Homily for the 21st Sunday in Ordinary Time, preached August 22/23 at St. Kateri at St. Cecilia

Today's readings:  http://www.usccb.org/bible/readings/082315.cfm

            We all know someone, I’m sure, who’s left the faith.  Who’s either gone someplace else to Church, or just stopped going to Church altogether.  Maybe a son or daughter, brother or sister, perhaps a parent or cousin, friend or co-worker.  If you’re like me, you just don’t get it.  I mean, I love our faith, I love the Mass, I can’t imagine why anyone would walk away.

            I met a man just this (yesterday) morning who told me he used to be a Catholic.  We were both participating in a peaceful, prayerful protest vigil over on Ridge Road in Greece in front of the Planned Parenthood clinic there, part of a nationwide protest of Planned Parenthood, in response to the recent undercover videos (which you won’t see in the mainstream press but which are thankfully readily available on-line). Videos which lift the veil of secrecy and reveal the abhorrent practices going on there.

            Well it was near the end of the vigil that this man came up to me – he saw that I had on a shirt that identified me as a Catholic deacon – and I suspect he wanted to engage me in a discussion of faith.  I would have welcomed that.  But I think we both recognized that we weren’t there to try to win each other to each other’s brand of Christianity, but rather we were there united, witnessing against the evil of legal abortion.  He told me he’d love to get together with me to talk faith, and perhaps we will.

            As I was driving home, I kicked myself as my mind and heart moved to today’s Gospel reading.  Why, oh why, I said to myself, didn’t I at least invite him to go home and read and meditate on this Gospel?  Why, I said to myself, didn’t I simply invite him to take another look at the sixth chapter of St. John’s Gospel?

            That chapter, of course, contains our Blessed Lord’s “Bread of Life” discourse, which we’ve been proclaiming now for five weeks, and we conclude today, returning next weekend to our journey through the Gospel of Mark. 

            You’ll recall that last week, Jesus said to the crowds, “I am the living bread that came down from heaven; whoever eats this bread will live forever.”  Our Lord went on to proclaim “Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him on the last day.  For my flesh is true food, and my blood is true drink.  Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood remains in me and I in him.”

            In today’s Gospel, we see the result of that very hard teaching.  “As a result of this, many of his disciples returned to their former way of life and no longer accompanied him,” John tells us.  You can almost hear the crowd murmuring “Dang, I thought He was ‘the one’ sent to save Israel.  But eat his flesh? Drink his blood?  This guy must be a madman!” Went back to their former ways of living.  Left discipleship, stopped following the Lord.

            And our literal belief in this teaching, our belief that in the appearance of bread and wine at this altar, Jesus is really and truly present, Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity, a teaching that wasn’t an issue at all in the early Church, well this is one of the main dogmas that now separates us from unity with our non-Catholic brothers and sisters.

            But, I have to believe it is also this teaching that will restore that unity, will bring folks back to the Church, will bring folks to His Church, to His altar.  If only we will share it.

            Perhaps we’re reluctant to share this belief with others because we have our own doubts, our own share of disbelief.  If you and I read and learn and study and take into our hearts this “hard teaching,” then we have His assurance that He will set our hearts on fire.  He will come into our bodies and souls in a real way and dwell within us and His Spirit will convict us of His real and sacred presence.  And we will not be afraid to share this belief with others, as I failed to do this (yesterday) morning. 

            Or perhaps we’re simply numb to His presence, we come to Mass and go through the motions and we take for granted the awesome miracle that we witness and participate in here at this altar.  We take for granted that the Lord of the Universe, through Whom all was created, becomes right here in the re-presentation of His sacrifice on Calvary, really and truly present, really and truly available to us.  A real and true gift of Himself to us.

            If that’s the case, then maybe you and I aren’t spending enough time preparing our hearts to receive Him, prayerfully meditating on what is about to happen here.  Examining our consciences – am I worthy, free of grave sin, to receive Him?  Asking Him to not let us ever take this gift for granted.

            Or maybe we’re not spending enough time after receiving Him.  Do we head to the doors immediately upon receiving Him, in a race to see who can get out of the parking lot first? Or do we kneel and pray in humble and heart-felt thanksgiving that He who created the stars would condescend to come and dwell with and within us?

            This belief in His real presence, is at the very heart of our faith, for Jesus in His sacred Body and precious Blood is the very source and summit of our faith, so say the fathers of the second Vatican Council.  Rekindling the belief in Our Lord’s real presence in the Eucharist is the only thing, our Bishop Salvatore said at his Mass of Installation, the only thing that he hopes to accomplish in his time as our shepherd.

            If our faith in His real presence is rekindled, we will unashamedly invite others to receive this same wondrous gift.  He will be ever so much more present to us on our journey, to inspire us to follow Him more closely, to love Him and one another more deeply, and out of love and gratitude to Him, to serve each other, and especially the poor, the disenfranchised, the powerless more faithfully.

            I’d like to close with a beautiful passage from Dr. Scott Hahn and his wife Kimberly’s book, “Rome Sweet Home.”  A Calvinist by upbringing and seminary education, Dr. Hahn had been more and more drawn to the Catholic faith until one day, he decided for the first time to see what this Catholic Mass was all about.  He writes:

            “I watched and listened as the readings, prayers and responses – so steeped in Scripture – made the Bible come alive.  I almost wanted to stop the Mass and say, ‘Wait.  That line is from Isaiah; the song is from the Psalms.  Whoa, you’ve got another prophet in that prayer.’

            “I realized, this is where the Bible belongs.  This was the setting in which this precious family heirloom was meant to be read, proclaimed and expounded.  Then we moved into the Liturgy of the Eucharist…

            “I wanted to stop everything and shout, ‘Hey, can I explain what’s happening from Scripture? This is great!’ Instead I just sat there, famished with a supernatural hunger for the Bread of Life.

            “After pronouncing the words of consecration, the priest held up the Host.  I felt as if the last drop of doubt had drained from me.  With all of my heart, I whispered, ‘My Lord and my God. That’s really you! And if that’s really you, then I want full communion with you.  I don’t want to hold anything back.”

            <pause>   Sisters and brothers, as Father _____ again holds up the Sacred Host, as we receive Him, Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity into our bodies and souls, let us this day proclaim with all of our hearts, “my Lord and my God.”

Preached Saturday, August 15, 2015 - Feast of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary (8:30a, St. Cecilia)

It was 1870

            It was 1870.  One hundred forty five years ago.  The fathers of the First Vatican Council declared that the Pope, whenever speaking “ex cathedra” – “from the chair” – on matters of faith and morals, speaks infallibly.  Meaning that when he so speaks, when he so teaches, he does so without error, we can be confident that he infallibly speaks the truth.

            Now infallibility gets a lot of press even to this day, but in that one hundred forty five years, we’ve had twelve popes but only once…once…has any Holy Father ever taught “ex cathedra” – ever taught infallibly.  And that is the dogma we call to mind and celebrate today – Mary’s Assumption into heaven.

            What Pope Pius XII declared in 1950, what we believe, what to be Catholic we must believe, is that Our Blessed Mother was assumed, body and soul, into heaven at the end of her earthly life.  That her virginal body, conceived without stain of sin, her sacred womb having served as a living tabernacle for the Son of God, would not and could not and did not undergo the corruption of the grave which awaits all of our earthly bodies.  That God willed that she did not have to wait until the end of the ages to experience the redemption of her body.

            To be sure, the Pope didn’t have to worry about opposition to this teaching from the faithful, as the Church has believed in the assumption of Mary since its earliest centuries.  But proclaim this teaching, and proclaim it infallibly, he did.

            And I think it was prophetic of Pius XII to do so.  Inspired by the Holy Spirit, perhaps he could foresee what changes were coming to our culture, changes that cause us to shake our heads as we look back but which we continue to experience.  Perhaps God gave him an inkling of how the sexual revolution would lead people to ever more greatly devalue and objectify the human body.  He surely wanted this teaching to uniquely stress the sacredness of the human body, how we are not merely souls, or even souls with bodies, but we are body and soul.  And how at the end of time, our resurrection will be of both body and soul.

            And might the Holy Father have foreseen a world in which so many proclaim “it’s my body and I’ll do what I want with it?”  In a world steeped in that attitude, we celebrate today this simple woman’s triumphant entry into heaven, made possible because by her fiat she said to God not “it’s my body” but rather “may it be done unto me according to your will.”

            And could the Holy Father have foreseen a world hellbent on rejecting all authority, a world ever more disobedient.  We celebrate the heavenly reward bestowed by Our Blessed Lord on His immaculate mother, by whose perfect obedience to the Father’s will, we have the hope of salvation.

            Yes, this is a powerful, counter-cultural feast we celebrate this day, because it is a counter-cultural woman we celebrate today.  And perhaps the most important part of this feast, the greatest reason to celebrate is this – we rejoice today that this most holy of women is with her Son in heaven, interceding with her Son in heaven on our behalf.  There she is cooperating in our salvation. 

            We have in Mary a sure guide, a sure help as we navigate through the troubled waters of this fallen and sinful world toward our own heavenly homeland.  With a mother’s tender love, she beckons us to come close to her merciful Immaculate heart, and she takes us by the hand and leads us to her Son, Our Blessed Lord.  As her children, if we entrust ourselves to her loving care, we have her assurance that she will protect us and never let us go astray.

            It’s what Mary is all about – always leading us to her Son, always pointing the way to Jesus Christ, Our Lord.

            Always leading us so that as she so perfectly glorified God by her life, we, too, may glorify God by our lives.

            Always guiding us so that as she brought forth, by her “yes!” the fruit of her womb, the very salvation of humankind, we too may, by the devotion of our lives and our “yesses” bring forth good fruit for the advancement of Christ’s mission.

            Always interceding for us so that as she was welcomed triumphantly into heaven, body and soul, we too may one day experience the glorious resurrection of our bodies and life everlasting.

            So let us praise and celebrate our Blessed Mother and invoke her powerful intercession:  Hail Mary…

 

Homily - 18th Sunday in Ordinary Time Cycle B - preached August 2, 2015, 8 and 11a, St Kateri at St. Margaret Mary

Today's readings:  http://www.usccb.org/bible/readings/080215.cfm

 

430 years.  A long time.  In our own history as a nation, if we were to go back 430 years that would put us 35 years before the Mayflower Pilgrims landed at Plimoth.  But that’s how long the Israelite community had been enslaved in Egypt.  Imagine - 430 years of slavery – without freedom, without dignity.  For 21 generations.

And we know the story – God miraculously intervened in their history - by plagues and finally the pass-over, led them through the Red Sea, set them free after 430 years of bondage!  And the very next scene is today’s first reading  - we see the community of Israel in the desert, less than two months later…complaining!  Grumbling.  Longing, even, to return to their enslavement where at least there were fleshpots and plenty of bread to eat.

Now my first inclination was to preach about their ungratefulness.  About their grumbling.  To think that they’d be complaining so soon after their freedom, especially after 430 years of slavery!  After all, aren’t we each, to some extent, ungrateful?  Don’t we all, at least a little, take for granted what we’ve been given and sometimes grumble?  Some people more than others, of course.  Some people, and I’m thinking now of a woman I recently met and got to know over a few months, seem never to be satisfied.   Nothing is ever quite good enough, never quite pleased.

But after further reflection, what I realized is this – the Israelite people were hungry!  Starving.  And physical hunger is a very powerful motivator, such that the “entire community” joined in grumbling against Moses and Aaron.  More powerful a motivator, apparently, than freedom.

Now if I were God, hearing this complaining and grumbling immediately after freeing this people, I might just have smote them, but our loving and merciful God does nothing of the sort – no, He listens, and He feeds them.  Quail in the evening, flakes of bread every morning – manna, it’s called, the Hebrew word for their question, “what is it?”

Food, He gives them, for strength, to sustain them for their journey to the land He has promised them. Food to satisfy their hunger.

In our Gospel, Our Blessed Lord also speaks of hunger, but a different kind of hunger.  Each of us is not any less dependent on our daily bread than the Israelite community to keep from bodily hunger, but each of us has another, different, even greater kind of hunger – the hunger for God, the thirst for His love.   This hunger is imprinted in our being, God created us with this hunger, indeed God created us for intimate union with Him.  At the very beginning of the Catechism, we read “the desire for God is written in the human heart, because man is created by God and for God; and God never ceases to draw man to himself.”

But so many of us go through life seeking to satisfy this hunger, quench this thirst, in all kinds of ways that are not God.  “Looking for love in all the wrong places,” so to speak, as the song goes.  And the inevitable result?  As Mick Jaggar sings, “I can’t get no satisfaction.”

Now it’s true that many of us get some satisfaction, become quite comfortable, with the things of this world, so that this hunger for God is kind of buried deep down.  Like the crowd in this Gospel whom the Lord had just fed with the loaves and fishes, fed til they were full, with twelve baskets left over.  So satisfied, so comfortable, that the flame of desire for God in our lives becomes barely a flicker.

But even so, that hunger is always there.  Whether we know it or not, whether we admit it or not, and many people go through life denying it, each of us has this hunger for God, for God’s love, imprinted on our hearts.  It’s a restlessness - a hunger of which St. Augustine wrote at the very beginning of his book Confessions: Lord, “You have formed us for Yourself, and our hearts are restless till they find rest in You.” 

Now just like the Lord God satisfied the hunger of His children in the desert, so He satisfies our hunger for relationship with Him as well – and He does so in the person of His very Son, Jesus Christ.  That is the message of the Gospel today – He, Jesus, is the only way our hunger for the eternal can ever be satisfied.  It is only He, the “true bread from heaven” as He calls Himself, given by our loving, merciful Father, who gives “life to the world.”

The message today, what Our Lord is saying to each of us, and not only us but to everyone out there who doesn’t know Him yet, is that we will only be satisfied, we will only find rest for our restless hearts, in relationship with Him.  “Whoever comes to me will never hunger.  Whoever believes in me will never thirst,” He promises us.

He, Jesus, is the new manna.  He is the new Man - sent from heaven as sustenance, as strength, as food for our journey – as we journey to the Land the Lord has promised.  In this life so often filled with pain, heartache, with sin, it is only in faith in Him, in intimate relationship with Him, in following after Him that we find peace, joy, rest.

And He will teach us at length in next Sunday’s Gospel and the week after that, He, Jesus, is the new manna here at this altar, here in Eucharist.  He has given to us this most amazing gift, Himself, His sacred body and precious blood, his real presence hidden under the appearance of bread and wine.  In this true bread from heaven He feeds us and nourishes us to sustain us on our journey to the land He promises us. 

Let us never take for granted, let us always be thankful, for His most amazing gift to us.  And let us always be filled with His fire to share this most amazing gift with others.