in the unexpected, in miracles, but most often in little, everyday occurrences); God’s gift to us of faith; God entering our world as human in the person of Jesus Christ. And Jesus gives us, until he comes again, another sign; a sacrament of himself really present here in our Eucharist; our action of thanksgiving to and communion in God; in Christ...

I pray for all of us that, through this celebration, the Table of the Lord; our Eucharist, sign and sacrament of the fullness of God’s Kingdom, our greatest treasure and our hearts’ greatest desire will become nearer to you, little by little; not imaginary like a faraway island or even hoped for in the distant future, but real and present.

My sisters and brothers in Christ, we celebrate, here and now, signs that are real of the promise of the fullness of the Kingdom of God that is real: God’s action in our world and its events and history, our story; God’s gift of faith to us; God having sent his Son, Jesus Christ; Christ who gives himself to us in our Eucharist. Here is where our treasure is. Here is where our heart is. We are “dressed for action”; dressed for celebration. And we are ready.

Homily for Sunday, 31 July 2016

18th Sunday in Ordinary Time

Readings of the day: Ecclesiastes 1:2, 2:21-23; Psalm 90:3-4, 5-6, 12-13, 14, 17; Colossians 3:1-5, 9-11; Luke 12:13-21

This homily was given at the Monastery of the Carmel of St. Joseph near Spruce Grove, AB, Canada.

What is the point?

“Vanity of vanities, says the Teacher,” the author of the Book of Ecclesiastes from which we hear our first reading today. “All is vanity”! Is this not a somewhat cynical and sad view of our world and of human labour?

After all, in our Psalm we have just prayed to God, “Prosper for us the work of our hands.” Does this not contradict the view of the Teacher in Ecclesiastes, who says of “the work of our hands”: “For all their days are full of pain, and their work is a vexation; even at night their minds do not rest. This also is vanity”?

I am willing to admit that maybe the person who wrote Ecclesiastes may have been having a bad day at work. Maybe he was suffering from a severe case of writer’s block (if so, I can empathize with him, as a priest and graduate student). Maybe the Teacher had a difficult boss… or editor or publisher. Maybe (and by no means do I wish to make light of depression) he was depressed. And yet is there not surely more dignity than vanity in our work and in our world? If not, what is the point of anything we do? To borrow the title of a book from Fr. Timothy Radcliffe, a Dominican priest I had the joy of meeting a couple of years ago at his home at Blackfriars, Oxford, England, What Is the Point of Being a Christian, especially if “all things are vanity”?

I think both the Letter to the Colossians and our Gospel reading today from Luke give us clues toward answering questions like these. St. Paul says to the Colossians, “If you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above.” And Jesus reminds the crowd he teaches with the parable of the greedy rich man to seek to be “rich toward God”; to be “rich in what matters to God” and not to stockpile vain, perishable, earthly riches. And so our question shifts from “What is the point of our work; our faith; our worship; anything we do” to “How might we be rich in what matters to God; in what is of heaven and imperishable”?

Our world gives us many countersigns to “things that are above”; to richness “toward God” and “in what matters to God.” Some seek to be rich in money and material wealth. These are not bad in and of themselves, unless we rely on this material wealth in place of God or accumulate this wealth at the expense of other people. Some seek to be rich in military might and weaponry; rich in various forms of violence. Some seek to be rich in security and certainty. These people go so far as to want to build walls against anybody who may threaten their security. They go so far as to barricade their hearts and minds so not to need to respond to people who challenge their certainties (sometimes constructively), instead of defending the truths of God and of our faith, if necessary, with charity, kindness, and openness to better ways of expressing these timeless truths.

The “prosperity gospel”; the gospel of might and violence; the gospel of security; the gospels of greed and pride: These are not the Gospel of Jesus Christ; the Good News of our God. These are countersigns to the Gospel of Jesus Christ; these are false gospels. Yet enough people fall for these countersigns so that we have reached many crisis points in our world: Frayed and broken relationships in families; disregard for human life and dignity, especially of the not-yet-born, the elderly and the sick, and people with disabilities; wars; racism; a growing gap between the world’s wealthiest and poorest, many who lack even sufficient food and safe drinking water; acts of terrorism, most recently the murder of Fr. Jacques Hamel in France while he was celebrating Mass; more Christians and people of other creeds abused and killed than ever out of hatred for their faiths…

“This also is vanity.” This is appalling. And so what is the point, whether of our work, “of being a Christian,” or of being at all? What matters to God, and how might we be “rich toward God”? It can be well and good of us to condemn the “vanities”; the inhuman horrors of our time. It is well and good of us to speak to the truth of our Christian faith. But to condemn what is vain and false and to affirm truth is not enough. Religious faith cannot rest on the affirmation, “Because it is true.” “A religion,” Timothy Radcliffe says in What is the Point of Being a Christian?, “that tries to market itself as useful for some other purpose” than “to point us to God who is the point of everything… cannot be a religion that [we] could take seriously.” Religious faith demands a lived, ethical response. Our faith; our God calls us to live our response to these great questions: What is the point of who we are and what we do? How do we become “rich toward God”; “in what matters to God”?

And so how do we live our response to these questions? When I ask myself this, I think back to one of St. John Paul II’s earliest encyclicals; his teaching letters to the whole Church: Dives in Misericordia, or “Rich in Mercy.” “It is ‘God, who is rich in mercy,” Pope John Paul II begins. Mercy is “what matters to God.” Our God has revealed himself to us as mercy and invites us Christians to continue to reveal God to our world as mercy.

This, without doubt, is a difficult task for us, even before we consider all the countersigns in our world to mercy. Where do we even begin? I am not sure how many of us have been able to follow the news from World Youth Day in Krakow, Poland. This past Friday the Way of the Cross wound through the streets of Krakow. Each station of the Way of the Cross at this World Youth Day, during this Jubilee Year of Mercy, also included a meditation on one of the corporal or spiritual works of mercy. Might I suggest that these corporal and spiritual works of mercy would be great ways for us to reveal to our world our God “who is rich in mercy”?

Feed the hungry. Give drink to the thirsty. Clothe the naked. Shelter the homeless. Visit the sick and the imprisoned. Bury the dead. Instruct the ignorant, counsel the doubtful, and admonish sinners, always with love and patience. Bear wrongs patiently. Forgive offenses willingly. Comfort the afflicted. Pray for the living and the dead.

These are all ways in which we, as Christians, reveal Christ; reveal our God to our world as “rich in mercy.” And we show, by doing these works of mercy ourselves and by encouraging one another to do the same, that we are “rich toward God”; “rich in what matters to God”; that we, too, are “rich in mercy.” It is all the better when we show God’s mercy in our world quietly; unassumingly, without regard for our own gain but for “[glorifying] God by our lives.”

This, I dare say, is “the point of being a Christian.” Mercy, with humility, is the antidote to injustice; to greed; to violence; to “vanity.” Mercy points us to God; toward “things that are above.” Mercy makes us “rich toward God” who is “rich in mercy” and who prospers “the work of our hands.”

Homily for Thursday, 28 July 2016– Ferial

Thursday of the 17th week in Ordinary Time

Readings of the day: Jeremiah 18:1-6; Psalm 146:1b-2, 3-4, 5-6ab; Matthew 13:47-53

This homily was given at the chapel of Kateri House Women's Residence of St. Joseph's College, University of Alberta, Edmonton, AB, Canada.

Has anybody here ever done pottery or known somebody who has? Has anybody ever fished or known somebody who has?

Both pottery and fishing can be painstaking and even frustrating work. I have fished although, perhaps thankfully, not for a living, and I know at least one of my brother Basilian priests who has done pottery. Often my Basilian confrère would bring home mugs or other pieces of pottery he had made, and I would think of how beautiful these pieces of pottery were; how much work he had put into each one! On one occasion, when I was out fishing as a boy, the fish in the lake where my family fished had all been infected with a strange parasite. Many of the fish we caught, although they were large enough that we did not need to release them, were no longer good to eat, but we could not know which fish were infected with the parasite until we examined them more closely.

Both pottery and fishing can be hard work. Today the prophet Jeremiah presents God as the potter, working and reworking the clay, the people of Israel, into a vessel that seems “good to him.” And, in Matthew’s Gospel, Jesus presents God as the fisherman who has “caught fish of every kind” in “a net” and, “at the end of the age”; the end of time, will separate the good from the bad fish; “the evil from the righteous.”

Might images like the “furnace of fire” and like the clay vessel being broken down and “reworked… into another vessel” give us the sense of a harsh God? Instead, the reworking of the “spoiled” clay vessel “into another vessel” by the potter and the sorting of fish from the net in our Gospel reading are meant for us to be images of a patient, merciful God.

Our God does not want to break us down in order to re-mold us in his image. Our God does not want anybody to be lost to the “furnace of fire, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.” But our reality is that sin exists in our world. It exists and infects us like a parasite: Divisions among and within nations; among and within families; fearmongering and gossip; exclusion of entire groups based on their ethnicity, religion, or other reasons; all forms of violence, verbal and physical.

Sin is real. And yet it would be a mistake, a heresy, to suggest that any person is totally depraved or beyond redemption. Our God keeps molding us as the potter breaks down and reworks one vessel into another, “as [seems] good to him.” This is an act of re-creation by our God, bringing us back to our beginnings, when God fashioned us and declared us “very good.” Our God will wait until the end of time to “separate the evil from the righteous.”

Until then, God will continue to work to heal us of the parasite of sin; to re-mold us. And God invites us to work with him with patience and mercy, until we are made fit for the Kingdom of Heaven.

Homily for Sunday, 24 July 2016

17th Sunday in Ordinary Time

Readings of the day: Genesis 18:20-32; Psalm 138:1-2, 2-3, 6-7, 7-8; Colossians 2:12-14; Luke 11:1-13

This homily was given at the Monastery of the Carmel of St. Joseph near Spruce Grove, AB, Canada.

Please allow me to ask a couple of personal questions, and please do not answer aloud or even by a show of hands, but keep your answers between yourselves and God. First, has anybody here ever known somebody else to be a real pest to you? This person could be a co-worker; a relative; somebody in your family; a neighbour; somebody you hardly know and do not really want to know any better. For those of us here in consecrated religious life, the pest could be somebody in our religious community. Children among us: How often have you felt pestered by your brother or sister (if you have brothers or sisters); by another kid at school; by somebody else? This pest in your life may ask endless questions or make unreasonable demands. He or she gets under your skin. The pest will not simply give up and go away!

My second question is this: How many of us have ever been a pest to somebody? I have asked us to keep our answers to these questions between ourselves and God. But I must say that I am guilty as charged of having been a pest on a few occasions. As the eldest of three siblings in my family (I have one younger sister and one younger brother) and as a member of a religious community of priests, I have had many opportunities to be a pest. Sometimes the temptation is irresistible!

And sometimes to be a pest is fine. My sisters and brothers in Christ, today we hear first from the Word of God, from Genesis, the story of Abraham the Pest. Abraham is one of the finest pests in Scripture! God is on the receiving end of Abraham’s persistence “by the oaks of Mamre.” We have heard that all this begins with God’s plan to destroy the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah for their great wickedness.

I suppose that God did not need to tell Abraham that he was about to destroy Sodom and Gomorrah. Why invite the trouble; the endless questions? Just go and destroy those wicked cities! Yet God relents. Way to go, God; now Abraham the Pest is sure never to leave you alone! But God has a purpose in allowing Abraham to question him about Sodom and Gomorrah. God, even at his fire-and-brimstone best, is not consumed with anger or bent on destruction. God is our God of mercy; of “loving kindness”; of true justice through and through. This event in Genesis is not about the nature of Sodom’s or Gomorrah’s sin (of which, despite longstanding speculation, scholarly and not, nobody is really sure) but first about God’s merciful love. Destruction is God’s last resort.

Long before our current concept developed of “innocent until proven guilty,” God applies this principle by going “to see whether” the people of Sodom and Gomorrah have done as they are accused of doing. By doing this, God allows Abraham the chance to plead with him: “Suppose there are fifty righteous within the city; will you then sweep away the place and not forgive it for the fifty righteous who are in it”?

God must admit that Abraham has a good point here. To find fifty righteous people, even in cities as wicked as Sodom and Gomorrah, would be somewhat easy. But then Abraham persists: “What if there are only forty-five righteous people in Sodom and Gomorrah”?

We might imagine God responding, “Fine. I will spare the city if only forty-five righteous people are there, but do not push your luck”! And so what does Abraham do? He pushes his luck further, of course: “Suppose forty are found there.” “Fine,” God says, “hold the brimstone.”

“Suppose thirty are found there.” “Fine,” God sighs, “I’m having trouble finding my flamethrower anyway.”

“Suppose twenty are found there.” God responds, “Abraham, what did I say about not pushing your luck? But, yes, no problem, I will not destroy Sodom and Gomorrah if you know of twenty righteous people there. Now go away and do not bother me anymore”!

This does not deter Abraham the Pest: “Oh, do not let the LORD be angry if I speak just once more.” “What is it”?! God growls at Abraham, “I said not to bother me anymore about Sodom and Gomorrah! Then again, I’ve promised you everything else: A son; descendants to outnumber the stars… I kind of like you. In fact I love you dearly, even though you are such a pest! What do you want”?

“S-s- suppose ten are found there…” Abraham trembles. “Done,” God says, “for the sake of ten I will not destroy it… Now will you go relax under the oaks of Mamre and stop pestering me”? “Deal,” says Abraham.

… If we have such a great example of how to be a pest as Abraham in the Old Testament, can we not imagine that, in the Gospels, to be a pest would be raised to a fine art form? Jesus gives his disciples; gives us a prayer, the Our Father, the Lord’s Prayer, that is an acknowledgement of the holiness of God’s name, “Father, hallowed be your name,” followed by a series of petitions. We ask God for things in this prayer: “Give us this day our daily bread. And forgive us our sins, as we forgive everyone indebted to us. And do not bring us to the time of trial.”

Might we understand the Our Father, especially in light of the rest of today’s Gospel reading, as Jesus’ teaching on how to pester God effectively? The Our Father is not meant to be prayed only once. We pray it together every time we gather to celebrate our Eucharist. And many of us pray the Our Father multiple times a day. God wants us to pester him!

Now God invites us to join in the long tradition of pestering him effectively. Abraham, our father in faith, is also our father in persistence. Jesus was persistent. So were Jesus’ disciples, and so are we invited to be.

Jesus gives us a story, exaggerated for humorous effect, of the man who “at midnight” asks his friend for “three loaves of bread” because his “friend… has arrived.” The man is able to get “whatever he needs” in the end, Jesus says, if only “because of his persistence.” And then we hear from Jesus through Luke another memorable saying: “Ask, and it will be given you; search, and you will find; knock, and the door will be opened for you.”

Only here Jesus is no longer exaggerating. God will answer our prayer; our petition. God may not answer our prayer in exactly the way we expect, or even the first time we ask. But often, I think, God wants us to keep asking; to be persistent; to ask in a variety of ways for what we desire so to give us a chance to purify our desires. What, ultimately, do we all desire? I think the answer to this question is eternal life; salvation.

Our salvation is worth pestering God about, as are other desires of ours that lead us in the direction of salvation; of eternal life; of stronger relationship with God and one another. St. Paul, another of the Bible’s most brilliant pests, says this in his Letter to the Colossians: Do not be afraid to ask God to be saved; to ask God for forgiveness; for the strength to forgive others. Even “when [we] were dead in trespasses,” we were never beyond God’s saving love, kindness, and mercy.

Our God, Paul adds, has already anticipated our persistent prayer; our ultimate desire to be saved: “He forgave us all our trespasses… He set this aside, nailing it to the cross.” If Abraham were effective in pestering God to save Sodom and Gomorrah “for the sake of” only ten righteous people, now we have a chance to be saved because of the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ; because of this action of the one and only truly Righteous One.

And so it is worth our while to pester God. Pray with persistence. Knock on God’s door at midnight, saying, “Our friends have arrived and we need bread for the great celebration of your merciful presence; the sacrament of salvation we call Eucharist.” And, with persistence, our desires will be purified, to lead us more directly to God; to salvation. After all, God began working on satisfying this ultimate desire of ours before we ever asked.

Homily for Wednesday, 20 July 2016– Ferial

Wednesday of the 16th week in Ordinary Time

Readings of the day: Jeremiah 1:1, 4-10; Psalm 71:1-2, 3-4a, 5-6ab, 15, 17; Matthew 13:1-9

This homily was given at the chapel of Kateri House Women's Residence of St. Joseph's College, University of Alberta, Edmonton, AB, Canada.

Have any of us ever been asked to do something we thought to be difficult, or even unreasonably beyond our capabilities?

Today’s readings are especially meaningful to me for a few reasons: Our reading from Jeremiah was the first reading during my ordination as a deacon three years ago this upcoming September. And, well before I was a priest, or a deacon, or a seminarian, or even a microbiology lab tech, the job I had immediately before entering the seminary, I was a mushroom farmer.

On the farm, if I may describe the process of planting or, as we called it, spawning the mushrooms, it was not like planting most ordinary vegetables. The spawn is like little sticky grains, each of the size and consistency of cooked rice. To spawn the mushrooms, the farmer takes a handful of these little grains and scatters them somewhat haphazardly on the growing beds that have been layered with soil. Most of the spawn lands on the fertile soil, where it quickly takes root and, after a month or so, produces tasty mushrooms. But some spawn lands on the farmer’s clothing, or on the floor of the growing room where it is trodden under foot, or in other places where it will not grow into mushrooms.

Does this sound familiar to any of us? Perhaps few if any of us have been mushroom farmers, and yet Jesus’ parable of the sower reminds me of the mushroom farm every time I hear it: The sower scatters seed haphazardly. Some seed falls “on good soil” and brings “forth grain” of a sizeable yield, but as much or more seed falls “on the path,” where the birds eat it. “Other seeds fall on rocky ground” where they lack soil and are scorched by the sun; still other seeds fall “among thorns” and are choked out.

I question God’s efficiency as a sower! Could our Almighty God not have sown seed more efficiently than haphazardly scattering it to fall where it may? Even we mushroom farmers are (maybe) more efficient and less messy when spawning than the sower is in Matthew’s Gospel. And, most inefficiently of all, God asks us to take part in the sowing!

As a priest, I consider this to be a most difficult task, although not beyond my capabilities most days. An exception lately has been when we hear and many are scared by the latest horror in the world: Terrorist attacks; police shooting or being shot; wars; other violence; gossip and bullying… I want to protest, in Jeremiah’s words, “Truly I do not know how to speak, for I am only a boy.”

And there God is to say to me; to us: “Do not be afraid… Now I have put my words into your mouth.” Imagine, then, God handing us a large container of seed; a handful of mushroom spawn, and asking us: “Will you help me to scatter this seed; to speak my Word to a world in need? Do not worry first about efficiency. Do not be afraid; together we will make a great big creative mess in our world! Enough seed will fall on fertile soil that the yield will be amazing. I promise.”

Homily for Sunday, 17 July 2016

16th Sunday in Ordinary Time

Readings of the day: Genesis 18:1-10a; Psalm 15:2-3, 3-4, 5; Colossians 1:24-28; Luke 10:38-42

This homily was given at the Monastery of the Carmel of St. Joseph near Spruce Grove, AB, Canada.

What is hospitality? What would be the best image we could form in our minds of the perfect host?

Our readings today present us with several images of hospitality; with several hosts. We hear in Genesis of the visit by “three men” to Abraham and Sarah at “the oaks of Mamre.” Abraham shows himself to be a gracious and even quite humorous host. He says to the three men, “Let me bring a little bread.” I imagine Abraham with a slight smirk on his face as he enters the tent to ask Sarah and his servant not to make only “a little bread” but a magnificent feast of “cakes… curds and milk and the calf that he had prepared.” Maybe Abraham thought, “These three visitors are in for a big surprise. They do not know the feast I have in store for them”!

At the end of this feast at Mamre, one of the servants says to Abraham, “I will surely return to you in due season, and your wife Sarah shall have a son.” Might Abraham have thought at this point, “Wait a minute!? I have heard this promise of a son before. What a joke! Sarah and I are way too old to have a child”!

We know that Abraham had not always been the best host. God had made this promise of a child before to Abraham and Sarah, and they had dared to laugh at God and his far-fetched promise. Now, as he hosts his three guests “by the oaks of Mamre,” we see that Abraham is beginning to master the art of hospitality with a bit of humour. And just as the three men are about to leave, they deliver God’s announcement to Abraham that, from this point, in her womb Sarah has become the host to God’s last laugh at the expense of Abraham and Sarah: She is now pregnant with Isaac, whose name means “he who laughs.” One does not simply laugh at God and get away without consequences!

This would be far from the last or most direct time in which God would enter our world; in which God would teach us something about hospitality; in which God would go so far as to become human like us, to share in our life, our death, our sorrows yet also our joys, our tears and, I am sure, even our laughter. God has revealed himself to us in this utmost way in the person of Jesus Christ. Now we as Church are hosts to Jesus Christ; to God in our world. How do we go about hosting God in our world; revealing God to our world today?

The episode of Abraham with his three guests at Mamre is perhaps most famously depicted in the Russian Andrei Roublev’s fifteenth century icon called “The Trinity” or “The Hospitality of Abraham.” I do not dare to explain the sublime symbolism of this icon, which I do not understand well: Which angelic figure represents which person of the Trinity; why in some cases the angels’ wings overlap and in other cases do not; the significance of the chalice form of the space among the three figures and the wine-filled chalice on the table around which they are gathered; what the meaning is of the angels’ clothing, of the house in the upper right and of the tree at top centre… I would just as soon laugh at God as try to decipher Roublev’s “Trinity.”

I will only say this about the Most Holy Trinity: In the Trinity we have the ultimate revelation of hospitality; of the love among Father, Son, and Holy Spirit such that there is mysteriously distinction yet no division among the three persons of our one God. In the Trinity there is even more perfect hospitality; more perfect love than the hospitality and love shown by Abraham to his three guests at Mamre.

Yet I think there are simpler images of hospitality and of love, with humour, than Roublev’s “Trinity” or than Abraham’s feast with his guests at Mamre. I think of two images in my mind of great hospitality, one from my experience of being on pilgrimage to the Holy Land and the other from the history of my religious order, the Congregation of St. Basil or Basilians.

Three summers ago I was on a Basilian Peace and Justice Pilgrimage to the Holy Land. We were in the Palestinian territories of Bethlehem, Hebron, East Jerusalem, Jericho, Qumran, and the Dead Sea, south toward the Bedouin lands of the Negev desert, and elsewhere. It was the beginning of the Muslim month of fasting by day, Ramadan. In several of the homes in which we stopped, we were offered tea and sometimes small sweets. The hosts, if they were devout Muslims, would not partake of the food and drink they offered us. At the same time as we on pilgrimage felt for them, we were moved by some of the most profound hospitality we had ever experienced.

From our Basilian history I recall the story of our ten founding priests, who ran a clandestine minor seminary on a hill near Annonay, in the foothills of the French Alps, in the wake of the French Revolution. From time to time the Revolutionary troops would stop by our minor seminary to inspect us, to ensure we were not doing anything religious. One advantage of the hilltop placement of the minor seminary was that our founding confrères could see the troops approaching from a long distance. Our priests had enough time to prepare for their arrival by setting out the best French bread and wine their meagre resources could buy. The troops would go about their “inspection,” wining and dining with these priests-in-disguise until, suffice it to say, they went home more than full and satisfied, leaving our first Basilians and the minor seminary they served to survive another day.

The hospitality of our one God in three persons was alive and well in the meeting of Abraham with his guests at Mamre; alive and well in the Holy Land; alive and well among our early Basilians in Annonay. And our God of hospitality is alive, well, and present here now. Mysteriously, here in Carmelite community in this monastery, united with your Carmelite sisters and brothers throughout the world and all religious and the entire Church, particularly in this Eucharistic celebration, we are both the guests and the hosts in this house of God.

Yet in trying to take in this mystery we may try to do too much, so that we become less-than-ideally present to God; to God’s hospitality; to God’s love among us. And so Jesus offers us a gentle caution through our Gospel account of the encounter among Jesus, Mary, and Martha. I think we do well not to try to smooth over Jesus’ admonition of Martha who, Luke’s Gospel says, “was distracted by her many tasks.” At the same time, Mary is fully attentive to Jesus, sitting at his feet and listening “to what he was saying,” taking the posture of a disciple of the time. Jesus says to Martha, “Mary has chosen the better part, which will not be taken away from her.”

Would we not expect Jesus to give Martha more credit for welcoming “him into her home”; for serving him and Mary at table; maybe for caring for their other household, material needs? And yet Jesus sides with Mary over Martha! Why?

Somehow Mary, in sitting “at the Lord’s feet” and listening to him, was more hospitable to Jesus than was Martha, who was left “to do all the work by” herself. How can this be? Hospitality can take many forms. Sometimes hospitality means to “do… the work”; to serve at table; to expend energy serving our sisters and brothers. This is the “Martha” form of hospitality shown rightly by Abraham at Mamre; by our Palestinian Muslim hosts during our Holy Land pilgrimage; by the first Basilians to the Revolutionary troops in Annonay; often by us in religious life. But then sometimes the “Mary” form of hospitality is most appropriate: Simply listen, quietly but actively; be present; learn from our Lord and from one another.

The right form of hospitality for the moment will be a constant process of discernment. Yet this discernment; this hospitality is an essential part of our calling as Christians; as a people gathered here in celebration; as a people of God who is love; who is hospitality in person, always present to us.