2nd Sunday of Easter - Divine Mercy - Saints: the goal of the Church

This weekend the entire Catholic Church rejoices as Pope Francis declares two of his recent predecessors to be saints: Angelo Roncalli, who as Pope took the name of John XXIII and shocked the world by declaring the Second Vatican Council, a sign that his hope for the church and for the world was not shattered despite the dark and scary times he lived through in WWII and even of his papacy (most notably the Cold War and nuclear threats); and Karol Wojtyla, who over so many years as Pope John Paul II did many great things, perhaps the greatest being his travels around the world (enough to go to the moon three times) because they created such a strong unity in the church. These men are saints, they weren't perfect. But with God's help they were strengthened to overcome their weaknesses. This is what the Church is meant to be about: making its people to be saints, to overcome the disease of selfishness and concupiscence.

Every year during the Easter Season we hear from Acts of the Apostles, because the life of the early church is meant to be a model for us: this is what we are supposed to be! And today, Acts summarizes for us of the early church understood themselves and lived their baptism. While this whole passage is something we should reflect on, I want to focus especially on the first verse: They devoted themselves to the teaching of the apostles and to the communal life, to the breaking of bread and to the prayers. I would argue that these four things signify the fullness of the Christian life. The meaning of life is hidden within these four things: it is only within them, lived to the full, that we truly alive in divine life that God wants to give us! If someone, although nominally Catholic, is not participating in one of these areas, they are not truly living the Catholic faith. For example, if someone were to say “I am Catholic, I go to Church, but I don't listen to the pope,” then they are missing something: The teaching of the apostles.
And if they said “I am Catholic, I do everything the pope says, but I don't go to Church that often,” or “I don't really go to Confession” then they don't understand The breaking of the bread, code language for the Eucharist, and for today I roll in all the other sacraments, too!

What if you did those things but tried to just live in your own little world, never getting involved at all in the parish or the diocesan initiatives? You are missing The communal life. You can't be a Catholic and a loner, a solo-spiritualist.

And even if you did all those things but had no prayer life whatsoever outside of Sunday Mass? Then you aren't truly what Catholics are supposed to be, for the early church was devoted to The prayers. Spiritual development and personal prayer, drawn from the relationship we find in the Our Father, is essential to Catholic life. God wants this of you.

(1st Communion Mass) My dear children, today you most perfectly participate in the Holy Mass: through your reception of the Holy Eucharist. This mystery is now a part of your life, but that does not mean it is something that you fully understand. None of us ever completely understand it in this life!

Homily 4-20-2014 Easter Sunday - Peter and Paul

Pope Francis calls us to be missionary disciples, saying that every disciple has to be missionary.  In today's readings, we see two examples of such disciples in Saints Peter and Paul (who by the way are the two patrons of the Petrine ministry, since they both died for Christ in the city of Rome).  While these readings speak very powerfully of our Lord's Resurrection,  it might be helpful to reflect on them in their chronological order.  We start, then, in the Gospel, with Our Lord's empty tomb.  Just before today's section, Christ came and spoke to Mary Magdalene, someone who in the eyes of the world is little but is truly great and powerful because of her love for Jesus (seen especially in her faithfulness at the cross).  Mary brings that news to Peter, the Lord's first disciple and the representative leader of the Christian community.  Running to the tomb with the Beloved Disciple (John), Peter goes in the tomb and finds only cloths.  He is baffled, while the other disciple believes.
Then we can flash forward to Peter's Pentecost sermon, his bold proclamation as presented in the Acts of the Apostles.  Something has clearly changed in Peter.  Now he gets it.  What has happened?  The Lord has appeared to Simon, and to the other disciples, has spent 40 days with them, ascended to heaven, and sent the Holy Spirit upon them to drive them forth as witnesses to the Resurrection.
Three things outline the time Jesus spends with them accoring to Luke in Acts: he appears to them, he speaks to them, and he eats with them.  All three of these are essential to strengthening their faith that Jesus' Resurrection is absolutely real, so real that they will eventually speak with the boldness that Peter speaks today, that they will travel the world making disciples of all nations, and that they will all save John suffer death for Christ.  Appearing to them, Jesus shows himself as the same person (the wounds are there) but as now experiencing life on a different pitch (he will no longer die and can walk through walls).  Speaking to them, Jesus supports their faith, prepares them for their mission, and helps them to see the meaning of the scriptures (remember today's Gospel ends with “For they did not yet understand the Scripture that he had to rise from the dead.”  Eating with them, the Lord binds Himself to them forever, re-affirming the covenant in His Blood that he established at the Last Supper on Holy Thursday.  This is why Peter can proclaim so boldly today.  His words will ring with importance for every time and place, and they are words we should let speak anew to our own heart.
Lastly we have Saint Paul, who today speaks of yeast and “the feast,” referring to the new Passover of Christ, the Lamb of God who has won forgiveness for our sins.  Paul asks, “Do you not know that a little yeast leavens all the dough? Clear out the old yeast, so that you may become a fresh batch of dough.”  Paul is saying that in Christ, who has risen from the dead, we ourselves are also transformed, since we have been united to Him in our Baptism.  The “old yeast” refers to sin and to the ways of the world that is passing away.  Let Jesus make you from scratch!  This is exactly what He did to St. Paul, who was transformed from the great persecutor of the Church into its most powerful witness to the Gentiles.  Jesus did this to 17 people last night at our Easter Vigil, and he did it to all of us through our Baptism.
But what does that mean for us?  This is exactly what the Easter Season is about: living the meaning of the Paschal Triduum more fully.  For the next 50 days, we celebrate our Lord's Resurrection and let Jesus encounter us in three ways, the same three ways that he did with the original disciples.  First, Jesus appears to us in the Christian community, for he said “where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them.”  Secondly, Jesus speaks to us in two ways: in our personal prayer lives, for he said, “Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, [then] I will enter his house and dine with him, and he with me.” and in Sacred Scripture, for the Word of the Lord is none other than Jesus, so that Saint Jerome can say “ignorance of Scripture is ignorance of Christ.”  Finally, the Lord Jesus encounters us from this altar, where the sacrifice of Calvary is represented in the new and eternal covenant as He established at the Last Supper and lived those 40 days before returning to the Father.  In the Eucharist, we receive the Risen Body of our Lord Jesus, indeed that is the only Body of Christ there is to receive.  In this gift, as we are drawn into Him and united to each other through Him, let us beg of him to be witnesses like Saints Peter and Paul.

Good Friday Homily

It's been hard to find the right words for this homily today. Things too deep for words have been flooding my mind and my heart, not the least of which is my grandmother's passing. Today is a weird and strange day for many reasons. First, it's the only day I preach without shoes on. It's nice weather but we can't enjoy it like we could on Sunday. The tabernacle is empty. We genuflect to a piece of wood. But even stranger is this: today is not a Mass. We priests do not offer the Eucharistic prayer, we do not consecrate new hosts. In fact, Mass is not allowed at all today. Outside of danger of death, the only sacraments we can offer today are confession and Anointing of the Sick. Why is that? Why do the sacraments stop today? I think because we need to remember the source of all those sacraments, because the source of the Mass's power, the offering of the high priest Jesus Christ himself is today offered in the heavens before God the Father face-to-face. Because today the world was changed forever.

John remembers that today's account finishes in a garden. This garden, where so much life grows, is right now a place of death: the seed is planted but has yet to sprout. John recalls this truth for a reason: the events of this garden will heal the events of another garden, at the other end of salvation history. In the Garden of Eden our irreconcilable plight arises: human beings, created to have a relationship with God, have forfeited it by sin, have severed it. When Adam & Eve grasp at the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, we creatures commit an offense that is beyond our remedy to heal: an offense against God, the infinite and eternal, is something for which we can never atone. And this offense is repeated in every one of our hearts, expecting our sorrowful mother Mary. We all have deprived ourselves of the glory of God (Ps. 52). So God's remedy is Jesus, God in human flesh: the one called the Lamb of God, symbolized by the Passover Lamb sacrificed this day at 3-o'-clock, and foretold by Isaiah the prophet. through his suffering, my servant shall justify many, and their guilt he shall bear.

Pope Benedict (Jesus of Nazareth, Part 2): Again and again in the world, truth and error, truth and untruth, are almost inseparably mixed together. The Truth [God Himself] in all its grandeur and purity does not appear. The world is “true” to the extend that it reflects God: the creative logic, the eternal reason that brought it to birth. And it becomes more and more true the closer it draws to God. Man becomes true, he becomes himself, when he grows in God's likeness. And God's likeness, rather, His very essence, is manifest in the Cross. Here we see that God Himself is love that loves to the end, purely and completely, with no hint of selfishness holding anything back for Himself.

The power of the cross hits us squarely in between the eyes in this way: we realize how great is God's love, and how short and faltering is our response. Saint Francis used to summarize the Cross, and indeed the whole Gospel in these few words, “Love is not loved!” This is what strikes our hearts today. Here today we mourn our failures. We mourn what sin does. We look at it for all the filth that it is and we begin to find healing by growing to hate sin, hate its consequences. And at the same time we find hope. We find hope in the fact that a God who created us out of love finds a way to redeem us; that the garden of sin turns into the garden of salvation; that we who have sinned through stealing a tree's fruit are now offered the pure fruit of Our Lord's body on this tree of the cross; that we who forfeited the tree of life are welcomed to the tree of eternal life in the cross. And especially for me today, hope that my grandma who suffered through the longest Lent of her life, is now finally at peace after carrying her cross to the end.

Today we kiss the body of our King, enthroned on a cross. As we look at the Lamb of God, and see the horror of sin mingled with the fulness of God's love, we find the healing for which the world has always longed. Before this one and only source of salvation, let us lay our burdens. We cry out as Christ did with the pains of our families, the sufferings of the poor and abandoned, the abused and cheated, and of the entire world. It is here alone they can be answered, here alone where pain turns to hope.

Homily 4-13-2014 Palm Sunday (A): Hosanna to the King, the Son of David

 Today we processed into the Church crying “Hosanna, Hosanna to the Son of David!” This cry echoes the words of the crowd that joyously welcomed Our Lord Jesus into Jerusalem, riding on a simple donkey with a small crowd of simpletons as disciples. Certainly this is not the King we expect when we think of the Most High God, exalted above all the earth! And yet our Lord shows his humility in this entrance, performed not because he feeds off the praise of the masses, but because He wants to fulfill His Father's Will, to drink from the cup, even if it means the cup of suffering. And how quickly the suffering comes, and how quickly the crowds turn. And perhaps most painfully for Our Lord, how quickly those closest to Him abandon Him. I can only imagine that when He looks from the cross for those three hours, he certainly noticed that practically all of them were scattered and nowhere to be found.

Pope Francis, as the Roman Pontiff, the Vicar of Christ on earth, sometimes relives very poignantly the mysteries of Our Lord's life. In these days when the masses of our world, the raucous crowd of our time is praising the Pope for his witness, indeed a good one, I can't help but think that they are very often misunderstanding him just as the mobs misunderstood Jesus. They wave their palms today in praise, but will they soon turn to yell out “crucify him”? Like Jesus, Pope Francis does not enjoy public opinion for its own sake, but only if it is the Father's will, and I expect Him, like many popes before him, to be a sign of contradiction, a man of mixed reception.

When the masses abandon our Pope, when the crowds cry out against the Church, and when the mobs demand Jesus' life, where will we be? It is easy to sing “Hosanna” when everyone else does, but will we still be there at the end? Let us try to be faithful. And also, as Pope Francis asks of us (and shows us with his very life), let us be missionary disciples, those who witness to Christ at all times, especially by our humility, our mercy, our love. These palm branches are signs that we make Jesus our King. I challenge you to carry these around with you. In your pockets, etc. Make a cross of them if you wish. Use them as missionary tools, as methods of evangelization. Help others to see Jesus the King, your king, by your life. And do not abandon Him when the road becomes difficult, for then is your greatest chance to testify to the God who loves us with such deep love.

Homily: Sunday 4/6/2014 The weeping Jesus. What life are we living for?

The weeping Jesus.
Why does Jesus cry passionately in today's Gospel? Jn. 11:35 Jesus wept. It is the shortest verse of the entire Bible.
Jesus chooses to weep, just as He chooses to go back to Jerusalem. But also just as He chooses to wait 4 days. This seems like a peculiar choice, but the reason Our Lord gives is “that you [His disciples] may believe.” Just like in last week's story, the man was born blind “so that the works of God might be made visible through him.”
So Jesus chooses to let his friend die, so that he can model His own Resurrection, which this foreshadows. Remember, Jesus brings three people back to life in the scriptures: the 12-year old girl, the widow's son, and Lazarus. This is not the same as His Resurrection, because those people will die again. They have been given back their earthly “life” (Greek bios) and not any particular divine life (Grk. Zoe).
So if Jesus chose this, then why does He choose to weep? I think for two reasons. First, because God has pity on humanity. He hurts when we hurt, even if it is ultimately for our good. God sees us suffering and, because He is love, He hurts with us. This is proof that God is not some tyrant out to get us, but is moved by our pain, moved by His love for us.
The second reason is I think more important. Jesus weeps because he feels kind of distraught at our lack of faith in Him. Just like that woman in the well who wants “living water” only to satisfy her earthly needs so she can feel safe and secure; just like the Hebrews in the desert who would rather worship a golden calf than the God who is intimidating because they cannot control him, or would rather rot in Egypt than take the hard road to the Promised Land; just like those Israelites of Ezekiel's time who lament in Babylon that their lives are just dead, dry bones, so also the people closest to Jesus don't understand Him: they struggle to find the faith that overcomes death. Except for Martha and Mary, they give death a greater power than Christ.
Death is a kind of gift, a strange gift. God offers it to us as a remedy. It is part of a solution to the deep problem of our fallen world that needs to be re-made: our sinfulness that needs to be ripped out of our human nature. Death is required for this, because we cannot be reborn until we die. Death is something we all have to face. It scares us because it demands everything, all at once. Death symbolizes all the little sacrifices of this life and is greater than all those sacrifices combined. But is it the greatest power in this universe? No! Jesus is the “resurrection and the life” and from Him alone do we find a solid foundation. God swallows up death in victory, so that when it comes upon us and those we love, although it strips us bare of all our false comforts and even brings crashing down the false houses we build, we find ourselves in one piece, because the shepherd of our souls will never abandon us, and because He has made this journey Himself and makes it with us.
Jesus weeps because we focus more on bios than on zoe. We care more about earthly life than divine life, more about physical death than about the spiritual death that sin can cause in us. We so quickly forget that Christ is “the resurrection and the life.” We so often ignore heaven because life on earth can be horrible, as if the pain suffered in this short life makes the eternal happiness of the next to be nothing. I am certain that the saints themselves had to suffer pain; they had crosses; and they died - every one of them. I am also certain they were (and are) the happiest people to walk this earth, and they who lived every moment with heaven in their eyes also did the greatest good for their fellow man on this earth. Let us ask our Lord, who as already won the victory for us, for the courage to live for our heavenly life and not focus on our earthly life.