The Heart of the Matter

Homily for the 1st Sunday of Advent - 11/27/2011

“Oh, that you would rend the heavens and come down, with the mountains quaking before you, while you wrought awesome deeds we could not hope for...”

These words from the Prophet Isaiah are from what is called “Third Isaiah.”  The prophet Isaiah lived before the time of the cataclysmic destruction of Jerusalem in 587 BC.  He prophesied about the need to return to the practice of being faithful to the commandments of the Lord, the God of Israel, lest disaster come upon the people.  They were not faithful; and disaster did come upon them; Jerusalem was destroyed and the people were taken off into exile in Babylon.

“Second Isaiah” was either another prophet who belonged to the spirit and tradition of First Isaiah, or it was the very same Isaiah who lived a very long life.  Here the Israelites are in exile and bemoaning their predicament; and Second Isaiah prophesies to give them hope, starting in Chapter 40, assuring them that God will indeed act on their behalf and bring them back to the Promised Land.  Second Isaiah is also called the Book of Consolation, because it is replete with reasons for hope.

70 years after the Israelites were conquered and carried off into exile, their redemption did in fact happen.  The Babylonian empire was conquered by the new Emperor, Cyrus of Persia. He allowed the enemies of Babylon, who had been brought to Babylon to be slaves, to return to the homelands.  It was a very effective move in that it won for Persia many friends.

Israel’s return to the Promised Land is when “Third Isaiah” is written.  Now either the original Isaiah is extremely old, or this is another prophet from the same school of thinking as the original Isaiah.

At this time, the Israelites had miraculously been returned to their homeland, something that they had yearned for, hope against hope, for 70 years.  But when they returned home, each one was looking out for himself, rebuilding his own ancestral home and not caring about the welfare of the whole people of God.  In other words, it was turning out to be much more difficult than they expected.  The community was not drawing together, not doing for each other, and not remembering to live by the laws of their ancestors, their covenant with the only God.

So, Isaiah cries out to heaven:  “Oh, that you would rend the heavens and come down, with the mountains quaking before you, while you wrought awesome deeds we could not hope for...”

“Would that you might meet us doing right,” Third Isaiah says, “that we were mindful of you in our ways!  . . . [But]  There is none who calls upon your name, who rouses himself to cling to you; for you have hidden your face from us and have delivered us up to our guilt.”

Ah, but the Potter, who molds the clay of those whom He calls if they are open to His grace, know that He has indeed rent the heavens and come down, and does so again at every Mass.  Yes, we are His people, and He is our God.

But there is another generation coming along who finds it very difficult to grasp this mystery, “which no ear has ever heard, no eye ever seen, any God but You, doing such deeds for those who wait for Him.”

Why is it that the younger generation has a very difficult time committing not just to our Church, but to any church?  It seems that everyone has this or that opinion for the cause of this, but some serious research was done and published in a book, "You Lost Me: Why Young Christians are Leaving the Church ... and Rethinking Faith," (Baker Books), by David Kinnaman, and Aly Hawkins.  

One of the elements that their analysis of a wide range of statistical data shows is this:  The younger generation does not think like the older generation; and it’s not caused by youthful enthusiasm to be different.  The way they have received data during their development is greatly influenced by technology, especially the egalitarian aspect. They have had access to all kinds of information through the internet, which they grew up on.  In their world there is not some authority showing them that this is wrong and this is right.  It all comes in on an equal basis.  This would be fine if we were teaching philosophy and helping people learn how to think and reason and learn the art of logic.  But we're not teaching people to think.

Complicate this by society’s questioning every utterance of what used to be an authoritatively defined answer to life’s questions, and you have one generation unable to relate with another.

Isn’t this like the return of the Israelites after exile, feeling lost and unable to help each other cope with fulfilling the promises of the Lord?  So, with Isaiah, we say: “Oh, that you would rend the heavens and come down!” And He does come down, upon this altar.  And He will see us through.  On our part, we must stay awake, be faithful and trust in God.  As crazy as it all seemed to the disillusioned Israelites in those days of returning from exile, yet they were the very ones from whom the Savior of the World was to come.  So, in our time, and during this season of Advent, let us put more confidence in hoping that God will act to save His people, in every generation.

 

Solemnity of Our Lord Jesus Christ the King -- 11/20/2011

This week I  watched a Public Television documentary called, “Elusive Justice: The Search for Nazi War Criminals.”  After the Second World War there was a brief period of bringing to justice those who had committed the war crimes of genocide.  The most famous of the trials was the Nuremberg Trial held in 1945 and 1946, during which 24 of the most important, still living Nazi officials were put on trial.  There were other trials as well, but within a few years of the end of the war, energies shifted to things other than vengeance.  

There were thousands of Nazis who were never tried, but the starch to go after war criminals petered out.  This happened to the great dismay of families of people who had fallen prey to the genocide. 

This documentary picks up on the story of how certain individuals went in search of war criminals, capturing them from their various places of hiding, and bringing them to Jerusalem to face justice.  The most famous of these was Adolf Eichmann, the architect for the Final Solution, the mass murder of Jews.

The documentary is actually rather exhausting as the viewer settles in with the fury of those who were frustrated with the general lack of interest in bringing such war criminals to justice.

Since I am a preacher, always alert to see a connection between events in life and the Scriptures we read at Mass, I had an “Aha! Moment.”  

It occurred to me that the hunger for justice, even for vengeance, is one of the most powerful motivators human beings have.  It spurs people to give their lives to correct what we call “social injustice.”  Think of the wrath of the descendants of American slaves, a wrath that, on the positive side, begot the Civil Rights movement, and on the negative side, begot the race riots after Martin Luther King, Jr. was assassinated.

There is at the core of every human being a hunger for justice, a demand for justice, especially if it is you, or your people, who have faced some enormous injustice.  If the injustice is not fully addressed, it moves into the soul and becomes so terribly frustrated that it pours out in a loss of faith, a loss of humanity, or a loss of hope, eventually bringing about some form of revolution.

What was so remarkable about South Africa was the peaceful and just resolution of this very dark energy of vengeance.  It was done by the very honest effort of the “Truth and Justice Commission” where all the ugly horrors of apartheid were faced and not only repented of, but were also forgiven.

Today’s Gospel assures all victims of injustice that if there situation is not rectified in this life, there will indeed be a truth and justice commission called the Last Judgment. They will have their justice! 

When the Son of Man comes in all his glory he will separate them into two groups: the goats and the sheep.  The goats are the perpetrators of social injustice, especially those who perpetrated injustice by their inaction, in the face of hunger, thirst, immigration injustice, poverty, and lack of care for the sick and imprisoned.  Apathy sends goats to hell.

The sheep, however, are those who do care for all these people in need.  Attending to people in need is called the work of social justice.  

We cannot be one-sided:  either interested in social justice alone or in personal righteousness alone.  We must be personally holy and socially engaged.  To do so is to face the Son of Man when he comes in all his glory and find oneself placed among those on his right side. 

Once when Mother Teresa was asked how she had the energy to do all she did for the sick, the dying, the orphaned and the unwanted, she held up her five fingers and said, “Five words: ‘you did it for me’.” 

St. Ignatius of Loyola said there are three degrees of humility.  The first degree is to have the humility to stop arguing with God about the 10 Commandments.  For all the money in the world, I will not commit a mortal sin by breaking even one of the 10 Commandments.

The second degree of humility is to have matured in Christ so much that I don’t want to commit even a venial sin.  Nothing could entice me to do the least little thing against God’s will.  This is not scrupulosity, but a desire to be one with God in all things.

And the third degree of humility is to be able to see in the hungry person, the thirsty person, the alien, the naked, or the imprisoned person, the rejected person: Christ himself.   And no matter what anyone thinks of me, I prefer to be with that person in need, even if it means I am loathed by others, because I will be in the presence of Christ himself.  This is what it means to live in such a way as to hear the Lord say those 5 words: “You did it for me.”  

 

Homily for Sunday, November 13, 2011

This parable is often used for different purposes, such as a divine endorsement of capitalism, or as a motivator to think of the poor as “wicked lazy servants” who have no initiative. These are not correct interpretations of the text.

The approach I wish to take requires us to reflect on the talents we are given.  First of all, what was a talent in the days of the New Testament? It wasn’t our meaning of the word “talent,” an ability or an aptitude or an expertise in some art or sport or way of being human.

A “talent” was a bar of gold that could weigh up to 72 pounds from which coins would be struck.  That bar of gold could produce as much as  5,040 golden coins.  We’re talking about big time money.  And the Master was enormously wealthy.  As he left on his long trip, he gave 576 pounds of golden bars to 3 men whom he put in charge of all of his wealth.  Then he left on a journey, expecting them to turn a profit.  Can you see how this looks like a divine seal of approval of capitalism. Gad zooks!

We know how the story goes: 2 of the servants used great initiative, took risks and doubled their money; while the wicked, lazy servant buried his treasure and met the wrath of the Master. 

The Father of the Church saw this passage as a scene for the judgment that is coming.  The Master is the Lord Jesus and his going on a journey was seen as his Ascension to the Father's right hand; and his return to take an accounting was seen as the judgment.

So, I don’t think this Gospel is about money at all.  I think this is about the treasure the Lord gives us in our baptismal faith, and our being entrusted by the Master of All with a responsibility to make a harvest happen from the way we live our faith, a harvest in our own lives and a harvest of what happens to the human family because of our living the Gospel responsibly, or not.

Right now we are living in a time of turmoil; and it will last for the rest of our lives.  It will become increasingly risky for us to live out our Catholic faith.  The tide of morals is contrary to so many of the things that are most essential to us: the preciousness of human life, the code of moral behavior that we have held for two millennia as our ideal, as something to aim for, and as a guide for us to know what we should repent of.  That’s all disappearing - quickly.  That Judaeo-Christian foundation of Scripture and ethics is almost forgotten.

But, because we as Church will not compromise and betray our Lord on these ideals, we are a target of hate and animosity that is increasing daily.  One state after another is attacking our moral principles and refusing us the right to believe in them and practice them.  In state after state we are being banned from carrying on the business of helping families adopt children, or be foster parents, forcing our Catholic hospitals to make abortions available, and other services that we cannot and will not provide.  The state is, in effect, shutting us down. A darkness is coming upon the human family, denying to us the right to practice our religion freely. It’s what we used to say about the Soviet Union, but now’s it’s becoming a dark reality here. 

“But you, brothers and sisters, are not in darkness, for ‘that day’ [the day of judgment] to overtake you like a thief.  For all of you are children of the light and children of the day.  We are not of the night or of darkness. Therefore, let us not sleep [or, sleepwalk] as the rest do, but let us stay alert and sober.”

Another dangerous time in which it was life-threatening to be faithful, was during the persecutions of the Church by the Roman empire. A great saint from that era, St. Ignatius of Antioch, was condemned to be fed to the lions for being untrue to the idols, the false gods, of the empire. As he was being transported in chains from Antioch to Rome for his execution, he wrote to fellow Church members, “Christianity shows its greatness when it is hated by the world.  Just beg for me the courage and endurance not only to speak but also to will what is right, so that I may not only be called a Christian, but prove to be one.”  

The talent, the treasure we have been entrusted with, is to be faithful to Christ no matter how unpopular it is to those who do not know the Lord.  If we bury this treasure we may think that we have no responsibility to advocate for goodness and justice and to love our world in which we live.  The temptation here is to give up, to be afraid of being unpopular, afraid of rejection by people who matter to us, maybe even becoming convinced by the wisdom of the world to abandon the faith of our ancestors.  If we abandon our role in society to challenge the direction we are going, we leave the public sector to slide into even an greater post-Christian mentality, totally detached from a foundation upon which to make moral judgments.  Without bringing to bear the voice of the Gospel, we leave society to fall prey to who knows what kinds of social experiments.  

So, my brothers and sisters, be strong in the faith, bolster other people’s faith, especially when they seem to waver.  To quote one of my heros* in life, “Catholics must sustain and give life to the nation through active Christian witness. ‘Such is the Christian’s lofty and divinely
appointed function, from which he is not permitted to excuse himself.’
We are citizens of heaven first. The more truly we love God, the more
truly we serve the world. The proof of a person’s faith is whether, and how much it shapes his or her behavior.”
[* That is, Archbishop Charles Chaput.  See his book, “Render Unto Caesar.”]

 

Homily for Sunday, November 6, 2011

At the end of this month we will be embarking on the adventure of the new translation of the Roman Missal.  Those of us who remember the Mass in Latin will remember that when the change in the language of the Mass was made, many people felt that a lot of the mystery had gone away from the Mass.  Part of that lessening in a sense of the mystery was caused, in my opinion, by the choice of elementary English vocabulary and syntax, and a preference for an English that would simplify the precise, lofty and elegant Latin words and expressions that are meant to open to us the doorway to the mystery of who God is.

We will be hearing over the coming years a richer language and noticeably longer sentences.  Why?  In order to convey the beautiful and profound theological connections that exist in the Latin original.  We’ll hear a more formal, more reverent and far more humble approach to how we talk with God than the more casual, informal translation we have been used to.  This new translation is meant to help us recover a sense of mystery of what it is that we are doing when we enter into this direct contact with the Living God in the Eucharist. 

The reason we have vestments instead of street clothes, vessels made of precious metals instead of pottery, and all the other uniquely churchy things, like sacred music and art and architecture, is to help us enter into another world when we come to Mass.  And the more we can be open to the mystery of this other world that is called the Kingdom of God, then we start knowing more and more of the One who is beyond all of our imaginings.  This is what it means for us to worship, to gather together in the liturgy of the Mass, to be fed by our Lord, both with His Word and with His Body and Blood.  

Because in the Eucharist we are invited into the inner life of God.  We are invited to realize more and more of how the Father empties Himself perfectly into the Son, and how the Son in turns donates all of Himself back to the Father, and how this perfect giving back and forth between the Father and the Son is the Holy Spirit; and the more we catch on, the more we participate in the very inner life of the Triune God.  This self-giving of the Persons of the Trinity is at the core of understanding how the Mass is the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass.

The wise virgins of the Gospel understand this, even if they become weary and drowsy waiting for the mystery of God to engulf them.  They are fully prepared to wait and to be ready for when the Bridegroom comes, even if He delays.

The unwise virgins are totally unprepared to wait and be ready for when the Bridegroom comes “at an hour we least expect.”  

Our ultimate union with God comes when we die and, hopefully, pass through the judgment successfully and are found to be ready and waiting, and then we shall become like God for we shall see Him as He is.  In the meantime the Eucharist is the training ground, the foretaste, of how to be in the presence of God.

Think of it this way: the weekly Mass is our school of learning what heaven will be like.  Whenever I hear a Catholic say they are “spiritual but not religious,” it usually boils down to their not going to Mass, or religion on their own terms, without the community, without the structure, without worship and without the commitment.  

However, my response to such an attitude is that if one is not at home at Mass, one will not be at home in heaven.  After all, the New Testament presents heaven as an unceasing act of worship of which we join in when we sing with all the heavenly host: "Holy, Holy, Holy Lord God of hosts...” Heaven is portrayed as an unceasing hymn of praise, as participation in the wedding feast of the Lamb, of which the Mass is this experience on earth.

Being prepared for that hour of the coming of the Son of Man, however, entails more than worship.  Perhaps it best phrased by Blessed Teresa of Calcutta:

"What are the oil lamps in our lives? 
They are the little everyday things:
faithfulness, punctuality, kind words,
thoughtfulness of another person,
the way we are silent at times,
the way we look at things,
the way we speak, the way we act. 
Those are the little drops of love
which make it possible for our life of faith to shine brightly."   

So, may our new translation be matched by the little things we can do to prepare for meeting our Lord when he comes with all the angels.