Homily - Sunday March 2, 2014 - - - Trusting God in the Deep End

Today we are reminded about trust. Trust in general in the first reading; trust that God's judgment is more accurate than others' in the second reading, and trust in God's providence for our needs in the Gospel. Trust is the foundation of healthy relationships. This goes for marriages, for parenting, for friendships,...even for the workplace. If we are afraid or unsure of another person, we cannot have a good relationship because we will never be honest about ourselves with them.

Adam and Eve lost their trust in God and that is why they sinned: Catechism #397 "Man, tempted by the devil, let his trust in his creator die in his heart and, abusing his freedom, disobeyed God's command. This is what man's first sin consisted of. Also sequence and would-be disobedience toward God and lack of trust in his goodness."

(Confirmation: as you guys grow up and prepared to become adults, you need to remember that there are some things about which you must always be childlike, some lessons that need to remain with you forever.)

A great image of trust is a child jumping into his or her father's arms. When I was growing up we would always have a summer visit to a lake or two. The youngest kids in their floatation devices or the ones learning to swim would sometimes be nervous about jumping to dad, mom, or an older sibling. Their level of trust was written all over them. You can just see the difference in their eyes, in their body language, in their voices, and you knew which ones were having a really hard time with it because they were scared, even big-time scared. The funny thing is, did that make the situation more or less objectively dangerous? No! My mom or my dad had just as much love for one of them as for the other, and there would be no problems, but they couldn't see it, they couldn't feel that love at that moment. All they saw was the dark water, not the loving parent within the water, in a sense conquering it.

Adults live in fear a lot, too. Fr. Barron's podcast for this weekend said that the 3 largest buildings in Chicago are owned by life insurance companies. That's fear. And how do we work against that fear of the dark water of unknown tragedy? We give money in the promise of receiving more. Because those green bills that say “In God We Trust” are somehow going to be the things that save us from pain, from death, from sin, and from loneliness. No one can serve two masters – stewardship in any form (but especially in this campaign we are embarking on) is essential for us. If we trust God, we will show it in our actions. We have to activate our faith.
My grandma is dying happy, at peace, with full trust in God. She has been making acts of faith all her life, so now she is ready and happy to go to the God she knows and loves. Grandma is not afraid of the deep end of life. She knows who is there in that water, conquering it: it's the Lord Jesus Christ whose image she moved to right in front of her death bed. “It gives me so much peace,” she said on Friday.
I am more and more convinced that the deepest wound of our world, especially of our youth who so easily and seemingly unexpectedly can slide into despair, is the lack of awareness that they are so deeply and irrevocably loved by God. They don't know that God loves them, that he's here in their life, that he cares about them and provides for them. They don't know how to see it; they don't feel it; they have forgotten how to experience it. They need to be shown it! Who is failing to teach them, remind them, help them! Perhaps we need to start here in our work as missionary disciples: tell them directly and clearly: "I know that God loves you, and that cross is proof!"

In a sense, I as a priest have given my whole life for this very purpose. But all of us, no matter what state in life we are, no matter our age or our knowledge of the faith, can manifest and show this love of Christ from his Sacred Heart through our own to those who are hurting.  May that Sacred Heart fill us with His love, help us to have trust (have faith), and share that love with one wounded soul this week.

Homily 2-16-2014 "Forever" and Marriage

 Sirach tells us today: If you choose you can keep the commandments, they will save you; if you trust in God, you too shall live. This is a good summary of the call to conversion that we hear every Sunday in one way or another. In our hearts we hear God wake us up and show us what we were made to be.

Do not murder, nor adulterate, nor divorce, nor lie. These commandments in today's Gospel are good starting points, and if you keep them (which means to let them thrive in your heart and in your actions), then you will live. Jesus takes that foundation and ups the ante today, when he demands a righteousness that surpasses that of the scribes and the Pharisees (those most upright people of His time). He shows us what we are truly called to.... and points out a funny thing about our fallen human nature: if we don't try for the best, we don't get very far. We have to go for it all as Christ calls us to, or we won't even make the minimum that the commandments demand of us.

It's National Marriage week, and the Holy Father met on Friday with 10,000 of engaged couples for a special audience in honor of the love celebrated on Valentine's Day. He was asked many questions, and one that was most important to me was about the fear of “forever.” This to me is a foundational crisis we all go through: how can someone be certain and make a perpetual commitment that steers their entire life? Fear of “forever” is the start of our vocation crisis, whether it be marriage, priesthood, or a life of faith in general – if we live in fear, we will never go “all in.” Pope Francis' answer was “forever” is built day-by-day, and is built up like a house, stone upon stone, board upon board.

My grandma is slowly passing from this earth, resigning herself to the cancer that has ravaged her energy and her appetite (but Thanks be to God, no pain). I went home and on Thursday I celebrated Mass at her bedside with grandpa, just the three of us on a makeshift altar. Right behind grandma hangs the photograph of them leaving Church on their wedding day. Afterwards, we talked for five minutes and she was thinking back to times when she was a child, showing me the miraculous medal she has worn since she was about 15. I squeezed her hand a little and she squeezed back, saying, “how did you know that? Who told you that?” I said, “Told me what?” “Me and your grandpa have been doing that for years.” And squeezing my hand three times she said, “I...Love...You.” and then four times for “I Love You, Too.” Then her exhaustion forced her to rest again. Little things, that's what builds up to “forever.” So don't be afraid of forever, just build it up day-by-day.

Say “yes” for today. Let our yes be yes and our no be no. Jesus is all yes. The cross shows us that God is not afraid of loving us forever. The Eucharist is the source of our strength to make that same commitment to our world and to each other. In our marriages we make a forever “yes” to another. In my priesthood I made a forever “yes” to Jesus and to you, His Bride, the Church. And this month, the Lord is calling our parish to make a kind of “yes” also to this campaign for our future, a “yes” built up day-by-day and founded on the “yes” that Jesus is for us. I now invite parishioner Jack Ruhe to come to the cantor stand and share his experience of responding generously to Christ's “yes” through his life. Thank you, Jack.

Homily 2-2-2014 Light in the Darkness

Today I want to quickly give you something to reflect on.  One of the questions every person must answer is this: What is the point of pain and suffering?  Is life just hard sometimes?  Why do we have to endure such trials?
The Blessed Mother today is promised to undergo suffering.  Some promise, huh?  If someone came up to me and simply said, "You've got yourself a long and ugly road ahead," then my response would probably be "Wow, thanks a lot!"  But Mary doesn't flinch, she only treasures these words in her heart and looks to her Son.
That's the way we all should address that deep question we have to answer.  Let us look to Mary's Son, who Himself, infinitely more than Mary, didn't deserve to suffer.  But despite that, he freely chose it.  And for this we give thanks, because we know we do not suffer alone.
One year ago, my spiritual director, Bishop D'Arcy, who mentored me all my life and especially those first 1.5 years of priesthood, passed away.  I visited him on Feb. 1st, watched Him suffer on his death bed, celebrated Mass with him and my brother and Fr. Bill.  As he clung to a crucifix, we knew that he wasn't suffering for nothing.  He was being purified, as we all are in this life.  I thank God for the witness Bishop D'Arcy was all my life, especially in his last moments.
Today Mary and Joseph come to the Temple, bearing the Son, and giving thanks to the Father.  They thank God for the blessings, for how he works even in the midst of their difficulties.  They are truly a light for us also.
Both in Sacred Scripture and in Church liturgical life, The light of a candle is a very layered image, evoking a wide array of meanings and allusions.  It represents our faith when we are told to at baptism to keep the light burning until the day Christ Jesus' return in glory.  It represents Jesus Himself when at the Easter Vigil we remember that the resurrection is the light that shines in the darkness of human history.  It represents the soul infused by the Holy Spirit just as the tongues of flame hovered over the Apostles at Pentecost.  It represents the truth and goodness of the Christian who is called to be a lamp shining in the world.
As we at St. Pius Parish reflect on how to be a better light to the world with Christ in our hearts, please watch this video in preparation of our parish campaign.  It shows us some of what we are called to be at St. Pius, and what we hope to become more and more as a parish family shining light in the darkness.

Homily 1-26-2014 Incoming Call! Accept??

Gaudium et Spes, section 22, tells us that we get our identity from Christ: The truth is that only in the mystery of the incarnate Word does the mystery of man take on light. For Adam, the first man, was a figure of Him Who was to come,(20) namely Christ the Lord. Christ, the final Adam, by the revelation of the mystery of the Father and His love, fully reveals man to man himself and makes his supreme calling clear.

When Jesus looks at the Apostles today, he doesn't see what they are, He sees what they can be, what they should be, and what they will be if they respond fully to Him. But all He can say is “Repent and believe in the Gospel; the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand; Come and Follow me.” The rest is up to them: CCC 2002 - God's free initiative demands man's free response, for God has created man in his image by conferring on him, along with freedom, the power to know him and love him. The soul only enters freely into the communion of love. God immediately touches and directly moves the heart of man. He has placed in man a longing for truth and goodness that only he can satisfy. The promises of "eternal life" respond, beyond all hope, to this desire...

Were Peter & Andrew, James and John, created to be fishermen? Were they created for more? You have to even wonder how they felt about their work (and how much they knew of Jesus) to just drop it all, leave it all behind and follow. Maybe it's normal for us to sort of hate work when we don't have a higher calling attached to it – Adam was told work would be hard, require sweat. But after following Christ, the work becomes lighter, easier, elevated to something higher.

We see in this Gospel that God calls us in our work. Priests of our own diocese were successful in the world in their own small ways: Dentist. Paintball factory. Businessman. Engineer from Purdue. Rocket Scientist. Notre Dame architecture student. Teacher.

God calls us them because of their heart: Chrys.: It is no small sign of goodness, to bear poverty easily, to live by honest labour, to be bound together by virtue of affection, to keep their poor father with them, and to toil in his service.

An interesting fact of today's calling is that that they were two sets of brothers. I wondered why this was so, particularly because it hits so close to home for me: Jesus called me, and my brother, at about the same time, to be fishers of men, priests. 2,000 years later, He still calls brothers!

Pseudo-Chrys.: He “called them” together, for by their abode they were fellow-townsmen, in affection attached, in profession agreed, and united by brotherly tenderness. He called them then at once, that united by so many common blessings they might not be separated by a separate call.

Brothers, when they get along, are a great sign of unity.  And this is exactly what Saint Paul is trying to stress today in the beginning of his First Letter to the Corinthians: they are breaking up into factions, and are filling up with pride and jealousy, claiming Apollos, or Paul etc. as their "leader."  Paul responds by using the name Jesus Christ ten times in the first ten verses.  We are united, Paul stresses, in Jesus Christ - no one else; nothing else.  Let us pray for that true unity among the entire Body of Christ, among all Christians.

And the way that Christ meets us to unite us is with today's call to conversion, to "repent". CCC 1989 - The first work of the grace of the Holy Spirit is conversion, effecting justification in accordance with Jesus' proclamation at the beginning of the Gospel: "Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand."38 Moved by grace, man turns toward God and away from sin, thus accepting forgiveness and righteousness from on high.

Only if we convert our hearts are we able to be united in Christ Jesus, because only then do we allow ourselves to be transformed into Him, to become what we were created for; what He truly sees we can be.

Every Ash Wednesday we hear these words: “Repent and believe in the Gospel.” Every Sunday in the scriptures, indeed every day of our lives, Jesus calls us again: “Follow me” a little closer, leave behind things a little more completely.

In today’s Eucharist, as we meet Christ, let us abandon our old selves and follow our True Self who unites us by giving His Body and Blood for us.

Our Great Nickname! (Homily 1-19-2014)

If we're not different at all from the world, then we will not make much of a difference in the world.

One of the most important things that makes people unique is their names. We all have names given to us from our parents, and those names in some way show us that we are a person with dignity even before we can possibly earn it, just as God, through our Baptism into Christ Jesus, calls us His children even before we realize that we can never do anything to deserve it. He calls us “beloved.” God calls us.

But throughout out lives, we are called all sorts of other things, too. I'm not only referring to all those sorts of things that one cannot say with propriety (especially not in the middle of a homily), but even to those affectionate and heartfelt nicknames we receive in lifetime. Nicknames which people call us show relationship, such as “mom,” “dad,” “amigo,” “honey,” and whatever other nice things we call each other. But they also can show our personal values: for example, my grandfather was called by the name of his favorite baseball player because he loved the sport and that athlete so much.

Well, today we hear a lot about God giving nicknames to people. Through Isaiah God calls Israel his servant. This servant will later become the suffering servant who dies for the sins of the people. To Saint Paul God calls him to be an “apostle,” one sent ahead to bring a message – the message of Christ Jesus who has turned the world upside down and opened for us a new way to God. Saint Paul tells the people of Corinth that they are called to be holy (or “saints”). And in today's Gospel John the Baptist gives Jesus a nickname of His own: Behold The Lamb of God, Behold Him to takes away the sins of the world. (The word lamb, by the way, is the same word used in Aramaic for a servant, such as Isaiah mentioned in the first reading). John later testifies further that Jesus is the “Son of God.”

These nicknames from God describe more than the personal values of Israel, Paul, the Corinthians, or Jesus. They do not only establish a relationship, though they certainly do that also. What they do most powerfully is they define an identity. This is who this person is at the deepest level. Israel, and all of us with them, are called to be a servant of the living God. Paul, and all of us with him, are called to bear the Good News of Christ to others and live it in our bodies and through our lives. We like the Corinthians are created to become the saints that we know we are not yet.

But what of Christ? we aren't supposed to take away the sins of the world. Although we are adopted into God's family, we cannot be “the Son of God” as Jesus is.

No, but we are meant to bear the light of Christ within us, for we have also received a specific nickname, a calling, a vocation, that defines us at our deepest level. We are called Christians, meaning most literally “one of those people who belong to the Anointed One” (the Messiah). And that says it more perfectly than anything. We belong to Him. We are His, not anyone or anything else's, and throughout the Church year, we learn bit by bit what it means to bear the light of Christ we have received in Baptism for a world that needs it.

If we're not different at all from the world, then we will not make much of a difference in the world. If we simply conform to everything that society leads us towards, how are we going to help to move it in the right direction. No, the Church is meant to be a leader in this world, not a follower, because it knows and follows the one leader who takes us to our true happiness, even if it means through a cross. We are different because, call us whatever they will, we call ourselves Christians. We belong to the Lamb of God who has shown us a love greater than all the world, and we will not give it up.

Homily 1-12-2014 Baptism of The Lord

Why now, at the close of the Christmas season and the start of Ordinary Time, do we celebrate the Baptism of the Lord? We just celebrate the mystery of the birth of Christ, the only begotten son of God. Now we reflect on how, through Him, we are all able to be adopted children born not of human choice...but of the will of God.
Furthermore, in last week's feast of Epiphany we continue the un-veiling (which is what the Greek word epiphany means) of the mystery of the person of Jesus Christ, which we see so poignantly in today's mystery.

Thirdly, the public life of Christ Jesus begins at His Baptism, so it is fitting we start the season that focuses on Christ the Teacher with the first event of His teaching ministry.

Why was Jesus baptized? On two accounts I can think of, Jesus clearly does not need the baptism that John offers. First, He is no disciple of John, but rather the one John says He is not worthy to stoop down and loosen a sandle. Secondly, Jesus as the sinless Son of God does not need a baptism that is meant for a confession of sins that prepares the way for the Messiah, Jesus Himself.

1. “To fulfill all righteousness.” This mysterious phrase helps to show us that Jesus sees God's plan in a deeper way than we do ourselves.
2. As an example for us. To show that we ourselves should move by the path of repentance for our sins if we profess to be followers and disciples (“students”) of Christ Jesus.
3. On our behalf. Jerome: Suffer now that I who have taken the form of a servant should fulfill all that low estate; besides, know that in the day of judgment you (John) must be baptized with my baptism. [through his death at the will of King Herod] Pseudo-Chrysostom: He comes to baptism that He who has taken upon Himself our human nature, may be found to have fulfilled the whole mystery of that nature; not that He is Himself a sinner, but that He has taken on Him a nature that is sinful. And therefore though He needed not baptism Himself, yet the carnal nature in others needed it.
   
   
   Why us?
   1. Participation. As Christ comes up from the waters of Baptism, we through our baptism are united with Him. This means we share in all that is His and He in all that is ours. He shares our sinful human nature, our human suffering, and in death. We share in His Cross, in His Resurrection, and in the signs of today's event: the Heavens are open to us who are reborn in Him, eternal life become available to us. And we hear the words of the Father as words directed to us: “Thou art my beloved.” “I am well pleased with you, my son, my daughter.”
   2. Adoption. “In truth, I see that God shows no partiality. Rather, in every nation whoever fears him and acts uprightly is acceptable to him.
   3. The Cross. Christ's mystery is foreshadowed today in His Baptism. We envision His humble acceptance that John mentions as if it were the Garden of Gethsemane; the going into the water as the Cross and burial in the tomb; the coming out of the water as the Resurrection; and the opening of Heaven as the Ascension. This mystery, through Baptism, becomes our mystery. It becomes the meaning of life for us. Let us rejoice in it, even in the crosses. Let us bind ourselves to Our Lord Jesus' baptism through our participation in Him from this altar.

Worship and Stars (NOT worshiping stars!)

The reason we love the feast of epiphany, is because we see in this story that we are able to make an offering and give something back to God. Perhaps we get discouraged because we feel at times inadequate in our relationship with God - that have we to offer, when He had everything and gives us everything? Perhaps parents could understand this example: a little child fix of his father to give him $25 so that he can buy a gift for his father. The father, keeping of his own goods does not feel this is a sacrifice, interest to receive something from his son: an active true and sincere love.

The opportunity to offer worship to God is a gift that he gives us. God loves us so much, that he gives us things that we can offer back to him. And the act of giving it back to him in worship (in the Mass, private prayer, acts of charity, etc.) is something that brings us our deepest joy because it establishes a relationship, the most important relationship. It is a symbol of putting back together the brokenness of sin which had shattered the harmony of our souls. We need to worship. We don't feel whole if we don't have something to worship. As I've said before, we were created with a throne in our hearts, and if God is not placed there, then we, whether consciously or not, will choose something else to fill it – we simply can't live without it.

People in our world, like the wise men, are desperately searching for the right thing to worship. They are looking, they are longing, they are dreaming to discover the answer to The deep questions of their hearts. Do we make up the meaning of life? Do we choose among various solutions to what life is all about? Or is it something we have to seek, and find? The answer to those questions is not a thing or piece of information, but rather, a person. If we don't give up on the journey, if we don't let those dreams of ours die, if we keep searching until the end, our restless hearts will find that the Lord Jesus answers those questions. He reveals to us that life is worth living, that God exists, and that, as Pope Francis recently said, “when all is said and done, we are infinitely loved.” (Evangelii Guadium #4)
That star which draws the wise men to Christ is a good symbol for evangelization. We are called to be like that star in the sky, that leads people to Jesus, not like a cloud that darkens their travels, not like a king Herod who becomes an obstacle and tries to destroy it because he is so focused on himself and the power that he temporarily holds.

The Saints are said in the Book of the Prophet Daniel to be like stars in the sky: “the wise will shine like the splendor of the firmament, and those who lead the common people to righteousness like the stars forever and ever.” (Daniel 12:3) So, is there a star out there for you...leading you to the answer to your deepest longings, to the healing of your woundedness, to the joy beyond all telling that is Christ Our Lord? What saint will be guiding you this year? My saint is Margaret Mary Alacoque of France, who promoted devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus. I encourage you to get a saint, a big brother or sister. Let those stars in the sky bring us to Christ, so that we can also shine that light in our world that leads others to the heart of true worship and the answer to their deepest longings and questions.