Second Sunday of Easter Sunday of Divine Mercy (April 24th, 2022)

On Easter day, Christians throughout the world are invited to be overcome with joy that God, in Christ, proved himself of drawing out of a horrific tragedy new and hope-filled life and possibilities.

God in Christ did something that demonstrated that an end can, through his grace, become a beginning and that even what we fear the most can be transformed.

What God in Christ did was, of course, his resurrection from the dead.  And mind you, by resurrection from the dead we are not trading in metaphor or symbols, in understanding something in a new way or discovering a new outlook or perspective.  The Lord Jesus was really and truly dead- a battered and bloody, mangled and mutilated, corpse in a grave, and this Jesus is really and truly alive.

The American author Flannery O’Connor put it most aptly when she has one of her characters remark that it is Jesus who “throws everything off” and it is not just his teachings that do the “throwing off”- it is, most especially, his resurrection.  The world has been reeling from being “thrown off” by the resurrection for over two thousand years and it is the Christian who should be the one who has the least equilibrium.  We should know that because of it all the tectonic plates that we take as solid have and continue to shake and shift.  What human beings had, for countless millennia projected into the world as sure and certain are irrevocably altered by God in Christ’s extraordinary surprise. 

We thought we had it all figured out and then Jesus Christ, crucified and risen from the dead, threw everything off.

Today’s Gospel presents an extraordinary account of the resurrection of the Lord Jesus.

Christ’s disciples, who had abandoned and betrayed him, are living in fear.  We are told that they are afraid that those who had executed the Lord Jesus with such cruelty and ruthlessness are coming for them and this should not be taken as an illogical conclusion.  Yes, they were in danger, but not just from the wicked people who had crucified their Lord.

The danger was the Lord Jesus himself.  And before him all defenses, represented by the locked door, would prove ineffectual. 

You see, if the rumors they were hearing were true, and the tomb was empty and the Lord Jesus was alive, then he was truly more than what they had conceived him to be, and he had a power greater than anything that they had seen him reveal. 

Christ’s words about judgement, with its dramatic separation of good from evil, and the horror of losing the opportunity that he offered, was undoubtedly afflicting their hearts and minds.

If and when the Lord Jesus returned to them what would he do with those who had abandoned and betrayed him?  They knew what they deserved.

And they would be surprised.  They would be thrown off.  They would not receive from Christ what they expected or what they deserved.

Christ could have thrown fists, what he did, instead, was offer mercy.

If the story of the Lord Jesus was simply the construct of a human author, then  the ending would have likely been very different than what the testimony of the Gospel delivers to us.

Our sense of justice is fierce and terrifying.  We render what we believe is due to people with calculation and cruelty.  We are not naturally inclined to restraint when we feel we have been wronged and our response to being hurt is often to hurt those who we perceive have hurt us even more.  We are masters of justifying the manner in which we increase the suffering of the world.

The manner in which we weaponize justice as a means of retaliation and impose restitution as a fatal blow against our enemies is truly dark.  The distillation of our sin, our sin rarified into its purest form, is cruelty. We are so quick to pass judgement and mete out punishment for what we conceive others have done or failed to do.

And Christ points out repeatedly and then definitively exposes in his own suffering and death, that the clouds and vapors of our self-righteousness and moral indignation are merely a smokescreen meant to conceal our envy and our hate.

What was done to the Lord Jesus was unspeakably cruel- what price should be paid for such a horrific injustice?  What could set things right in its wake?

If the author of the Gospel was merely a human author- somebody would have to pay. “Justice” would have to be served- and served cold.

But the author of the story is not merely a human author, but a divine author, the one, true God himself, and his response is, as I have noted, absolutely surprising.  There is a judgement and it sets things right, but it is not what we would have expected.

The great revelation of Jesus Christ crucified and risen from the dead is not simply that he is really and truly alive, but what he does with the new and transformed life in which he is revealed.

That is what today’s Gospel manifests. 

What we see and receive in the risen Lord Jesus is not just a real body whose wounds we can touch but an unexpected grace, an undeserved gift.  Christ’s followers betrayed and abandoned him.  It would have been fitting, it seems, that they received what was deserved for such treachery, a retaliation that was at least equivalent to what they did and a restitution that imposed a burden at least as heavy as the cross he had carried.

That would have been a fitting end to the story.  But God in Christ surprised us. 

He threw everything off.

Third Sunday of Lent (March 20th, 2022)

The Church’s first scripture is an excerpt from the Old Testament Book of Exodus.

The Book of Exodus recalls the extraordinary events that led up to the liberation of the Israelites from slavery to the false gods of the Egypt.

Moses, an Israelite who had been adopted by the daughter of Pharoh (the god-king of the Egyptians) has been sent into exile to the land of Midian.  It is in Midian that Moses is summoned by the Lord to act as his emissary and as God’s emissary manifests his power in signs and wonders.

These signs and wonders will be terrifying to behold.

Today’s scripture from the Book of Exodus, Moses hears that the Lord has not been indifferent to the sufferings of the Israelites and has come to rescue them.

This scripture foreshadows the revelation of Christ, who is the power of God sent to affect the liberation of his creation from the power of sin, of death and of the devil- who like the gods of the Egyptians, afflict and enslave humanity.

God in Christ presents his power in signs and wonders, the most significant of which is the cross, which is terrifying to behold.

God in Christ did not reveal himself to us as simply a teacher or social reformer, but as the Lord God himself, who seeing the affliction of humanity enslaved to dark powers, entered into the human condition so as to confront the dark powers directly and reveal to us that these powers, that, like the gods of the Egyptians, seem so fierce and invincible, can actually be defeated.

As Christians, we are, like Moses, emissaries of the Lord, charged with a mission to announce that the one, true God despises the sin that afflicts us, the death that frightens us and the devil that accuses us.  Christians are meant, like Moses, to stand our ground athwart these dark powers and announce the power of God’s liberation in Christ.

The apostle Paul makes reference to Moses in his first letter to the Corinthians.  His purpose is to remind us that despite the signs and wonders that were revealed and the power of God that was manifested to the Israelites, they were not faithful to God and the consequences of this infidelity was grim.

He warns us Christians that we should not take our relationship with God in Christ for granted or think that it exempts us from living in the manner that Christ asks us.

It is not enough simply to bear the name of Christian as if it were merely a title or something akin to an ethnic identity.   Being a Christian is a way of life. This way of life makes demands on us and because of it we accept certain responsibilities. 

St. Paul insists that it is not merely being designated as a Christian that is enough, being a Christian is more than that.  The Israelites made that mistake and we should take care and be mindful of what it truly means to be a Christian or we will repeat the mistakes of our spiritual ancestors.

Today’s Gospel is strange as Christ the Lord makes reference to terrible events that were known to the people of his own time but seem obscure references to us.  After these observations Christ the Lord speaks to us in a parable, the meaning of which is meant to not only teach us, but also to warn.

Christ makes reference to how Pilate mixed the blood of Galileans with the temple sacrifices (an unspeakable desecration and sacrilege).  This horror is accounted for in the writings of the ancient historian Josephus as a response to acts of sedition against Roman rule (remember, the Israelites were subjects of the Roman emperor and their lands were under control of Caesar’s empire).

The other reference is to a terrible accident in which flaws in the construction of a tower results in the collapse of the structure and the deaths of many people.

What is this all about?

Christ is making references to these events in order to point out that life is precarious and has uncertain outcomes.  Misfortune befalls just and unjust alike. 

Christians will not be exempt from the raw facts of life.  It is within the reality of this world that we will know our purpose and discover our mission.

So… Given the unpredictability and fragility of life, we should not defer until later what God asks of us today, which for the Christian is the demand of love. 

This insight is a prepares us to consider the meaning of Christ’s parable. 

The unfruitful fig tree is an image of the Christian who is unproductive and who generates little to nothing.  Grace increases in us in the measure that we give it away.  Holiness is evident, not just in one’s interior disposition, but in external actions that manifest one’s interior life.  The Christian way of life is not about the evasion of responsibility, but about our willingness to love what Christ loves and to do what he asks us to do.

Because the fig tree is unproductive and does not generate life, it’s future is imperiled.  It receives a reprieve, becoming the recipient of a mercy, a grace that is undeserved.  God proves in Christ that he is the great giver of another chance.

If we are unproductive as Christians, there is the opportunity right now to repent of our indolence and resistance, but this opportunity, like life itself, has its own expiration date.

Life is short and unpredictable. Christ insists that he has work for us do during our lifetimes.  Our time to love is limited.  We must be attentive and be productive on behalf of love, for our opportunities to love what Christ loves and serve what Christ serves are not unlimited.     

The time to be a Christian is now, not later. 

Sixth Sunday in Ordinary Time (February 13th, 2022)

The Church’s first scripture for today’s Mass is an excerpt taken from the Old Testament book of the prophet Jeremiah.

The prophet Jeremiah proclaimed the Lord’s word of truth during a dark time, the enemies of the Israelites were poised for war and an invasion of Jerusalem was imminent.  In 587 BC the Kingdom of David would fall and the devastation that would follow would be horrific.  Jeremiah foresaw all this coming and sent out word of warning.  Yet, his interventions went unheeded. 

The people would not trust the word of the Lord, but they would trust the words of men and this would bring the Israelites to utter ruin.

True prophets, authentic prophets, do not proclaim themselves or their opinions, they speak the word of God, bearing that word into real, human situations.  The prophet is not concerned with polls or politicos, consultations or the commentariat. 

Instead, the prophet presents a God’s eye view of human realities, and for the most part, that view insists on our conversion, identifying the real problem, the origination for all our woes is our own egoism, the elevation of ourselves to the status of God and the failure to come to terms with God’s commandments as non-negotiable necessities for human flourishing.

For Jeremiah, the real enemy of the Israelites was not just the enemy outside the gates, but the enemy within each person, that part of ourselves that thinks that we know better than God and acts as if God does not matter. 

For the person who trusts in God, their vision of themselves and the world is radically changed.  This vision imparts wisdom and understanding about the world and the role God wants us to play in his creation.  This vision inspires purpose and imparts meaning.  Bishop Barron speaks of authentic Christian spirituality as “a way of seeing” and this is an important insight.

Spirituality, Christian spirituality, should not be reduced to pious practices.  Spirituality is a participation in the God’s eye view of oneself and the world. 

This is the viewpoint of the prophet, but more than this, it should be the viewpoint of the Christian, not just in matters of piety, but in terms of all human endeavors.

An apt spiritual question for us Christians is this- in the midst of the particular circumstances of life, in relation to reality, to all the raw facts of human experience, am I willing to give priority to God?  And further- as I survey the realities of life have a learned that what God sees is of far greater importance than my own perceptions and opinions, indeed of far greater importance than the perceptions and opinions of others.

The apostle Paul reminds us in his first letter to the Christians of the city of Corinth of the centrality and significance of the Resurrection of the Lord Jesus.

Denial of the Resurrection, with all its implications, is anti-Christ and anti-Christian- and this includes the diminishment of its reality for our own lives- meaning how we understand our lives right now and in the life that is yet to come.

What does the resurrection reveal to us?

Our lives are not limited to the here and now.  What begins in this world for us does not end in a grave.  This world is not all that there is and there is a greater power, a power greater than even death, that is not just a power, but a person, a divine person, who wants to share a relationship with us, share communion with us, and invites us to become his friends.  This divine person has given us his name and even given us his life.  His relationship with us is personal- in this life and in the life to come.

If you believe this you are a Christian, and if your faith is in the resurrection of the Lord Jesus you see and understand your own life and death differently.  Both life and death unfold their meaning and purpose in relation to Christ and in terms of Christ’s relationship with you.  There are many systems of conviction (ways of understanding) about life and death, but for the Christian, whatever truth might be gleaned from these systems is always positioned by priority of the Resurrection of Christ.

In his Gospel, the Lord Jesus delivers to us blessings and woes- he has words of encouragement and words of warning.

He imparts blessing to those who are poor, hungry, mourning and reviled.

He imparts woes for those who are rich, comfortable, satisfied, content, and honored.

In other words, he overturns our expectations for what blessings really are.

What does this mean?

In one respect, God in Christ is telling us forthrightly who he identifies as being important to him- those who are in most need of him and if we want to be in relationship to him we should place ourselves in relationship to those whom God deems to be most important, not to us, but to God.

In another respect he is warning us about our inclination to see worldly success and accomplishment as somehow indicative of divine favor or of virtue.  This not always the case, and in many instances, worldly success is accomplished by using the appearance of virtue to mask immorality and selfishness.  For this reason, it would be better living bereft of worldly satisfactions, for if they come at the price of our own integrity, of our own soul, they are just not worth it.

In the end, when we all face the Lord, we come to him stripped of all our accomplishments, in the words of the author Flannery O’Connor, “even our virtues are burned away”.  What will matter then is not the “blessings” we have received, but the “blessings” that we have imparted.  The mercy that we plead for will be met by the measure of mercy that we ourselves offered to others.

Did we live in such a way that we sought, as God in Christ does, to alleviate the sufferings of the world, or did we, out of our own desires, for things like wealth, comfort, security, honor-  or worse- out of self-righteousness, personal entitlement and moral indignation, increase the sufferings of the world?

This question demands our answer.  It’s best to contend with question now rather than defer it to that moment when the possibility of changing our answer is no longer possible.

Fourth Sunday in Ordinary Time

The Church’s first scripture for today is from the Old Testament book of the prophet Jeremiah.

Jeremiah spoke the Lord’s word of truth in the dark days before the destruction of Jerusalem and fall of the Kingdom of David in 587 BC.

A true and authentic prophet does not proclaim his own truth or flatter people with words that confirm their biases or comfort them with pleasing unrealities. A true and authentic prophet speaks what God commands the prophet to speak and when God bids his prophets to speak it is usually because his people (that means us) have lost our way.

Jeremiah did precisely this and paid a heavy price.  In this respect, the prophet Jeremiah has for centuries been understood as a foreshadowing or anticipation of Christ, who, as the Gospel of John reminds us, “came to us and we did not know him”, meaning- we would not heed his words and change our lives.

Instead we lashed out at him, frustrated that he would not just tell us what we wanted to hear.

Prophecy has not faded into the past, but it is truly alive in the Church.  At our baptism we are all declared to be “priest, prophet and king”.  And this is not merely decorative language meant to flatter, but a statement about who Christ has made us to be.

Our role as prophets is to bear witness to Christ, not only by telling people the truth about who Christ is, but living in such a way that it is obvious to others that we not only know about Christ, but that we seek to live like him and to imitate him.

We do this out of love and because of our love for Christ we will suffer much- for wherever love is true there is a willingness to suffer and the intensity of our love brings with it the willingness to endure much for the sake of those whom we love.

Thus, the greatest suffering of a true prophet is not the pains of persecution, but the pain of a love that is unrequited and refused.  As Christian prophets, this is the risk that we must prepare ourselves for and the risk that we all must make.

The great Apostle Paul has much to say about love in today’s excerpt from his First Letter to the Corinthians.

This scripture passage, one of the most memorable in the New Testament is often proclaimed at weddings, and therefore might become associated with romance and sentimentality.

It is only romantic inasmuch as it speaks of the kind of love with which Christ loves us, love his Church, loves all those he draws to himself.

But sentimental?  It is nothing of the sort.

Try loving in the manner St. Paul describes and you will understand.

When a Christian speaks of love our reference is not a concept or idea or even a feeling, but instead love is for us Christians a revelation, it is a divine person who show us in himself what love actually is.

We all have ideas and desires about love, but these are always inadequate for us Christians, however helpful they might be. 

The thick description of love for us Christians is Christ himself and it is given to us not just in his teachings, but in what he reveals about himself.  In particular, what he reveals in his suffering and death.  One way to think about St. Paul’s testimony about love is that it is a commentary about Christ, a description of him.

St. Paul provides this testimony because far too often we prefer descriptions and definitions of love that although emotionally satisfying, are really just selfish and self-interested.  Consider then this beautiful text of St. Paul as a correction and an invitation to know what true love is, perhaps even for the first time.

Finally, in his Gospel, the Lord Jesus faces furious opposition.  Why?

Because he reminds the people that God loves the people that they deem unworthy of love- outsiders, outcasts, sinners. 

The opponents of the Lord Jesus, bound in self-imposed chains of moral indignation and self-righteousness have taken it upon themselves to tell others that they are less worthy of God then they are. 

Confronted with this truth, they become violent and the recipient of their violence is Christ, who is God himself!

Moral indignation and self-righteousness are signs of a grave spiritual crisis and throughout the New Testament, particularly in the Gospels, Christ presents himself as particularly attentive to these vices.

Rather than evading these vices in our own lives, we must confront the tendency of both in our own lives.  In other words, we are meant to come to terms with the opponents of the Lord Jesus as being none other than ourselves.

There is in each of a refusal of Christ, a refusal of love.  This “no” to Christ will subvert us if we are unwilling to contend with it and acknowledge its reality.

If we do not attend to it, our “no” to Christ it will manifest itself in subversive and destructive ways.  In the devout or pious, it appears in a religious outlook deformed by moral indignation and self-righteousness.  God’s love for those we deem unworthy will drive us to a frenzy and God’s mercy for sinners will be received by us as an attack on our own virtue.  

Christ can rescue us from this, but we must let him.  If not, we will ultimately turn on him and risk losing him.  We can avoid this, but not without conversion, not without change, not without repentance.

There is much at stake in our refusals of Christ. 

Twenty-second Sunday in Ordinary Time (August 29th, 2021)

The Church’s first scripture is an excerpt from the Old Testament Book of Deuteronomy.

The Book of Deuteronomy is a presentation of the laws of the Israelites.  Think of this as meaning the principles which are meant to shape behaviors, unite the people and express their unique way of life.  Israelite laws are not merely prohibitions and penalties but a description of how the Israelites are supposed to live in relation to God and to one another.

The Sacred Scriptures present Israelite laws as originating in the will of God, who communicates his will through the prophet Moses to the Israelites.  Israelite law covers all facets of life- from practical things such as what to eat or not eat, how to deal with infection and disease, how to manage personal possessions and wealth, but also, and most importantly for Israelite law, how God is to be properly worshipped.

Like I said, the laws of the Israelites are best understood as a description of a unique way of life.  Through this way of life, which meant adhering to and practicing the Law, the Israelites were showing the world the kind of people they were and the kind of God that they believed in and worshipped.  The law presented their religion, their faith, their culture, as being both personal and public- not merely assent to doctrines as abstractions of the mind or feelings in the heart, but embodied in actions, in specific things that one did, things that one accomplished in the real events and circumstances of life.

The entirety of Israelite law is given succinct expression in the Ten Commandments. These commandments are the non-negotiable necessities of the law of the Israelites and provide a description of the foundational principles for the Israelite’s unique way of life.  Human flourishing is inextricably bound to the Ten Commandments.  When these laws are broken, when these principles are negated, the result is catastrophic, particularly in terms of social relationships.  If you want to destroy a society, oppose the practice of the Ten Commandments.

Moses indicates in today’s scripture from the Book of Deuteronomy, that people will the see the Israelite’s unique way of life as they practice and live in accord with God’s commandments.  And what they will see in this is a society that is wise, dignified, and just.  Seeing this wisdom, dignity and justice, will make the Israelite way of life attractive to others and draw them into a relationship with the one, true God- which is, bottom line, the purpose of God’s commandments.

The Church is a new kind of Israel.  The story of the Israelites continues in the Church and so we are, like the Israelites have a unique way of life that is expressed in our acceptance of and adherence to God’s commandments.  As Christians we should embody the Ten Commandments and present them, not as a list that is merely imposed, but as the way in which we live.  Remember, the Ten Commandments are foundational, basic to our way of life- if we won’t practice these commandments, we are rejecting our unique way of life and failing to be the kind of people the Lord God wants us to be.

Despite the protests of the worldly and the wicked, the Commandments of the Lord are good and they are a gift. They do not inhibit human flourishing, but instead, makes such flourishing possible. And as I said before, they are meant to be practiced, not merely recognized as important ideals.  People should see the ten commandments in our flesh and blood, in our daily lives and this expression is the most important way to make the commandments known to others.

In our second scripture for today, an excerpt from the New Testament Letter of James, the apostle makes precisely this point- God’s law, his commandments are his word of truth in us- in other words the commandments express who we are as Christians.  And as Christians, the commandments of God, expressed so succinctly in the Ten Commandments, have as their ultimate purpose to make us more charitable, they are meant to teach us how to love.

For James, the perfection of the law is accomplished through charity, through love and the evidence that this is happening is when the most vulnerable among us are cared for- this is what James’ means when he identifies pure religion (which means following God’s commandments) as being care for the “orphan and widow in their affliction”.

When he references in this regard, that the perfection of religion is also to be “unstained by the world” and connects this to charity for the vulnerable, he is saying that the worldly would have us disconnect charity from our way of life which finds its fulfillment in love (in charity).  The worldly want a religion that makes no moral demands on us and is simply expressions of ideas, feelings, ethnicity or culture. You don’t have to love God or neighbor in worldly religion.  It’s merely an instrument, a thing to be leveraged and used.

 This is a religion without love, without charity, and it is a false religion.

Finally, in his Gospel, the Lord Jesus decries the hypocrisy of the Pharisees.  Hypocrisy means that you are appearing to be someone you are not.  You are living a double life in which the exterior of your life is not correspondent to the interior of your life.  In respect to the Lord Jesus’ harsh words about the Pharisees in the Gospel today, it is about appearing to be religious, pious, or virtuous when in fact you are not.

Our faith, our relationship with God is not simply meant to be a matter of appearances.  When faith is merely a matter of appearances, one is not living in the truth and when this happens, the dissonance between the exterior and interior reality of a person’s life leads to spiritual catastrophes- the worst of which can be a self-righteousness that expresses itself in bullying and cruelty.  The hypocrite will often use the appearance of piety and virtue as a means a status through which they can manipulate or take advantage of others. 

The lesson here is for us Christians, for we should take the Lord Jesus’ warnings about the hypocrisy of the Pharisees as a warning for us Christians.  The Pharisees are not simply an Israelite religious movement from long ago, they represent a dangerous tendency in our own spiritual lives, for all of us, let’s be honest, are hypocrites in some way.  There is dissonance in the life of every Christian between the exterior and the interior, between appearance and reality.  In each of us is a “no” to Christ that we so often keep hidden. We so easily pay lip service to what Christ wants us to do rather than doing it.  How easy it is to make excuses, defer responsibility, and to point out the failings of others, rather than live the Gospel we profess to be true.

Christians are not an elite group of the perfect, but are we all sinners who have found in the Lord Jesus a savior and a friend, and he is our savior and our friend, not because we are somehow better or of higher status than anyone else, but because Christ is merciful to us, and knowing the gift of his mercy, we want others to have that gift for themselves. 

To be a Christian is to be a sinner who has known and accepted the mercy of God in Christ and is willing to become for others the mercy we have ourselves undeservedly received.

Twenty-first Sunday in Ordinary Time (August 22nd, 2021)

The Church’s first scripture for today is an excerpt from the Old Testament Book of Joshua.

The Book of Joshua continues the story of the Israelites after their deliverance from slavery to the gods of Egypt and the death of Moses, who was chosen by God to manifest his power in signs and wonders and return the Israelites to their ancestral lands.

The Book of Joshua gives an account of this return and notes that it was not easy.  In fact, the return of the Israelites was wrought with peril and filled with conflict, violence, and war. 

Today we hear about how Joshua, who succeeds Moses as the leader of the Israelites gathers the tribes of the Israelites and asks them whether or not they are willing to serve the true God or false gods.  They have to make a decision. If they decide to serve the true God, they will give themselves over to his commandments and become the people that the true God wants them to be.  If they choose the false gods, they will become like those gods and they will lose the purpose and meaning of their lives.

What Joshua is asking the Israelites for is a profession of faith.  What do they truly believe?  What is of highest priority and importance in their lives?  What makes them who they are and gives meaning and purpose to their lives?  What has God revealed to them about who they are and what they should do?  These are all the things a profession of faith express.  A profession of faith is the fundamental way Christians remind themselves repeatedly who God is and what he wants.  A profession of faith expresses what we truly believe.

We Christians stand at attention during our sacred worship and profess our faith.  We publicly recite a long statement that is meant to call to mind the most cherished important beliefs we have as Christians and this statement is meant to bind us together as one people. 

This statement (profession of faith) is not a matter of our opinions or of customs, but it is testimony to what our relationship to God and to one another is all about.  The profession of faith tells us who we are and once we know who we are then we know what to do.

Our profession of faith is a statement, but it is also a kind of story as it relates to us that our identity and mission comes to us from the revelation of God in Christ.  And this story of God in Christ, which is a true story, reveals to us that our faith is in God who seeks to forgive and reconcile sinners who have become estranged from him and for those who receive this forgiveness and reconciliation, we then dedicate our lives to being ourselves agents of God’s forgiveness and reconciliation to the world.

This is what the Church is meant to be. The Church is not merely a non-profit NGO providing social services; or a faith-based discussion club; or a corporate international conglomerate of faith-based initiatives; or peculiar faith themed building and grounds project.   The Church is the mercy of God revealed and given to sinners.  Through the Church sinners are meant to be reconciled to God and to communities.  The Church is sinners who having been forgiven and reconciled to God, and, seek to give to others what they have themselves received from God.

This is who we are and who we are tells us what God wants us to do.

 It’s a difficult and risky mission.  We know this because of what our profession of faith tells us about God in Christ- who for the sake of forgiving and reconciling sinners, is “crucified, dead and buried” and “descends in hell”.

Knowing who God is, we know who we are.  Knowing who we are, we know what we must do.

The Church’s second reading is an excerpt from St. Paul’s magnificent letter to the Ephesians.

In this section, the Apostle Paul gives testimony to what Christians believe about marriage, which was very different from what the culture of his time believed. 

The Apostle Paul likens Christian marriage to the relationship of Christ to his Church, which is a relationship of mutual love expressed by self-sacrifice.  The meaning of marriage is not made, for Christians, by the individuals who seek it or by the state or by the culture, but by God and the nature of the marital relationship, for Christians, is defined by him and expressed in who Christ is for the Church and who the Church is for Christ.

And who is Christ for the Church?  And who is the Church for Christ? The answer: Mutual love expressed by self-sacrifice.

Finally, in his Holy Gospel, Christ the Lord has confronts resistance among his own followers- even his own disciples find his teaching about the Holy Eucharist to be troubling and they are concerned that because it is so audacious that many people will reject it. 

The resistance of Christ’s disciples is found in all Christians in all ages as concerns about practical needs or worldly projects are so often thought to be in our own minds linked to pleasing people or to being successful or accommodating the powerful in politics, culture or economics or keeping conflict at bay. 

Why not just change something, or at least, soften what seems to appear extreme the Church teaches so that more people would remain associated with the Church or would make things easier for people to join us?

Christ gives us an answer.  Because what he gives us, what he teaches us, shocking as it is, has the capacity to redeem and to save, to reconcile and to forgive.

Christian faith is full of hard teachings and our way of life is one of great risks.  Christ who gives us everything of who he is, invites us to join us in his mission and in doing so to become for others who he is for us- the one who is willing to love those whom the world so often deems unlovable and to seek to save those whom the world has deemed unsavable.  There is no love without sacrifice and the greater the love, the greater the sacrifice.  Such is the love that forgives and reconciles.

So while we might be tempted to accommodate what Christ asks of us to make the Church more popular or to dull the razor’s edge of the Gospel so that it no longer cuts into our consciences, or to follow the crowds into a retreat into safe spaces, we must know that to give in to that temptation is to take leave of the only One who truly has the words of eternal life.

Front of the Basilica of Saint Paul Outside the Walls – Roma – Italy

Solemnity of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary (August 15th, 2021)

Today the Church celebrates one of the great truths of our Catholic Faith- the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary.

What is the Assumption?

The Church teaches us that at the end of the course of her earthly life, Christ’s Mother, the Blessed Virgin Mary, was taken (assumed) body and soul into heaven. This is a truth of the Catholic Faith and it expresses our faith in hope in Christ’s Resurrection- what happened to the Blessed Virgin Mary is that she experienced for herself the fullness of all the gifts Christ promises us through his resurrection from the dead.  Death is not our end, but a route of access to a life that exceeds our worldly expectations.  Christ desires that that we experience with him the fullness of life- body and soul.  The strange revelation of the Assumption anticipates the fulfillment of Christ’s promises to all those who are faithful to him.

The Assumption is an ancient belief, celebrated in the prayer and worship of the Church for centuries.  It was defined as an article of the Church’s Faith in 1950 by Pope Pius XII.  This means that the pope formally clarified what the Church teaches about this mysterious truth of our Catholic Faith.

The Church’s scriptures for today are all intended to help us to appreciate the great mystery of the Assumption.

We first heard a fantastic and frightening vision from the Book of Revelation- the last book of the Bible.

The Book of Revelation describes in mystical terms the situation of the Church in every age of her life- a Church that is so often immersed in a world that opposes Christ and will not accept him.  Unable to harm Christ, those who oppose him strike out against the Church and the result is great suffering.  However, it is through this suffering that the Church is perfected and redeemed and Christ remains triumphant. 

The vision we heard of today begins with an extraordinary glimpse into the temple of God in which the innermost and hidden sanctuary called the Holy of Holies is opened for all to see.  This vision is meant to be interpreted mystically as referring to the Blessed Virgin Mary, who as the mother of God, contained within herself Christ the Lord.  She is God’s living temple.  She is the holy ark of covenant, in which was contained that which was most sacred and upon which the presence of the living God dwelled.

This image of Christ’s Mother as temple and ark of the covenant mystically  represents her identity and mission.  It is because of who Christ’s Mother is that the Church teaches the truth of her Assumption.

Then there is the vision of a great sign “in the heavens” of a woman “clothed with the sun” who is threatened by a terrifying monster capable of horrific destruction.  The woman is pregnant and gives birth to a holy child who is destined to rule over all the nations.

What does this mean?

The vision is expressing the truth of the Blessed Virgin Mary in terms of her cosmic and mystical significance.  On the level of worldly appearances, Christ’s Mother seemed merely an ordinary woman of limited means who lived in an insignificant place.  But this is only how she appeared to be, in actual fact she was much greater than anyone realized- she is the one through whom God acted to accomplish his great purpose of uniting humanity and divinity, God and man.  She is the one God chose to accomplish his will of inviting all people into a relationship with himself.

Therefore, the Blessed Virgin Mary, “the woman clothed with the sun” is the enemy of all those powers- sin, death, the devil (represented by the dragon).  But these powers cannot defeat God and cannot overcome her. 

This is expressed in the great truth of the Assumption.  In the conflict between all that is opposed to God and the power of God to redeem and save his people and his creation in Christ- it is God in Christ who is victorious.

The Church’s second reading for today is from the first letter of St. Paul to the Corinthians and in this excerpt the Apostle Paul gives testimony to the Resurrection of the Lord Jesus- which is the ground and source of all Christian faith and hope.

The Resurrection of the Lord Jesus is not merely a symbol or metaphor but a real event that happened in this world to the real, physical body of the Lord Jesus.  Christ is God. And God in Christ who himself suffered death is more powerful than death.  This is revealed in the most dramatic way in the reality of the Resurrection.

And the reality of the Resurrection is not just a revelation of what God in Christ can do for himself, but what he intends to do for all of us.  This life is not all that there is but God opens up to us a life that is much greater and important.  The Resurrection is the great sign of God’s promise that at the end of the course of our own earthly lives, he offers to us, through Christ, a destiny greater than that of a grave!

This promise has been manifested and fulfilled for Christ’s Holy Mother, she is the great sign of the promise of his Resurrection, a promise he has made for all of us.

Finally, in Christ’s Gospel we hear the account of Christ’s Mother going out to visit her cousin Elizabeth.  The Blessed Virgin Mary is pregnant with Christ the Lord and therefore, what she brings to her cousin Elizabeth is not just the pleasure of her company, but the living presence of God!

At this occasion the Blessed Virgin Mary cries out in praise of the mighty deeds of God in a song known as her Magnificat. 

The song of Christ’s Holy Mother extolls the power of God to overturn worldly expectations and surprise us.  God has chosen her to be the Mother of Christ, a person that the worldly might look at and think was nothing but a nobody.  And yet she is the one who is “full of grace”.

Christ’s Mother has an identity and mission that is exclusive and unique.  No one else of the Mother of the Lord.  No one else has the kind of relationship she has with Christ.  And yet she does not, through her relationship with God in Christ, instrumentalize or use her relationship for selfish or ego-driven purposes.  In response to what she has been given, she accepts as her mission to love and to serve.  She loves and serves all that Christ loves and serves.  This is what holiness is and this is what holiness looks like.

This love and service finds is fullest expression in the Assumption, for this gift enables her love and service to transcend the limits of this world.  Christ’s mother is the mother of all, a new Eve for a new creation, and the Assumption displays this truth to the Church and to the world.

She loves and serves us even now in heaven, allowing us to come to her as children come to their mother in need, offering to us her consolation, understanding, prayers and protection.  She sets herself against all that is within us that opposes and resists Christ and directs our attention to Christ so that we can learn to live as the friends of the Lord Jesus and so that do not lose our way.

The Blessed Virgin Mary is not a goddess or a symbol, she is a real person who lived in this world and knows what it means to be human.  As such, we know she has compassion for us and wants always to help.  In this she models for us how we Christians should live, loving and serving what Christ loves and serves and offering ourselves to the service of God and neighbor even if it means sacrifices on our part.

In a world that is often so harsh, lonely and unforgiving, Christ’s Mother is the Mother of Mercy, the one to whom we Christians can turn to both now and at the hour of our death.

It is in this mercy, that the deep mystery and mysticism of the Assumption is revealed. 

Nineteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time (August 8th, 2021)

The Church’s first scripture is taken from the First Book of Kings.

The First (and Second) Book of Kings is a chronicle of the rise, and then decline and fall of the Kingdom of David.  David is presented by the scriptures as the most important of all the Israelite kings and he establishes a dynasty that lasts for generations, coming to an end in 587 BC with the destruction of Jerusalem by the Babylonian empire.

The first (and second) book of Kings is unlike many of the other ancient chronicles of kings inasmuch as it is brutally honest about the failures, foibles, foolishness and faithlessness of the kings of the Israelites. History is presented in its reality and it is not whitewashed.  We come to know the kings and queens of the Israelites as flawed and prone to bad decisions.  They are regularly called out and even excoriated by the prophets.

One of the greatest of these prophets was Elijah who was not just a seer, but a worker of wonders.  One of the kings of the Israelites, Ahab, and his pagan queen, Jezebel, were the focus of Elijah’s wrath and this led to hard times for the prophet.

Today’s scripture presents Elijah on the run from Ahab and Jezebel and taking refuge in the wilderness.  There he laments his predicament and comes close to despair.  God hears the lamentations of Elijah in the wilderness and sends comfort and aid to him in the form of an angel, who provides Elijah with food and drink.  Strengthened by this divine intervention, Elijah returns to his mission.

What does this mean?

The Church presents this scripture to us today as a foreshadowing of our relationship God in Christ as it is expressed in his gift of the Eucharist.

Let’s face it folks- our lives can be at times very hard.  We might not have to face the kind of distress that Elijah did, but we all have known or will know times of desolation and even the experience of despair.  The world is fallen and we are finite creatures and as such suffering is an inescapable part of who we are.  The wilderness of Elijah is a symbol of this reality.

And, yes, like Elijah, we cry out to the Lord for comfort and aid, hoping that the Lord will listen and attend to our prayers.

As Christians, we believe the Lord God sends to us his comfort and aid in the Eucharist, in the Blessed Sacrament.  This is “heavenly food” (the Eucharist has been called from time immemorial “the bread of angels”). It is meant to sustain us, to strengthen us for our mission.

Like the food given to Elijah, the Eucharist may seem to us on the level of worldly appearances to be a small thing, but like Christ in his Incarnation, who in worldly appearance, made himself seemingly insignificant, the reality of the Eucharist exceeds its appearance.  The Eucharist is the divine life of Christ given to us to console us and sustain us in a suffering world.

A people who receive the divine life of Christ should be different in attitude and actions as a result of what they receive.

This is the message the Apostle Paul has for us in his Letter to the Ephesians.

St. Paul lists for us those qualities that should be noted as contrary to the Christian way of life- bitterness, fury, anger, shouting, malice. 

He proposes contrary values to this list- kindness, compassion, and forgiveness.

Christians espouse a unique way of life, a way of life that seek to love what Christ loves and serve what Christ serves. 

This way of life cannot be accomplished unless we come to know and accept that we must cultivate and habituate ourselves to specific practices of virtue- one becomes kind, compassionate and forgiving, not in abstraction, as if simply acknowledging those virtues are important and true.  Instead, we become kind, compassionate and forgiving through our practice of these virtues- by actually “doing” them.

The most convincing and impressive witness Christians have to demonstrate their unique way of life is not simply to assert our virtues and values as being important, but to show forth their importance by practicing doing what Christ asks us to do- to love what he loves and to serve what he serves.

Finally, Christ speaks to us in his Gospel. 

One of the great keys to unlocking the meaning of the Scriptures is to understand that when listening to or reading the text, we should see ourselves in the position of Christ’s interlocutors. 

In today’s Gospel, we are the crowd (the Jews) who find Christ’s testimony about himself as being for us the Bread of Life to be hard to take. 

And in response to our opposition, Christ remains insistent that who he is and what he offers is of eternal, or everlasting importance.

He gives himself to us as food and drink, and what he gives us is his own divine life.

This is what the Eucharist is.  This is what we receive. 

The claims that the Church makes in regards to the Blessed Sacrament are not the result of theological musing or philosophical abstraction.  The claims that the Church makes in regards to the Blessed Sacrament is the claim of Christ himself- he is the bread of life and the bread that he gives is his flesh for the life of the world.

The Church does not waver from the extremity of the Eucharist.  If the Church did, she would be content to call the Eucharist a mere symbol, but this is not what she teaches because it is not a symbol that Christ is speaking about.

Christ tells us that the Eucharist is his very self.  He gives to us the Bread of Life, which is who he is.

Eighteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time (August 1st, 2021)

The Church’s first scripture is an excerpt from the Old Testament Book of Exodus.

The Book of Exodus describes the events that accompanied the liberation of the Israelites from the power of the false gods of the Egyptians.  Languishing as slaves to these gods, the Israelites cried out to the one, true God to be rescued and he answered their pleading.  Through signs and wonders, the power of the one, true God defeated the false gods of the Egyptians and the Israelites were free to return their ancestral lands that they had left many generations ago.

The signs and wonders wrought by the one, true God described in the Book of Exodus are as terrifying as they are awe-inspiring.  One would think that those who experienced them would have an indomitable faith and a resolute conviction to serve the Lord God without complaint or hesitation- but this was not the case.

Instead, the Israelites were beset by a resistance to trust the Lord God and to serve him.  The real and imagined difficulties of life seem to be the source of the Israelites resistance to God, these things and also a kind of nostalgia that construes the past into something it was not- even to the point of thinking that the slavery to false gods they experienced was better than the liberation and freedom that the Lord God had given to them.

And so, the Israelites grumbled and complained and threatened rebellion- throwing the gift that the Lord God had given to them back into his face.

Today’s testimony from the Book of Exodus tells us that the dissatisfaction of the Israelites about the quality and quantity of their food is met by the Lord God’s response- which is not a response of chastisement or wrath, but to send them “bread from heaven”.  The Lord God who gave the Israelites defeated oppressive false gods and gave them their freedom will also feed his people with food of heavenly origin.

(Some writers and scholars speculate endlessly about what this food literally was and offer all kinds of theories, but losing our focus in such speculation usually means losing the meaning of the story).

A spiritually fruitful way of understanding this passage from the Book of Exodus is understand that it is not just a story about an event from long ago, but an event that is happening now.  Inasmuch as the story of the Israelites is now the story of the Church the meaning is discerned in what this scripture is teaching us about ourselves, our own ingratitude and rebellion, and our response to the gifts that God gives to us- particularly the gift of “heavenly bread” or “bread from heaven” which is the Church’s Eucharist. 

Seeing ourselves in this scripture is an examination of our own conscience in terms of what our own relationship with God in Christ and our resistance to him.  It further compels us to acknowledge that we, like the Israelites, too often bring ourselves to the Eucharist with an attitude, which in the words of the scripture from today, responds to a heavenly gift, by saying “what is this? For they did not know what it was”.

Or knowing what the heavenly bread is, we do not allow ourselves to appreciate the gift we have been given.

Today’s second scripture is also a provocation to examine our conscience.  In this brief passage from St. Paul’s letter to the Ephesians the great Apostle insists that we live as the Christians that we are.  This means that accepting that our way of life is different there are beliefs and practices that are essential to a Christian’s way of life that cannot be easily assimilated or accommodated to other forms of life. 

The challenge here is that we should not “spiritualize” the Christian way of life and think that it is merely a matter of interiority, ideas or emotions.  Instead, believing and living as a Christian has real world implications and is not merely a private matter, but a matter of public significance.  Professing the Christian way of life within one’s heart or within the confines of Church buildings while at the same time allowing the faith you profess to little to no impact about the reality of your life means that you are living in a contradiction, a kind of double life. 

St. Paul insists that this contradiction, this “double life” is a non-starter.  He doesn’t use the word “hypocrisy” in today’s passage, but this is precisely what his teaching for today is about.

The Lord Jesus speaks to us today in his Holy Gospel.

Like we did with the Old Testament text from the Book of Exodus, we should accept the Lord Jesus’ words as being directed directly and explicitly to us, and not try to defer their impact by pretending they are meant for a people from long ago.

The Lord Jesus is speaking addressing our tendency to be fascinated with him because we want something from him, something of worldly importance.  The people have seen the signs and wonders he performs and having experienced such power many want the Lord Jesus to act like their personal genie and give them what they want.

The Lord Jesus recoils from this attitude and insists that while we seem to have great certitude about what we want, we truly do not know what we need.

He means to give us something greater than our limited and limiting expectations.

This gift is himself- his divine life, the only reality that endures once everything that we want in this world has passed away into dust. 

The divine life of Christ is given to us in the Blessed Sacrament. This is what the Eucharist really and truly is.  It is a gift that exceeds even the “heavenly bread” that the Lord gave to the Israelites in the wilderness and it is also a greater miracle than the food the Lord multiplied and gave to the crowds to satisfy their hunger.    

Like the Israelites in the Book of Exodus, or the crowd today in the Gospel, we may also lack a true appreciation for the gift that God in Christ imparts to us in the Eucharist.  We diminish its importance by prioritizing worldly expectations and desires over against the Mass, or we lack appreciation for what the Blessed Sacrament really and truly is- making it less than what it really and truly is so that the demand on us is diminished. 

And so, we call the Eucharist a symbol, reduce the Mass to an experience of ethnicity or self-expression, and we forget (perhaps intentionally) that what is given to us in the Eucharist is not just bread, but is really and truly God.

Seventeenth Sunday in Ordinary Time (July 25th, 2021)

The Church’s first scripture for today is an excerpt from the Second Book of Kings and it features the Old Testament prophet Elisha- one of the greatest of the Israelite prophets.

Many Christians think of the prophets as seers, or predictors of future events, but the Biblical prophets are described as being capable of much more than providing insights in regards “things to come”.

The Biblical prophets were wonderworkers, accomplishing mighty deeds that manifested that they were gifted with inexplicable power- a power that would reveal God’s will in signs and miracles.

Elisha was such a prophet and today’s scripture testifies that it was remembered that he could multiply portions of food. 

This might sound strange to our modern minds and imaginations, and as such, we might look for explanations that would deprive this text of its strangeness, but I recommend that we not do that and accept the Biblical description of God being a worker of wonders through his prophets. 

For if we cannot accept that, we most assuredly will not accept that God in Christ can work wonders through his Church.

The reason the Church presents this scripture about Elisha to us is so that we might see in Elisha a foreshadowing of Christ.  Christ, who is the fulfillment of the prophets, manifests in signs and wonders, his continuity with the prophets.  But ultimately Christ exceeds the signs and wonders of the prophets as he is God himself speaking and acting.  God’s power was manifested in the prophets, but Christ is God’s power itself, manifest not just in the signs and wonders of mighty deeds, but in flesh and in blood.

As such, Christ will enact a sign and a wonder much greater than the mere multiplication of food and drink, he will make himself food and drink and through that sacred meal we know as the Eucharist and through this Blessed Sacrament, he will nourish us with his own divine life.

The Church’s second reading for today is an excerpt from St. Paul’s Letter to the Ephesians.  In the Apostle Paul’s testimony, he testifies to the characteristics of the Christian way of life- a way of life that has its own unique beliefs, values and practices. 

His words are about how we Christians should be treating one another, and how our unique beliefs, values and practices should inform our behavior.

Why the reminder?

Because the world hears about our unique beliefs, values and practices and is curious as to whether or not they are true.  The great indicator of this is whether or not Christians actually live what they profess.  If they do, the world finds a compelling reason, if not to believe what we believe, but also to trust us.  If we do not practice our faith and show it forth in a unique way of life, what we profess seems to the world to be a deception.

The other reason for St. Paul’s reminder is that he is highlighting an important truth about the Christian way of life. This truth is that Christians aspire to an identity that positions all others- familial, ethnic, political, ideological, economic, racial, social status or cultural. 

This identity is our Baptism and through this Baptism we become united, not only to Christ the Lord, but to one another.  Whatever our differences are, these differences should not become more important than the identity Christ has given to us.  St. Paul saw in Baptism the way of life through which God intended to unite people with an identity that transcended all differences.  This way of life would order all differences in relation to life in Christ- a life that finds its deepest expressions in love of God and love of neighbor.

The bottom line of this is that the world seeks to position the Christian way of life through its insistence that worldly identities must be accepted as the most important and in relation to these identities, the Christian way of life must yield, surrender and accommodate.  Many of the early Christians suffered much because they refused to do this.  St. Paul was one who suffered because he would refuse to compromise his identity in Christ.   

All Christians face this challenge.  Even us and in the end our commitment to the unique Christian way of life is measured by those moments when in the face of the opposition of the world, we have refused to yield, surrender and accommodate the demand that our identity in Christ be secondary to the identities of the world.

Finally, Christ speaks to us in his Holy Gospel and we hear about an extraordinary miracle, a sign and wonder- the Lord feeds a vast multitude with mere morsels of food!

This Gospel, connects us to today’s first scripture (as I have said earlier) and as with that first scripture, we should not waste our time making testimony to a miracle less than what it is by engaging in speculation as to how we can accommodate this sign and wonder to those who are skeptical about its truth.

The meaning of this sign will not be understood by insisting that the text is being deceitful and that there was no miracle at all, but there was instead a willingness to share.  (Quite frankly, I think that’s just stupid).

The meaning of the miracle, of the sign, is discerned in what is later revealed in the Mystery of the Eucharist, in which Christ “multiplies” or “increases” the gift of his divine life, by making his divine life food and drink and giving it to us so that dwelling within us, his divine life might transform us (as food and drink transforms us) and then through us, Christ “multiplies” or “increases” his divine life in the world.

Christ signals with a miracle a greater miracle to come. 

This miracle is revealed to us in the Mass.  In fact, it is this miracle that is the reason we Christians gather for worship and it is the culmination and fulfillment of everything that we are doing here right now.

Unfortunately, many Christians now refuse this miracle, coming to believe that worldly things and identities are more important than the divine life that God in Christ gives us here.  Enamored and distracted by worldly things and identities Christians allow the divine life of Christ to diminish in themselves and once this diminishment has happened, signs of Christ’s divine life diminish in the world.

The effect of this is that the world becomes colder and increasingly more alienating and frightening.  The reasons for justice become less convincing as does our willingness to forgive.  Worldly identities become ultimate and oppressive.  Without a sense there is a divine life available to us we become ever more enamored and fixated on our desires for wealth, pleasure, power and honors- and these things consume us, as our envy to have what we cannot possess drives us mad and makes us violent. 

The remedy for all this is in the miracle, in the Blessed Sacrament.  When we receive this Eucharist with reverence and with love, sharing with others the divine life of Christ that we have received in works of mercy and acts of self-sacrifice, the divine life of Christ multiplies and increases, not just in us, but in the world.  This is the reason for the miracle.  This is its purpose.

And we ignore this miracle at our own peril.