Deacon Dan Wright

Love in the Season of Lent

We enter the first Sunday of the 40 days of Lent considering the depth and meaning of the Lenten experience at this time in our lives. We look for spiritual purpose and reconciliation. Our practice of observing Lent varies from person to person. To be frank, I never cared that much myself for the penitential aspect of Lent, but it holds value in the overall scheme for us because Lent leads us to the Cross. No greater love has one than to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. As a jumping off point for our first Sunday of Lent, I’d like us to consider the somewhat unusual theme of love during the season of Lent. Think of it as a belated gift from our Ash Wednesday Valentine’s Day.

The antiphon for the psalm for today reads, “Your ways, O Lord, are love and truth to those who keep your covenant,” and in the text of the psalm itself we see, “Remember that your compassion, O Lord, and your love are from of old.” If I were to make a goal of Lent personally, rather than giving up something, I might consider the value that exists in exploring the terrain of God’s infinite love for us… Certainly, it is a rich field of experience when we consider it.

In the first reading God establishes an everlasting covenant with Noah and his descendants that never again will there be a flood of the magnitude that had occurred. From the depths of an act of punishment, 40 days of relentless torrential flooding, that is, from a penitential experience, springs forth love: a love that was immanent from the beginning but made manifest by the salvation of a remnant of humankind—just eight souls. I can imagine hearing the voice of the Spirit say, “I have set my bow in the clouds as a sign of my great love for you.” We also see the covenant as being between God and the Earth, which shows us the love God has for creation, an ever-present reminder of the call to environmental stewardship.

St. Peter reminds us in his first epistle that the flood of Noah was a sign of a much greater saving event, one that destroys sin and regenerates the human soul; one that washes us clean in the waters of eternal charity. God gives us life, in an act of pouring out divinity into the cup of humanity, in the waters of baptism. So, on this first Sunday we consider our calling, a calling to live out our baptismal promises and pour out that with which we have been so abundantly filled.

Lent serves as a reminder of love as a journey of faithfulness and truth. Its a time for reflection, repentance, and drawing closer to God’s love and truth; it’s an opportunity to live out that which has been given to us by embracing others with the same gift we have received. We put love into actions and we call it the praxis of faith. It’s a beautiful lesson that extends to all times of the year, not just here in our Lenten season. 

Take Lent as a time of year to reach out to someone in a positive way, give more of yourself when it comes to kindness and generosity. But also remember that we have a great calling to establish justice on Earth, to rebuild it, and to establish a world where we freely share the things we need.

What we are called to do and who we are called to be are not easy tasks by any means, but we count on help, spiritual help from God and from our fellows. It might be something as small as a smile or friendly glance. There are abundant temptations in our world. The greatest is the temptation to despair. Love is such that it has the power to conquer despair, but often we fail. This too we consider in the Lenten journey; again, it is a path of reconciliation as well. 

Jesus entered a world of temptation, compelled by the Spirit, he fasted in the desert for 40 days. The narrative showcases his steadfast love and commitment to God’s will. Jesus’ refusal to succumb to temptation is not just a rejection of sin but rather it affirms his deep love for humanity and his commitment to fulfill the purpose for which he came into our world. His love is sacrificial, it leads to the Way of the Cross by which we follow his steps and see him stripped bare and humiliated. His is a love willing to endure death for us.

In Lent we receive a call to recognize God’s enduring love in our lives, and to respond by living in accordance with the covenant, grounded in love and truth. We are reminded this weekend that one does not live by bread alone but by every word that comes forth from the mouth of God. God’s ways are indeed love and truth to those who keep the covenant.

Sunday Homily: Contrasting the Two Lazarus Stories

Today the Gospel of John recounts the story of Jesus raising his friend Lazarus from the dead. It’s a familiar story to us. We’ve heard it many times over the years, and perhaps we’ve even taken the time to read it and study it, either alone or maybe in a bible study group.

The story of Jesus raising Lazarus from the dead occurs only in John. However, it’s both interesting and insightful for us at this time of year to consider the story against that of another Lazarus, the Lazarus of Luke’s gospel, who lay in the rich man’s door and begged. It’s actually a story we hear in ordinary time during the C cycle of our liturgical year in the early fall.

Recall that in Luke’s gospel Lazarus died and was seen in Abraham’s bosom by the rich man who was being tormented in the grave. The rich man called out and begged Abraham to send Lazarus to his brothers to warn them. Abraham replied, “They have Moses and the prophets….if they do not listen to Moses and the prophets, they will not be convinced even if someone rises from the dead.”

During Lent we tend to focus on repenting from that which ultimately brings about the fate of the rich man in Luke’s story. Even though the story of Luke’s Lazarus is not one we hear during Lent, it does have the message of repenting or facing consequences in spiritual death, which is an important Lenten theme. However, what we hear today from John’s gospel, rather than focusing on death, focuses on life. In many ways the Lazarus of John gives us a mirror image of the Lazarus of Luke, who cannot return to warn the rich man’s brothers of the torments awaiting those who sin against justice.

Unlike Luke’s Lazarus, John’s Lazarus does return but does he convince us to refrain from the sin of injustice? Does his being raised open our eyes to the mercy of God who has allowed him to return? Aside from being a spectacular miracle, does Lazarus being raised from the dead spur us into action or does he fail to convince us just as the Abraham of Jesus’ parable warned?

Our reading from Ezekiel reveals not only the hope that awaits the righteous in the final judgment, the peace of heaven, but it also shows us the hope of transformation for the living in the world where we live now. God promises to enliven us. It seems obvious that enlivening occurs for a purpose.

On a spiritual level each one of us should rejoice and see ourselves being somehow like the Lazarus whom God has chosen to restore to life. The question remains as to what we do with the life we have been given. It seems that the opportunity exists for us, as spiritually enlivened beings, to bring about change in the world where we live.

We have the opportunity, unlike the first Lazarus, to go to our brothers and sisters and let them know that they can no longer turn their backs upon those who cry out in anguish. We are given the power, the life within, to heal the world. We must do it in a way that seems by analogy to be most like being in love.

In healing the world, in calling forth the dead into life, we tap into the deepest resources of our hearts and fully comprehend and share with others in our world. We take their part; we experience what they live, and we offer life. Like the poor man Lazarus, the Lazarus of today’s reading died, but God raised him. God has also raised us. With the spirit of God in us, whom will we call forth and restore from the world of the dead?

The Heart of the Matter

Today’s scriptural lesson has to do with the deepest matters of the heart, and with the things in life that cause us to be concerned. However, in a more important way, the message is about what should concern us the most.

When I was a child growing up, my mother taught me to trust God in everything. I was fortunate to have been brought up by someone whose faith led her to seek understanding of it. She instilled that in me at an early age. She would call me into the kitchen to teach me her lessons of faith when I was just a little more than a five-year-old. She believed that if she taught me, then when I was older I would not depart from it. That was a lesson she learned in scripture. She would often tell me, “Don’t ever be troubled about anything, but always put your trust in God.”

As I looked at today’s readings, the providence of God stood out clear to me. Providence is one of the great themes of Christianity. Perhaps as Catholics we don’t talk about it that much. Providence gets more attention in the mainline Protestant denominations that emphasize the theological framework of John Calvin. However, I’m not really going to talk that much about providence as a theology as I am going to refer to it from the viewpoint of our trusting in God's goodness toward us. A great part of what we learn today is the lesson of trust. The words of scripture seek to reach deep within us, into that spiritual interior of our being, which we refer as “heart.” Not that we should confuse heart with the organ that pumps the blood through our bodies, but to know it as that place of inner depth sought by the mystics. Indeed our lesson is really all about knowing our hearts. It is about knowing the rhythm and beat of our spiritual life.

Whatever things we might say about our relationship with the life that we live, we must say that life always gives something to us. It may seem odd to hear about being in relationship with life. Perhaps we would expect to hear a homily about being in relation to God or other pious concerns. We might expect a preacher to talk about our relationship with Jesus Christ, but in our direct firsthand experience it’s life—plain and simple—that meets us straightforward, and it’s life with which we must deal. We consider all other things secondary to life as we live it.

As we encounter life daily we learn to see our cooperative partnership in it. It is also a partnership with God. It is one in which we always take a role. Do you know that, willingly or not, each one of us always takes the role of a servant? Yes, we always do. I’m reminded of the lyrics of a popular song now close to 30 years ago. The singer sang, “You’ve got to serve somebody. It may be the devil or it may be the Lord, but you’ve got to serve somebody.” Jesus tells us in the gospel that no one can serve two masters. You will hate the one and love the other. He puts it plain: you can’t serve God and selfish gain at the same time.

The tone of today’s gospel indicates that we shouldn’t ever worry. God provides all we need. Do you really trust God? If so, then be at ease about things that worry others. Everything is in God’s hands. Even transcending the love that a mother can have for her newborn baby is the love of God. There is never a need to worry for a moment’s time. The reading from Isaiah expresses the matter clearly… “Can a mother forget her nursing child or fail to love the son of her womb? She may forget but I will never forget you. Behold I have engraved you on the palms of my hands. Your walls are always before me.”

Often the anxiety that consumes our lives isn’t about our basic material needs or even our desire for gain of wealth. Often we allow a culture of fear to be part of our world. Too often we live and act according to fear rather than according to love. However, all the things that concern us are ultimately in God’s hands. They belong to God’s plan and design.

A part of trusting in God’s providential love is about what we give back to life through our deeds. This is probably the truest meaning of being a servant. Jesus tells us to take no thought for what we will eat or what we will wear. However, does this mean that we are to take no thought for what others will eat, what they will wear, and where they will sleep on this cold night? Does it mean that we are not to be concerned with the clothing of human dignity and the intrinsic worth of every person? If we truly take no thought for our selfish concerns then we will be willing to transfer our efforts—without judgment—to the greatest needs of others wherever we may find them in our world. We may find them to south of us in Venezuela, or perhaps we may look to Eastern Europe or to Central Africa. We place our efforts, our concerns, where there is the greatest human need.

The giving that we discover in life, the unconditional gift of each and every day, of each breath we breathe, of every ray of sun, every cloud above and every drop of rain, and of every human encounter, teaches us to be imitators of that same giving. In the complete letting go of ambition and self-concern and in the giving of ourselves for others, we discover the innermost heart of the servant, and in this we discover what it truly means to be at rest. In this we learn to answer a universal concern.

Increase Our Faith: Sermon for the 27th Sunday of Ordinary Time

"If you have faith the size of a mustard seed…” Perhaps faith is one of the most misunderstood concepts in the Christian religion. We seem intuitively to know that we need faith. It’s something that all people who desire to live a godly life long for—it speaks to our deepest inner being—but what is it really that we desire? Is it that we should have all our doubts put to rest? Even the greatest of saints had their doubts. Or perhaps it’s that we long to see just one great miracle in our lifetimes. “ Oh, If I just had the faith! Then everything would be alright.”

The readings we have for today are clearly about faith, and to really get the message we need to look not only at today’s readings, but also we should consider where we have been liturgically in the past couple weeks.

Last Sunday we heard about the rich man and Lazarus, and how Lazarus laid suffering in the rich man’s door. He must have stepped over Lazarus every morning! The week before that we heard of the dishonest steward and those who trample the poor through cheating and dishonesty. Actually all these readings, along with the ones we have today are all about faith. Faith, or the lack thereof as it may be, becomes evident in the things we do and in the things that we fail to do.

What we sometimes need, when it comes to faith, is an eye opener. In today’s gospel Jesus provides the disciples with such an eye opener. I grew up with a literal interpretation of the parable of the mustard seed. I was told that if I had only a little faith, miracles would happen on a daily basis. In my Protestant evangelical upbringing I heard it all the time. Faith had to do with everything from gaining wealth and prosperity to overcoming incurable illnesses. Mustard seed faith was the key to everything. All one could want was possible by having mustard seed faith, or at least that’s what they told me.

I have to be honest. I never had that kind of supernatural faith. However, I did know of several Pentecostal preachers who could make people pass out by just touching them—of course this kind of thing was always suspect of trickery or prearrangement. Perhaps the faithful just knew what to do when the preacher touched them. Perhaps he knew if they had just the right very deep and intense prayerful look they were candidates for being “slain in the spirit.”

I did have someone pass out while I was preaching a couple years ago, but that was probably caused something else. I suspect it had more to do with a missed insulin shot than with supernatural power issuing from my words. My problem with faith when I was young wasn’t that I didn’t believe. Quite the contrary actually, it was just that no matter how much I desired it, regardless of how hard I prayed, no matter how much I contorted my heart and face, it wasn’t in my power to make the miraculous occur.

Nevertheless, I do wholeheartedly believe that faith leads us to realize unimaginable possibilities; that is, it leads to realistic possibilities that push the envelope in terms of what we would ordinarily consider. If we believe in something, something real and attainable in this world, and are willing to put forth the effort there’s a universe of pure possibility waiting. That’s a good thing, and I’m actually a lot more inclined to think of the mustard seed faith concept of my youth in this way nowadays. It’s the mystery of the power of God that makes the realization of faith possible. Not that it’s beyond our understanding, but that faith brings about a holy and transcendent experience. That’s the real meaning of mystery. It’s something that transcends what we would ordinarily expect.

In today’s gospel the disciples, somewhat impetuously, ask Jesus to increase their faith. As he often does, Jesus responds with hyperbole or overstatement to get his point across. The biblical literalists of my youth might have a hard time seeing it this way. In our translation that we heard today Jesus tell the disciples “If you have faith the size of a mustard seed” you could command this tree to be planted in the sea and it would obey. The Greek verb “have” in this section of the gospel is rendered in a tense, which older translations render as “had” in the sense of habitually having something. It is as though Jesus is saying to the disciples, somewhat accusatorily, “You say increase our faith, but I ask exactly what faith is it that I am to increase? If you had faith the size of a mustard seed,” he tells them, then “you could command the tree to be uprooted and planted in the sea.”

As they often do, the disciples are caught presuming something and they have to be corrected. In their being reproved—about assuming to have faith to begin with—we find something key to understanding faith. Jesus goes on to say, “When you have done all you have been commanded, say, 'We are unprofitable servants; we have done what we were obliged to do.’"

We are to do what we have been commanded to do. It seems rather simple doesn’t it? We are to obey the commandments and love. For me this is the key not only to understanding today’s scripture but also the readings for past couple weeks. It’s quite interesting that in each lesson the actions of faith they are cast in connection with how we interact with those whose lives are affected by extreme negative conditions outside their control: poverty, or as the case is today with the Habakkuk reading, how we react in the face of violence. No doubt these are all concerns quite relevant to us in our world today. What are we to do when we come face-to-face with those whose lives are affected by forces outside their control? How do we react to them? The manner in which we treat others determines the reality of faith much, much more than the sheer mystery of the miraculous.

I want to close by reflecting on something I became aware of this past week. It’s not to accuse anyone. After all we all have room to grow. I like to think that we encounter God each day, and each day brings us a test of faith. I have a friend, a devout person, who comes to church with her young daughter. Her daughter has autism. The child has behaviors typical for someone with autism. She can sometimes be a little noisy, but nothing too bad. Certainly she is less noisy than crying babies, who we tolerate very well. My friend’s daughter is a person who understands that we receive Jesus in Eucharist. I taught her that myself. Just last week I learned that someone who came to church late sat near where the child and her mother were in the back of the church. When the person noticed the child making a slight noise she told the mother, “Your child is distracting me, make her be quiet.” The mother explained, “My child has autism, she can’t really help it.” Again the person said, “Make her be quiet.” So my friend took her child and left Mass.

The things in life that require the response of faith come to us in many guises, be it Lazarus in the doorway calling out for help, the poor cheated by the rich, or the violence of our times. Perhaps it may the voice of a child in our midst with a disability. We only begin to reach out and take a hold of faith; we only begin to increase it, when we allow it to cause us to act when we encounter injustice. Faith is truly faith when we act in the lives of those who suffer. The mulberry tree will indeed someday be planted in the sea, but that will happen only when we decide to repair our world.

Sunday Sermon: Connecting Humility, Righteousness, and Justice

As is always the case in our readings we receive a message today that conveys truth to us about living a good life. For me this week it’s a message that is difficult. Not because the words don’t come to me, but because of the gravity of the message itself. It is a message about what leads to peace in our life and ultimately to salvation. The message for today, at first glance, has to do with conducting our affairs with humility. It seems rather simple actually, “Be humble in how you live.” At least this is what we see on the surface.

If it is the case that the lesson is merely about living as a humble person, there shouldn’t be too much to unpack. A couple words should do and then we can move on to the rest of the liturgy. Maybe that’s what you were hoping for from me today. However, before being too hasty we should ask ourselves if we truly understand the deepest meaning. After all, it is an important enough lesson that Jesus took the time to teach it.

The gospel tells us that at the culmination of the week people were gathering for what was probably a Friday evening dinner at the home of a respected Pharisee where Jesus was a guest. They were observing Jesus carefully. It’s likely that he had chosen to sit in an unexpected place. Actually, Jesus was observing them too: he took note of how they chose to be seated, and perhaps the order in which they were being served. In his observation Jesus must have been interested in noticing who gets honor in our world and where we place our values.

Indeed more than being merely a lesson in mere humility, the importance of what Jesus had to say goes much deeper.

If I were ever asked to choose what I believe to be the most important thing that Jesus taught, I would have to say it is that we are to be righteous. Jesus believed that everything about our lives should reflect the righteousness of God. Though some might insist that salvation comes by grace, and while we realize that it is true that the mercy of God knows no bounds, our turning toward God, toward righteousness, is the thing that may count most in our final assessment before the throne of justice.

Recall the very last sentence of the gospel reading today. It says, “… You will be repaid at the resurrection of the righteous.” I don’t believe that mere humility was what was being gotten at in the parable of Jesus. It’s too easy for us, and perhaps even a temptation for us pious or churchy types, to put on front of humility. False humility is no better than self-righteousness. True humility, like true righteousness, comes from authenticity. It flows from genuine experience: from life as we live it.

It is the righteousness of our hearts—our deepest innermost being—for which we will stand in judgment. Undoubtedly, we receive the command to do good in our world. Righteousness means doing good. In a world where events are often morally neutral we have the power in our free will to create goodness through our actions. It is also in our power to act in such a way that opposes good, which most often may mean choosing not to act at all. St. Augustine of Hippo taught that evil is only the privation or absence of good. It is not a thing itself. Ultimately the measure of righteousness is contained in how we relate to others. Too often we fail to see that our relationship with God is no better than the relationship we have with all others—all things, both people and creatures—whom we encounter in life.

In the gospel message today there is the implication that our world is upside down about what we value. There is a hint of what I think of as nothing less than a revolutionary intention in Jesus’ words. He lets us know, as he does time and time again, that he is going to turn the status quo around. It’s not just a shake-up that interests Jesus; rather, it’s an absolute earthquake of overthrowing the powers that be. It’s an ushering in of a new world of values: a new kind of human government. It’s a rule in which the underclasses find themselves on top. Now that’s probably not the kind of humility we may have been thinking about, is it?

What Jesus is doing in today’s gospel is letting us know that righteousness and societal justice are intricately, perhaps inseparably, connected. Pompous religiosity, especially the kind revealed in the temple hierarchy of Jesus’ times, and in the values of the priests and Pharisees, their structure, order, and bureaucracy had little or nothing to do with justice or righteousness. What can be said of our structures and hierarchies today? It is as if Jesus were telling us, “Don’t identify yourselves with the structures of power because they will ultimately fall away. Look instead to those who have no power, no wealth, no voice, and no rights. Look to those who suffer under the plight of war. Look to the victims of racism and at our own blindness to it.”

Beyond the obvious lessons for us of being good, being authentic, and even of being at the humble service of others, which we should do, there is more. Beyond considering and putting the concerns of others ahead of our own, which also we are to do, there is yet more. Even beyond our humble and pious bowing down before our most sacred shrines, there is the lesson about what we should really value most in life.

What Jesus demands will not be popular. It wasn’t popular in his time and it’s not popular in ours. He asks that we identify with those who struggle, with the underclasses and the outcasts—the ones we might prefer would go away or those whom we would prefer to keep out. Ultimately his message is revolutionary. It is one that connects righteousness inseparably with justice in the world. It is a message that does nothing less than turn the world upside down. It is a message that should turn our lives upside down as well. It puts our relationship with others first.

When it comes to the practical question of what we should do now the answer is clear: we are not asked to go out and start a revolution. The first action in becoming righteous is to repent of our former ways. Naturally, we take baby steps at first. We begin by being more accepting of those who are most different. We ask ourselves, “What do I really value most? Is there something about myself about which I have been blind, or is there someone—a class of people perhaps—whom I have been unable to see? Am I willing to turn and accept the least valued, the least wanted, of my fellow human beings? Am I willing to let them be my most honored dinner guests?”

Sunday Homily: Investing in What Matters

In today's gospel Jesus says to be rich in the things of God. In each of the readings I couldn't help but think of the analogy of making an investment. However, investment, understood in a financial or business sense doesn't necessarily speak to everyone, but even us non-business types understand investing our time and energy. If we think about it we have to admit that we all make investments of some kind. We invest in our lives each and every day, and to what ends? Really, that's the big question that today's scriptural lessons ask us to consider. Let’s explore it a little.

When it comes to faith, religion, or spirituality—however you want to think of it—we might be tempted to think that there’s a sharp division between the spiritual and material worlds. It is true that in the New Testament, and in St. Paul in particular, there appears to be a tendency to separate the earthly from the spiritual. We see it in today’s second reading. However, is it really asking us to withdraw from the world and the life we live in it or does the truest lesson lie somewhere in life as we live it?

We’re reminded in the first reading from Ecclesiastes that all of our wealth and possessions, all the things we love and cling to most closely, must ultimately be relinquished and that in our demise we hold on to not one bit of it. No money, no houses or cars, no fine clothing makes it to the other side. The truly wise action is to throw ourselves with absolute abandon into the most important of things. But does that really mean that our world and present lives have no value? Should we refuse to consider the world of our lives as a source of lasting value?

Because I believe our present lives do have value I like to look to future. It’s the investment analogy again. I think of the generations to come. Though I admit that I frequently wonder what kind of world they will have. Will they be able to live on an inhabitable planet Earth? Will they have fresh water to drink and food to eat? Will they live in a world with social order and peace? Will they live in a world where all life is seen as sacred? Sometimes it's difficult for us to have hope in the future but we shouldn't be negative or pessimistic. We should rather believe in future possibility. If we want there to be a future for our children, for their children, and even the generations we will never know, we must invest in that future for them.

To know of the riches of God and store them up, as Jesus says to do, we should look for God in others; that is, we should invest in building community. Our religion is one that is oriented toward others. The thing that has value in community--the key essential ingredient that causes it to let us know God--is relationship. It's easy to extrapolate from this that we strengthen each another when we intentionally form relationships and thus we increase the value of our spiritual investment.

It may be overly obvious or a truism, but the way to form relationships by spending time with one another and getting to know one another. I don't think it any accident that what we do here at Mass centers on sharing a meal. Eating with one another is one the foremost way of building relationships and of being community. However, to form a relationship we need more than an hour a week. The idea of the meal is symbolic on one level because it asks us with whom we are willing to have a relationship: it asks us with whom are we willing to eat. On a practical level we might consider inviting someone to eat with us. It could be as simple as a morning coffee or lunch. We might invite someone to our home for dinner or take him or her out with us.

Communities can take various forms. Foremost, our families are often our primary community. Surely our place of worship is a community, but for it really to be a spiritually valuable community entails us spending time with each other learning to be a parish family, getting to know one another by talking with each other, praying beside each other, learning with one another, and sharing a meal with each other. Our neighborhoods, our cities, even our nation, all are communities where we have an opportunity to invest in what matters, in what lasts. It shouldn’t seem strange at all that we can discover God in the community where we live daily. The community is where the symbolic—as well as the real—meal takes place.

What makes relationship spiritual is listening and sharing. Community involves encounter and reciprocity. In last week’s readings we learned a great lesson about prayer. There is a connection with what we are talking about today. In prayer we believe that God listens to our cries. We too must learn to listen to the cries of others. Turning a deaf ear to the cries of others—being unable to hear and see their need—negates spiritual value. It throws us back into clinging to things that don’t last. When Jesus tells us to love our neighbors it must include listening to them. It must include hearing the ones whose cries are go all the way to heaven.

In our times the voices of those who call out are all around us. If we are unaware we might ask what has deafened or blinded us. Do we hear those who long to join us, and not just here at church but in an even a larger sense of belonging? Can we reach out beyond the boundary of comfort? Can we see beyond our suburban values? Do we hear the cries of the poor and the ones who struggle just to make ends meet? Do we truly hear and see those who are racially, linguistically, culturally or religiously different from us? Can we step into their shoes and see life from their vantage point? Do we know what it feels like to be looked upon with fear or prejudice? Do we even realize that racism still exists? Are we willing to be courageous enough to remove the people “phobias” (the mix of fear and prejudice) and judgment of others from our lives? We want God to hear us and answer our prayers, but how is our own hearing?

Have we truly invested in what really matters? All that God asks of us, at least to start, is to listen and consider where we have invested.

Marriage and Original Ecology: On Being Bone of Bones and Flesh of Flesh

Weddings at churches are commonplace weekend events. Just this this weekend I celebrated a wedding where the first reading was the same as we have for the Mass today. Had the couple chosen the same New Testament and Gospel readings I could have just used the same homily, except then I’d be telling you to go forth and remember this day as the day in your marriage when you loved each other the least. Somehow I don’t think that it would have worked.

As I looked at the lectionary for today I thought it strange—maybe even a little humorous— that we have a reading about suffering wedged in between two stories about marriage. I was tempted to throw in Woody Allen’s “to love is to suffer dialogue,” but I’d never be able to recover from it if I did, and you would probably never forgive me. It’s best to get on to the deeper meanings. There is a mystery to explore.

In the very beginning, when God began to form all things and place in us the breath of life, that which God is, God created a partnership with humanity. Today is a good day to talk about life and the relationship that forms out of it. It’s Respect Life Sunday, and the month of October is Respect Life month. So it makes for a good meditation to consider life today.

At the time of creation God set men and women as stewards of the earth giving us a share in creation and establishing an original ecology where human beings had interconnection and interrelatedness with all things, and especially we had it with each other. The man saw the connection that God had created and he looked upon the woman and said of her, “This is bone of of my bones and flesh of my flesh.”

In the gospel today, we find the one time on record that Jesus taught about marriage. Today it’s from Mark’s gospel but it’s also repeated in Matthew and Luke. It’s a synoptic story. All three versions tell of the same event and make the same point: there is something so unique and so original about marriage that it can’t be lawfully dissolved. God created us for each other, and again in the act of marrying we say to each other, “You are bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh… what happens to you happens also to me.”

It is no accident that today’s gospel moves from the encounter with the Pharisees over a matter of law into the telling of the story of Jesus and the little children. It makes perfect sense when we consider that children are the natural result of the union of man and woman. God gives us a role in creation. It’s been that way from the beginning. Life is imparted to us, and we share life through the act of love.

This story of Jesus and the children bears a special importance to me. I recall being about five years old and my great aunt who brought me up called me into the kitchen. “Danny,” she said, “there’s something I want to share with you.” She brought out the family bible and turned to the story of Jesus and the little children. It was the same one we heard today.

Backtracking just a bit, it’s important to note something. I was born as the child of a teenage girl in the late 1950s in a small town in a bleak and desolate part of northwest Texas that had little more than an attitude and a few oil field pumps. I was with my great aunt and great uncle because the gift of adoption.

My great aunt told me there was something so special about little children that the Lord himself said that if we don’t become like them we would not enter his kingdom. I spent years trying to figure out what could possibly have been meant by that. I’m a schoolteacher and I’ve taught elementary, middle school, and high school, and I’m a parent of three kids myself. I have to say, knowing kids, I’m not sure exactly what Jesus was getting at. Seriously though, I love kids, though I know sometimes we all have our more difficult moments.

The story of Jesus and the little children contains the great lesson that we are to depend on God as our heavenly parent in the same way that a little baby depends on his or her mom or dad—or even aunts and uncles or grandparents—to provide everything. In the same way, God, our heavenly parent, provides everything for us. We are like little children—babies—held in the arms of the living God.

From the storehouse of creation God gives us enough for today and some for tomorrow. The story of Jesus and the children, if we delve into it and meditate upon it, also teaches us of the reciprocity inherent in our relationship the Divine. We too are to give to others completely and fully, even sacrificially. This is an important thing for spouses to consider, especially when marriage presents its trials.

I’ve been married for almost 20 years and I have a good marriage. I love my wife, but I would be a liar if I said that there had never been any time of difficulty. Marriage takes hard work, and sometimes it might even seem a bit like suffering—sometimes, in some of our lives, the suffering is real and tragic no doubt—but thankfully for most of us, given the right effort, marriage can become the greatest of all blessings. Here I believe it is important to realize the non-judgmental nature of grace. No one should be daunted because of the failure of a marriage. Again, in God there is fullness of grace.

Those of us who have children know how joyful it is to be parents, but we also admit that suffering can part of parenthood too. Often it’s out of our hands. There may be suffering because of disease or disability, or just because life with kids brings challenges our way. We look at our children and to them too we say, “You are bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh…what happens to you happens to me.” The eternal breath of life that is the source of all that is and all that will ever be, the eternal, invisible, ineffable name, also desired throughout time to say to us, “You are bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh.”

Jesus’ life is one that restores the original connection between God and us. Jesus mends the unlawful divorce that had occurred between humanity and our source. The mending took pain. We know all too well the events of the Passion, but through it that relationship which was broken was healed and restored. God now invites us on this sixth day to enter into the Sabbath rest.

Jesus is the one about whom the eternal and holy God can say, “This my flesh and bone; my body and my blood.” By Jesus’ humanity, which he shares as one of us, we become known to God. We become the children of the one who made all things, and that one now says to us “You are mine now, and I feel what you feel. We are of one body”

The creator invites us to commune with each other and with all that God is and with all that God has made. We are invited to participate in a reestablished relationship, a new original ecology with the breath of life that flows in all things, and in an irrevocable new covenant with God. The relationship we hold is one that no law, no power, no force on earth, can ever eradicate—there is no place for fear at all—for we are married to our maker forever.

Trinity Sunday: Revealing Jesus From Every Angle

Each year on the Sunday after Pentecost we celebrate the Solemnity of the Trinity.  It’s a good time to recall what’s most essential about our faith as Christians.

Aside from elementary religious education lessons involving clover leafs, apples, and water in its three states, whenever I try to visualize the Trinity, one of the first images that come to mind is a medieval Russian icon called “The Hospitality of Abraham.”  It depicts three pretty much identical looking angels sitting down to the dinner prepared for them by the patriarch.  This image has come to be known as the “Trinity Icon.”  The icon has its appeal because it expresses a basic truth about our Christian faith.  Everything that we know about God comes to us by way of Jesus.  He is the concrete expression within history of that which is infinite and which our minds and senses cannot grasp.  Regardless of the angle from which we look, what we see of God comes to us by way of Jesus.

The doctrine of the Trinity, implied in scripture and taught explicitly by the Church, has come to be the traditional measure of orthodoxy for almost all who claim to be Christian.  It has come to stand for what is normative in our beliefs.  Because of this, Trinity Sunday provides us a good opportunity to consider what should be normative in the way that we live our faith, in the way that we follow Jesus who reveals God to us.

So we might ask what it is as believers we ought to present to the world.  What best reveals Jesus?

For starters the Christian faith ought to be a force that makes positive changes in the world in which we live.  After all, isn’t transformation the promise of the Resurrection?  Did God not transform death into life?  Therefore our faith should be about sharing positive confidence that there is something that has the power to make life really worth living.

As Christians we are to offer hope to the world, and we ought to do it securely and without fear.  The reading from the book of Romans tells us that we did not receive a spirit of slavery to fall back into fear.  The real basis for hope in the world lies in our willingness to form relationships.  It’s pretty typical to hear something about relationships on Trinity Sunday—relationship is one the ways that we’re taught to try and grasp this difficult concept.  Yet with the focus on Jesus the difficulty disappears and we try to show the world the face of God he showed us.

For Christians relationship is normative, but it has to challenge us or we've failed to get the idea really.  Relationship is Christian when it causes us to embrace our neighbor who is different from us.  It best reflects Jesus when we reach out with genuine affection to the weak and vulnerable, to those whom we encounter who put us in tolerance mode, and to those who we might consider to be our enemies.

What’s normative in Christianity is that which compels us to do the unexpected.  In acting in such a way we reveal the transformation that witnesses to the indwelling of the Holy Spirit and the presence of the risen Lord.  To do the unexpected means to turn away from selfish acts and consider the needs of our neighbors first.  It demands that we act in a selfless manner when it comes to relating to our neighbor.  It asks us to reach out across cultural, linguistic, religious, political and economic lines, and to embrace others.  In this way we begin to establish lasting peace in the world: we give the world something truly unexpected.

The Lord commanded his disciples to go out and baptize.  It’s by our baptism that we receive the call and the grace to live in a way that transforms the world.  By baptism we are empowered and we strive to live the Trinitarian life.  For us this is a call to be mindful that we are to live in such a way that regardless of what angle the world sees us, that in us and through our actions, they see the face of Jesus.  Our call is to be a Trinity icon by revealing God in how we live and in how we relate to all others.

Sunday Homily: The Faith of a Parent

Each year during Lent we look ahead to what lies at the end of the 40 days.  Easter stands as the destination or the culmination of the Lenten journey.  On the way there Lent reminds us that in this life, where we sometimes stumble and wander, our ultimate destination is the glory of the Resurrection.

However, in an indirect way today’s scripture reminds us that in order to experience the Resurrection, we must first experience Good Friday. It’s not so much that we are guilty of overlooking Good Friday either.  The opposite is true.  The suffering of Jesus is not something that escapes our attention during Lent.

I know—without a doubt—that each Lent, year after year, we look at the events of the Passion from the perspective of Christ’s sufferings.  However, what today’s scripture does is allow us to look at the passion of Jesus from the viewpoint of a parent.

We have a peculiar story from the first reading today that most of us recognize when we hear, but we may have not spent much time considering what it might mean to us.   God tells Abraham to take his beloved son and offering him up as a sacrifice.  In the story we learn that God didn’t intend for Abraham to kill his son but was a test of Abraham’s faith or commitment to the Lord.  It’s hard for a parent to imagine himself or herself in the shoes of Abraham; however, the deeper importance of the story isn’t so much about Abraham’s test of faith as it a prefiguring of God the Father’s sacrifice of his only Son.

In the gospel we have the wonderful story of the Transfiguration of Lord on the mountain.  Again, it might be easy to lose sight of the import of the story.  It is one that has the power to dazzle.  It easily inspires the religious and artistic imagination, but overall one sentence stands out: “This is my beloved Son.”

Jesus and his faithful disciples journey to the mountaintop in the style of Abraham with Isaac and the voice of God pronounces, “This is my Son.”  God shows the willingness that he asked of Abraham, only this time—in something that resembles a plot twist—he doesn’t so much test the faithfulness of those who had journeyed to the mountaintop as he shows his faithfulness toward humanity whom he loves so much that he was willing to offer up his only Son that we, also his children, might live.

I believe that God wants us to be imitators of his actions.  In doing so we show our commitment and we learn faithfulness.  Of course it isn’t that anyone is asked to give a child as an offering, but God does ask us to be true givers from the heart, an to give in such a way that it reflects a true sacrifice.  During Lent we have an opportunity, though it exists year round, to ask what faith really consists of.  Faith, on a deep level, is to do what God asks of us, and to do what God does.  God asked Abraham to give in faith, and God gives faithfully.  Likewise God asks us to be faithful givers.

Faith might mean different things to different people, but it always involves some kind of action or exchange whether we consider it to be “giving up something” in Lenten fashion, or the “giving of something.”  For some it might mean giving up or offering something material.  For others it might mean participating in some kind of spiritual activity.  Whatever we choose to give—or to do—it better approximates the meaning of faith when the value of the thing given or done is great.  We have to look at the world in which we live and ask what it needs most, and in order to give in true faith we may find that we are called upon to offer something not easy to give or to let go of.  We may find that we need to give in the same way that a loving parent offers his or her whole life for the benefit of their beloved child.

Sometimes when we read in the news of the decline of faith in the world it may seem disappointing or discouraging.  All that we really need is to remember what faith really is and how that might differ from commonly held ideas.  Isn’t real faith the ability of the human heart to rise to the toughest occasions, to show courage, and to believe that every obstacle can be overcome?  Isn’t faith that which believes that it can change the world by what we do and give?

Faith accomplishes much, but one thing it never does is to give up hope.  Having faith means that we behave like a parent who refuses to give up hope for a child. When we feel the temptation to have doubt or be in despair we have to keep in mind that what’s needed most is the kind of faith that finds solutions in action, goes to any length, and believes that nothing is ever impossible.  To act in faith we ask ourselves what we have that we may give, and then we offer it as if it were given to a child whom we cherish most.

From Drudgery to Grace

It may come as something of a challenge to connect the positive message of Christian faith with a scriptural reading like the one we have in the Book of Job today.  Job asks, “Is not man’s life on earth a drudgery?”  We all may have been tempted at some time—when facing the challenges of day-to-day work, or the threat of burn out—to feel exactly the same way.  All work and no play.  Right?  “Please Deacon,” you may say, “don’t set the tone for the week.  I had planned on taking it easy!”

Job, in asking his question, establishes something of a baseline for seeing things from more than one point of view.  From Job’s vantage point we see life in light of humanity fallen from grace.  The Catechism of the Church teaches us that originally our daily work was not a burden, “but rather the collaboration of man and woman with God in perfecting the visible creation.”

The Christian faith allows us to see everything from the point of view of life having been transformed; that is, from a view that differs from the reality of fallen humanity. Indeed Christ has the power to redeem work along with everything else in the world.  Through his transforming grace, work—rather than remaining drudgery—becomes what God intended it to be from the start: collaboration between humanity and God.

One of my relatives recently posted a quote on Facebook: “Life is not really a useless endeavor, but it might be liberating to give in to that orientation: Especially when faced with the enormity and the majesty of why we are really here.”  He told me that I might not want to cite his source (Norman Mailer).  I told him that I once quoted Woody Allen at a wedding.

In both the readings from First Corinthians and the Gospel of Mark today there is a strong sense of obligation, duty, responsibility, and stewardship—“for this purpose I have come,” Jesus says speaking of his own call or purpose.  Most of us probably can relate to the idea of obligation.  In my work as a deacon, and away from the parish as special education teacher, I have often reflected on duty and obligation, and on my lot in life, though not so much in terms of it being my sole purpose—especially on difficult days.  However, I do believe that in terms of Christianity purpose does play heavily as does the aforementioned ideas of duty, obligation, and responsibility.  They’re the true stuff of Christian ethics.

In Christ human labor is transformed by grace and humanity becomes a partner with God in work.  I think it would probably be a mistake to consider this as relating to our particular jobs only—say teacher, homemaker, engineer, or manager, whatever it might be that we do each day—and just stop there.  There’s something more about work and purpose that we should consider. 

The apostle Paul talks about himself being a slave to all.  The only reason one might consider becoming a slave is to set slaves free.  It’s hard, or at least it is for me, to take the image of slavery lightly.  Slavery plays heavily in American cultural memory—it hasn’t really been that long ago—and it may come as a surprise to some that slavery is still an issue in our world today, but it’s true.  Even in our own country slavery is a reality through certain kinds of forced prostitution and pornography.  In other places in the world forced labor is still a reality.  I believe Paul knew that the only way to break the strongholds of the world was to place himself totally in the service of building a new world through grace.

Sometimes we make the mistake spiritualizing the idea of God’s transformation so that we think it only pertains to our inner lives.  In the case of the idea of God transforming work it might be easy to say, “So okay, God has transformed my work.  That’s nice to know—I can pray about it— but I still have to put in my hours and on many days it still seems like the same old same old.”  I personally try to avoid thinking of my work as drudgery, but we all do it at times.  Just out of practicality, perhaps we should work to find out what makes our work seem that way and attempt to improve it, whether we’re talking about tons of paperwork or difficult interpersonal relationships.

The truth is that the pain and drudgery of the fallen world we hear about in Job is still an existing reality.  As Christians we have the duty and obligation to meet the fallen world with grace infused into our actions.  Our Christian ethics go beyond the merely personal things we experience.  The world is larger than we think.  In a foremost way Christian ethics demand that we address the social injustices that exist in the world outside ourselves, injustices like true human bondage, and regardless of whether it is the evil of a certain a certain kind of slavery, or the kind of business and economic practices that put material gain above the needs of the least among us, we as Christians have an obligation to act.

Our obligation, our duty and service, only begins by considering the fact that for many people daily life is not filled with freedom and grace.  Our true obligation is to be bringers of grace, healing, and reconciliation where the need is greatest.  If we truly believe that Christ transforms our work from burden and drudgery into the original collaboration that existed between men and women with God, then to bring it about we have to be the active agents in this collaboration.  We must discover Christ’s activity in the world—his purpose in the world—and actually work alongside him in the things that he does.

True Christian action in the world, true responsibility, is not about withdrawing from the world; far from that, it’s about stepping up to the real duty that sees as its object humanity that suffers from injustice and the absence of the grace that we have been given to share.  It is nothing less than the majesty of why we are really here.

New Year's Homily: Being Blessing

We begin the year with a blessing, and whether it is a coincidence from the lectionary, or something planned, what better day is there to receive a blessing than the first day of the New Year?

The Lord Bless you and keep you! The Lord let his face shine upon you and be gracious to you! The Lord look upon you kindly and give you peace!

So we start the year not only with a blessing, but with something of an invitation to look back on the past year and consider where our blessings have been. Perhaps we consider the blessing of being with family at Christmastime. We might also consider other blessings. Perhaps there was a wedding last year, or maybe a new baby came into the family.

Following along with scripture we consider the blessing that is Mary’s baby. We might also be inclined to consider the theological blessing, of which St. Paul writes to the Galatians: “When the fullness of time had come, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under the law, to ransom those under the law…”

On this Solemnity of Mary, who we call God-bearer or the Mother of God, we consider the blessing that she received, and we might pause to bear in mind how this blessing must have seemed. A young woman, still a teenage girl, pregnant without being married, gives birth--barely indoors--and exhausted from labor she puts her baby to sleep in a feed trough because there was no other place to lay him down besides the ground strewn with straw and dung. 

The first witnesses, we are told, were the shepherds. In those days there wasn’t much romance in being a shepherd. Being a shepherd probably carried something of a social stigma. Shepherds were on the bottom rung of life; they were the ones below all others. Yet God chose to reveal the glory of the angels to the poor shepherds. God chose, in the miracle of incarnation, to be born to a young teenage couple who were the talk of the town in a very negative way. God chose the poverty of a stable and a feed trough to reveal blessing.

As we move into the New Year our eyes turn to the future. I’d like it to be a year of blessing for myself and my family. I want my children to do well in school. I want a year filled with health and happiness for my wife and me. I’d like to have successes at work, and I pray for the blessing of a mild summer with plentiful rain. I have my New Year’s resolution list and a positive attitude. Still, I realize that for others the future might not seem to have much hope at all. Others are entering the year with sadness. For many there is no cause to be positive. Others are entering the year with poverty, hunger, and violence.  Where is the blessing for them?

I recently read an article from a professor who works at a Christian university here in Texas. He says that he often hears from students who say they feel as if they need to work on their relationship with God. They believe they need to spend more time in prayer and reflection. He says he likes to direct them instead to work on their relationships with other people. He says that too often we get taken in by a bait and switch and go after any number of so-called “spiritual” substitutes to bring ourselves closer to God rather than doing so by working on just being a decent human being to others.

The point that I take from this is to ask myself how I can bring about blessing to those who seem to have so little of it in their lives. Really, when I consider it, I realize that it’s too big for me to do alone.  I have to join with others to bring blessing into the world, but the decision to do it has to start with each one of us personally. We have to act ourselves; we have to focus, and we have to usher in the blessing for others. I think soon we will find ourselves joined by others or joining with them to bring about true blessing.

In our world today there are others with whom we must stand. It’s likely that we won’t have much in common with them. They’ll be different from us in many ways: maybe in language, color, religion, disability, or in their economic status. For them life has not been a blessing, but we, as Christians, as people of God, are the ones who are called to be the bringers of blessing.

Blessing involves a transformation, both within ourselves and one that we enact upon the world. To be a part of the blessing above all other blessings we go to the teenage parents, Mary and Joseph in the stable with the poor and outcast shepherds, and we stand and gaze upon the hope of the world lying in a feed trough.