20 Dec 2015
4th Sunday of Advent, Year
C
He was born in 1945 and died in 1947. And his name was Mike. And Mike was a chicken living on a farm in
Colorado. But he wasn’t just any
chicken. When the farmer went to the hen
house to get supper one night, he found Mike and chopped his head off (mostly). But Mike kept on going! He lived for another year and a half and
walked around the farmyard . . . without a head. He was a body without a head!
It was a strange thing to see, for sure. But it’s not entirely unrealistic. In fact, Mike the Headless Chicken is kind of
a metaphor for us human beings sometimes.
How many times do we hear political opponents on tv and our reaction is:
“What are they thinking?! That doesn’t
make any sense—what they’re saying!” Well,
maybe so. Maybe they’re not thinking; maybe they’re going around
without a head—figuratively speaking.
Even we as a people of faith do it sometimes. We might go to Mass completely disengaged; we
go through the motions of our rituals without really thinking about them. Of course, this is what we hear about in the
letter to the Hebrews—God’s not interested in empty rituals. He wants us to think about what we’re doing,
and to be soulfully invested in it. But,
you know, sometimes, we’re like Mike—we’re like a chicken with our heads cut
off; we’re a functioning body, but we’ve lost our head.
Now in the letter to the Hebrews, we hear Jesus’ prayer to
the Father: “Sacrifice and offering you did not desire, but a body you prepared for me.” And we can take that to mean two things. First, Jesus takes on human flesh from his mother Mary, in the Incarnation. This is the body we celebrate at Christmas and the same body we receive in the Eucharist.
And, second, God the Father has given Christ the body of the faithful, the Church.
This is what St Paul calls us in his first Letter to the Corinthians—“you
are the body of Christ, and each one of you is a part of it.”
Jesus says: Father, “a body
you prepared for me.” We were like sheep
without a shepherd; we were like a body without a head. But God has prepared us to receive Christ as our Head. Remember John the Baptist: “Prepare the way
of the Lord.” Prepare the way of the
Lord. Prepare for Light and Wisdom,
Truth and Knowledge, Grace and Salvation to come by way our Head, Jesus the Son of God.
If sometimes our world, or our leaders, or even people of
faith seem like they’ve lost all common sense and are acting and speaking like
a chicken with its head cut off . . . well, maybe that’s what happened. Maybe they (and we, sometimes) have lost the connection with Jesus our
Divine Head. Advent has been a time to
consider that possibility and to be reconciled with him, our Head and Shepherd.
You know, we as a Church are a “hierarchy.” But that doesn’t mean some of us are “higher
and better” and some of us are “lower and more pitiful.” “Hier-“ comes from the Greek “hierus,” which
means “sacred things; divine things.”
And “-archy” means “to be ruled by,” or “to be governed by.” We, as a Church—as a people of faith—are governed by “divine things;” namely, God. We are a hierarchy.
And we see the idea of hierarchy already at work in people
such as Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. We see
it in Moses, the Prophets, and all people of real and living faith.
We especially see it here in the gospel in Elizabeth and Mary.
Elizabeth proclaimed Mary “blessed” because Mary “believed
that what was spoken to [her] by the Lord would be fulfilled.” The Blessed Mother believed; and she trusted
. . . in God, her divine Head. From the early centuries of the Church, the
faithful have seen Mary as a metaphor and an image of the Body of Christ, the
Church. And so, when she says: “Let it
be done to me according to your will,” she’s acknowledging that all Wisdom and
Goodness, all Truth and Love come from God.
It’s a beautiful image of true hierarchy
at work.
Mary is “governed by divine things;” not as an unthinking,
unfeeling, disengaged slave, but as a fully engaged, fully alive partner with God. She was no chicken with its head cut
off. And because of it, she was “full of
grace;” full of Wisdom and Knowledge, full of Humility and Gentleness, full of
what we might call “common sense.”
In these days, when the Church and all society is
increasingly polarized, it would be good to consider how often we say to God: “God,
let it be done to according to your will.
You are my Divine Head; lead me.
Lead me into all that is good, true, and beautiful.” How often do we say that, and then let God lead the way? My guess is: Not often enough.
But every day we have a chance to get grounded again in
Christ, our Divine Head, our Shepherd, our Source of Wisdom and Knowledge. Every time we’re tempted to fly off the
handle at some nonsensical remark, go to Jesus.
Every time we want to shoot back a defensive statement without thinking
first, stop and go to Jesus. Every time
we think have it all figured out, stop and go to Jesus.
We don’t live in anarchy.
We live in a hierarchy. We’re governed
by our Divine Head—if we let ourselves be governed—not as a slave, but as a
partner with God. And thank God for
that! It sure beats running around like
a chicken with your head cut off.
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