Homily for 12 Jun 2015 Most Sacred Heart

12 Jun 2015

Solemnity of the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus

In most Catholic churches, the main piece of art in the sanctuary is a crucifix.  We don’t have that here.  Instead, we have the statue of our patron, the Sacred Heart of Jesus.  And yet, it isn’t quite right to say the crucifix is not here.  And that’s because the Sacred Heart of Jesus is what’s behind the crucifix; it’s what led him to the Cross; it’s the indomitable Spirit of divine Love poured out.

The bleeding Heart of Jesus and the open wound on Jesus’ side from which blood and water flow are the same.  The human body of Christ is broken open as is the divine Spirit of Christ—they both overflow with blood, with life and divine love.  And this gush of Body and Spirit is the love of the Bridegroom for his Bride, the Church.

Some people jokingly say that their wedding day was their funeral.  But for Jesus, his funeral—his crucifixion—was his wedding day.  It was the day and the place that he gave himself, definitively, to the Church, his Bride given to him by God the Father.  And behind that act of spiritual and bodily love for us is the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus. 

His love is not given in a spirit of sentimentality, as we so often take “love” to be today.  Instead, the sacredness of his love is that it is unconditional; it is freely given and sacrificial; completely selfless and given for the good of those who are open to receive it.  This kind of love is, ideally, seen in marriage, in the family, within intimate friendships.  And this relational, sacrificial love is central to the Sacred Heart.

The image of husband and wife, where God is the husband and Israel is the wife, is a thread that runs throughout the Old Testament prophets.  So, too, is the image of a parent’s love for a child.  The prophet Hosea speaks of God who “fostered [Ephraim] like one who raises an infant to his cheeks.”  It’s a touching image, one that has a sentimental and emotional aspect to it.  But beneath that is the more primordial, unconditionally devoted love of a parent for a child.  We adore God.  But it’s important to remember that God adores us first.  That divine adoration is his Sacred Heart poured out for us.

But Hosea notes also that, although God “stooped to feed [his] child, they did not know that I was their healer.”  The love of God was not acknowledged nor returned with any gratitude.  And that’s the overarching story of Scripture; it’s the story of the whole of salvation history.  God loves us and creates us.  For a time, humanity returns his love.  But then we go on this roller coaster relationship of fidelity and infidelity.  We are faithful.  We are unfaithful.

But the Sacred Heart of Jesus pours out one last definitive show of divine love for us.  And we have the crucifixion, the wedding day when Christ the Bridegroom pours out his love for his Bride the Church.  The day when his Sacred Heart moved him to give his whole body, his whole being in love to the Bride, to us.  And he says to us: “Return to me.” 

That’s the message of the prophets, the message of Christ’s teachings, the message of our Scripture and Tradition as a whole: return to God.  Entrust ourselves to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, to that love which knows no limits, which is eternally forgiving, which is kind, gracious, and merciful.

This is the prayer of St. Paul when he writes to the Ephesians.  He kneels before the Father interceding for us so that we might “know the love of Christ which surpasses knowledge, . . . [and] be filled with all the fullness of God.”  In effect, his prayer is that we be able to pray the psalm from today: “God indeed is my savior; I am confident and unafraid.  My strength and my courage is the Lord, and he has been my savior.”

And he shows himself our Savior on the Cross.  There, his Sacred Heart is poured out in sacrificial love: the Bridegroom gives himself to the Bride.  And he says to her—he says to us: Come to me.  Follow me, whose Heart is aflame with love for you.

Homily for 7 Jun 2015 Corpus Christi

7 Jun 2015

Solemnity of the Most Holy Body and Blood of Christ

Advent and Christmas are done.  Lent and Easter are over.  And things are pretty much back to “normal.”  Now we’re in this long stretch of Ordinary Time until Advent comes around again.  And so it’s a good time to stop and say, “Whoa!  What did we celebrate?”  And it’s really the Lord who makes us put on the brakes, turn around, and go back for a second look. 

In about the year 1240, Jesus appeared to a nun, St. Juliana of Liége, and he told her he wanted the Church to celebrate, with greater focus, his Body and Blood.  He gave her a few reasons why.  But the first was that he wanted the Church to stop and reconsider what happened on Holy Thursday.  There’s a lot that happens on that day, and it seems that the Eucharist was too often lost in the mix of things (and, of course, the Eucharist still gets lost in the busyness of life today).   

And so, since the 13^th Century, this feast of the Most Holy Body and Blood of Christ has been celebrated.  Since the Middle Ages, every year the Church stops and says, “Whoa!  What did we celebrate?  What happened back there on Holy Thursday?”  And we do it because God himself wants us to see there’s something important about that night.  And so, Jesus said to St. Juliana and his Church: “Stop.  Turn around. Reconsider what really happened on the night of my Last Supper.” 

Well, we know that on that night Jesus had sent his disciples ahead of him to prepare for the Passover meal.  And later, while they were eating, Jesus made the prediction that one of his disciples would betray him.  They each denied it, of course.  And then, at some point, Jesus, “On the day before he was to suffer for our salvation and the salvation of all . . . took bread in his . . . hands, and with eyes raised” to his Father in heaven, he gave thanks, said the blessing, broke the bread, and gave it to his disciples saying: “Take it; this is my body.”

And we also know that, “in a similar way, when supper was ended,” he took the chalice filled with wine.  He gave thanks, said the blessing, and gave it to his disciples saying: “This is my blood of the covenant, which will be shed for many.”  And after that, they sang a hymn and went to the Mount of Olives—at least, that’s how the evening went according to the gospel of St. Mark.

And it’s interesting to think of Jesus singing.  He was probably singing what’s known as the “Hallel Psalms;” psalms in praise of God.  These were psalms 113 to 118.  If you notice, we sang Psalm 116 today; we sang part of the hymn Jesus was singing on the night of the Last Supper.  And to get at the idea of what happened there on that Holy Thursday evening, our ancestors in the 13^th Centuries wrote their own hymns.

St. Thomas Aquinas wrote the hymn we sing every Holy Thursday called Pange lingua, which means “Sing, O tongue!”  “Sing, O tongue, the mystery of the glorious Body, and of the precious Blood, which the King of all nations, the fruit of a noble womb, poured forth as the ransom for the world.  Given to us, born for us of a stainless Virgin.”  . . . Did you hear it?  There’s a hymn within this hymn.  And the gist of this “hidden” song is very familiar to us; although, we don’t usually associate it with Holy Thursday or the Body and Blood of Christ.  It’s a song we might recognize in these words:

“Hark! the herald angels sing, ‘Glory to the newborn King; Peace on earth and mercy mild, God and sinners reconciled!’  Veiled in flesh the Godhead see: hail the incarnate Deity, Pleased as man with man to dwell, Jesus, our Emmanuel.  Hark! the herald angels sing, ‘Glory to the newborn King!”

There’s a fantastic connection between Holy Thursday, the Body and Blood of Christ, and Christmas Day.  We say it every Sunday: “For us men and for our salvation he came down from heaven, and by the Holy Spirit was incarnate of the Virgin Mary, and became man.”  The Word became Flesh.  “This is my body, this is the blood of the covenant.” “Veiled in flesh the Godhead see; hail the incarnate Deity.”  The Word of God became Flesh.  Not an image of flesh; not a symbol; not a metaphor, but really and truly.  The Word became Flesh and Blood.  And, hark! the herald the angels sing: “Glory to the newborn King!”

If we believe that Jesus, the Son of God, was born as a real flesh-and-blood infant to the Virgin Mary, wrapped in swaddling clothes and laid in a manger, then we believe just as strongly that Jesus, the Word of God, by the power of the same Holy Spirit, becomes flesh-and-blood here, wrapped in the mere appearance of bread and wine, and laid on the altar. 

The Word became Flesh on Christmas Day.  And that same Word became flesh again on Holy Thursday.  And he becomes flesh again and again, every time we come here and celebrate the Eucharist, every time we call on the Holy Spirit, every time we “do this is memory of” him.  We just thought Christmas happened only once a year.  But it happens every day.  The Word becomes flesh all the time—not metaphorically, not symbolically, but really and truly. 

What a beautiful insight our medieval ancestors had.  And we can benefit from their wisdom.   If we believe in Christmas—if we believe in the Incarnation—then we believe in the flesh-and-blood reality of Jesus present in the Eucharist. 

This feast that Jesus asks us to celebrate every year really challenges us to look beyond what we can see and feel.  It really challenges us to grow in faith.  The Body and Blood of Christ challenge us to go to a place where our human reasoning and our senses can’t help.  St. Thomas Aquinas also wrote a hymn about this as well called Tantum ergo (which is actually just the last couple verses of Pange lingua).  It goes like this:

“Therefore, so great a Sacrament let us venerate with heads bowed, and let the old practice give way to the new rite; let faith provide a supplement for the failure of the senses.”  Let faith provide a supplement for the failure of the senses.  Seeing here on the altar the flesh-and-blood presence of Christ takes faith.  It takes Catholic faith.

For the first 800 years or so of the Church’s life, there was little written about belief in the “fleshiness” of the Eucharist.  And that’s simply because it wasn’t an issue; everybody believed it.  But in the 9^th Century, there were some who began to see the Eucharist as a metaphor for the Body and Blood.  Or they started to see the Body and Blood as not really the Body and Blood, but more as a symbol of our shared life in Christ. 

And so, in the 9^th Century (and ever since then), there’s been a lot written about the Eucharist.  From Day 1, the Church has believed with faith in the Lord that “this is my body; this is my blood of the covenant.”  Even though, to our senses it looks like bread, (or a cracker, which is more of what the unleavened bread would have been like at the Last Supper) . . . even though, to our senses, it looks like bread and tastes like bread, and the wine looks like wine, smells like wine and tastes like wine . . . they aren’t. 

Our senses and our human reasoning can deceive us.  We have here the real Body of Christ, the real Blood of Christ.  In the manger at Bethlehem, there was a little baby boy.  He looked like any other infant, but he wasn’t.  Something else was present there: the living God was present there—Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity; as he is present here in this miracle of incarnation we call the Eucharist.

That’s what happened on that Holy Thursday night—the Word became Flesh, again.  “The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light; upon those who lived in a land of gloom a light has shone.  For a child is born to us, a son is given to us; upon his shoulder dominion rests.  They name him Wonder-Counselor, God-Hero, Father-Forever, Prince of Peace” [Is 9:1,6]. 

As the infant Jesus came to share our humanity, so Jesus remains with us—not only in Spirit—but in the Flesh.  His Body and Blood is a sign of the new and eternal covenant with us; the Eucharist is a flesh-and-blood sign that he will never leave us; not a symbol, but a concrete sign that he is always here for us.  And not only that, but it’s a sign that he wants to be within us. 

He asks us to eat and to drink, to mingle his Body and Blood with ours.  He wants to be one with us—in Spirit and in Body.  Then again, what else would we expect between Jesus the Bridegroom and his Bride, the Church?  He wants to be one with us—in Spirit and in Body.  And being the happy Bride of Christ that we are as the Church, we say: Amen.

The Body of Christ.  Amen.  The Blood of Christ.  Amen.  And through this really fantastic mystery of Body and Blood, the mystery of the Incarnation, the mystery of the Word becoming Flesh, we see—hopefully—the mystery of our own transformation.  As Christ gives his real Flesh and his real Blood for us, so we turn around and we give our real body and our real blood in love for God and others.

We are a “Eucharistic people;” that is, we help Christ to be reborn again and again in the world—through our own flesh-and-blood.  Someone struggles to rake the lawn or blow the snow in winter, and we put our own bodies into action to relieve their stress.  A friend is in the hospital, and so we make the effort not only to call or send a card, but to get our flesh-and-blood bodies over to the hospital to be physically present to them.  When someone is having a hard day, or maybe an excellent day, we give a hug, we smile, we shake their hand, or give them a pat on the shoulder—all very physical things to let them know that Christ is with them . . . in the flesh.

On this feast day Christ asks us to stop! turn around, and say “What did we celebrate back there on Holy Thursday?  What happened that night?”  When we take the time to do that, to open our eyes of faith, we see that the Word became flesh, again.  Christmas day happened again.  The herald angels sang ‘Glory to the newborn King; Peace on earth and mercy mild, God and sinners reconciled!’  God and sinners are brought together again—not by a symbol, not by a metaphor, not by an image—but by the very real Body and Blood of Christ.   

Homily for 6 Jun 2015

6 Jun 2015

People of all sorts and shapes come into our lives.  And we can be tempted to idolize the people who inspire us, the people we enjoy knowing.  But the archangel Raphael says, “No, praise God.  Thank God for the gift of those people who inspire us.”  Of course, there’s nothing wrong—and, indeed, it’s very good—to thank people.  But we mustn’t forget to thank God and realize it is, ultimately, God at work.

But God is always present to us in some or another.  God doesn’t “come and go” in our lives.  And so, ultimately, all the good we encounter in others is meant to draw us to God and to give him thanks.

While our main vocation in life is to love God, our other vocation as Catholics is to help others connect and reconnect with God.  That’s what the priestly vocation is all about.  It isn’t about me.  It’s about pointing others to God.  That’s what evangelization is all about.  It’s about bringing others to know God and believe in him, not us.  And, of course, we evangelize every time we are an instrument of God—whether it’s with a kind word, or some encouragement, or something else that brings God’s mercy into their lives through us.

The archangel Raphael talks about almsgiving, the idea of giving from our “wealth.”  But the most precious, valuable “thing” we have is our own relationship with God and our own experiences of knowing God—God who is goodness, truth, beauty.  That’s the wealth we want to share.  And that’s the wealth we want others to share in as well.

We try to give ourselves over to God, to God’s will and the ways of God—just like Tobiah and Sarah, just like the widow putting her two coins in the treasury.  We try as best we can to say to God, “I am yours.”  And in return God says, “I am yours.”  And from that rich relationship, we give to others. 

And all those people in our lives who inspire us . . . well, they have their own relationships with God, the God of life and love, the God of all goodness.  When we encounter them, we give thanks to God for his presence in them.  And, hopefully, when they encounter us, they give thanks to God for his presence in us. 

Behind all that inspiration we receive from others is God.  And to that we say: “Blessed be God, who lives forever.”  Blessed be God. 

Homily for 5 Jun 2015

5 Jun 2015

We know that God is present and at work in the here-and-now.  And yet, our hope and our joy as Christians also lie in the future. 

We hear today of Anna, the mother of Tobiah, who looks off into the distance for her son.  She looks to the future with anticipation because she knows he’s coming.  And when he comes, she is overjoyed—as we expect.

The same can be said of the Jews.  In the 1^st Century, they were expecting the messiah to come.  It was a reason for them to celebrate when they heard Jesus talking about the messiah in such a fantastic way.  They couldn’t, of course, foresee that the messiah would have to suffer and die.  But when that did happen, Jesus himself held an inner “joy,” an inner peace because he knew where he was going—back to his beloved Father.  On the Cross, he was looking ahead.

And that’s a common thread, it seems, with so many of the saints.  Even though they face difficulties, they have a vision of where they’re going and what they’re about.  We remember today St. Boniface, the patron saint of the Germanic lands, who went from one difficult situation to the next around Europe, only to be martyred one night while reading a book.  His life revolved around the Kingdom of God—both in the present and in the future to come. 

God was his hope and his joy.  And the same goes for us.  Our hope is in God alone.  And as much as God is present here and today, he also stands further down the road in a place we hope to be.

Beyond the Cross is the Resurrection.  Beyond the difficulties of life are the blessings of life.  Beyond the darkness of doubt is the light of hope.  May we look ahead and be upheld by that light.  

Homily for 4 Jun 2015

4 Jun 2015

It isn’t enough to quote Scripture.  It isn’t enough to say, “the Church teaches” this or “the Church teaches” that.  It isn’t enough.  The Christian faith demands more; it requires understanding.  Jesus recognizes the scribe’s response as having come from a place of “understanding.”  And that scribe is “not far from the Kingdom” because of it. 

Knowledge of Scripture, knowledge of Church teaching, knowledge of Tradition is one thing.  But understanding why we do what we do, and how we teach what we do makes all the difference between passing on knowledge and passing on wisdom and truth.  And, of course, that translates directly into how we live and how we evangelize others.

It’s often said that Catholics might not be able to quote Scripture, but they can tell you what it means.  And that’s what we aim for—we aim for understanding; not only in what Scripture and our Church and our Tradition say, but also understanding in how to bring that to others.

If we want to evangelize others and share our faith with them, it doesn’t do much good to slam them with an out-of-context Scripture quote.  It doesn’t do much good to say, “the Church teaches” this or that when, for some people, the Church has no authority whatsoever—in their mind.  Jesus could have come down in a dramatic display of divine power and proclaimed, “Here I am, the Son of God, obey me and everything will be fine.”  But he didn’t.

Instead, he took the time—and still takes the time—to walk with us.  He helps us to move from having knowledge to having real wisdom and understanding.  And he does that with such patience, with forgiveness, with divine mercy, and yet more patience.  And, in that, he gives us an example to follow—both with ourselves and with others.

Jesus is wise enough to know that isn’t enough to simply quote Scripture.  It isn’t enough to say to people (and ourselves), “Here’s the truth—just follow it!”  It isn’t enough.  The Christian faith he gives us demands understanding and wisdom.  And the beginning of wisdom is a humble walk with our God; it begins with “fear of the Lord.”

In a nutshell, wisdom demands, above all, a love of God.  From that love we can speak to others with wisdom, with understanding of the knowledge we have from Scripture, our Church teachings, and our Tradition.  But we can’t do that with that first commandment: Love God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength.  Above all, love God.  Then what we do and what we say . . . will be enough.

Homily for 3 Jun 2015

3 Jun 2015

As God lives, so do all who belong to him.  And since God lives eternally, all who belong to him live eternally.  This is what Jesus is getting at when he quotes that famous line from Exodus: “I am the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.”  This is how he taught the idea of resurrection and eternal life.

God is the one constant in life and death.  Abraham is born and dies.  Isaac is born and dies.  Jacob is born and dies.  Every person is born and dies.  But God is the God of them all.  From one generation to the next, God is there, ever-present, ever-faithful.  Through the centuries, through the millennia, God remains constant.  As God lives, so do all who belong to him.  And since God lives eternally, all who belong to him live eternally.

And one of the prime ways we show that we belong to God, not as a slave, but as a friend, is that we turn to him in prayer—with thanks, with praise, with our needs.  In the story of Tobit and Sarah, we see two people who are already living eternal life.  They definitely have their problems; but they turn to God.  They are firmly attached to God and rely on his help and guidance.

Of course, this is an example for us to follow.  We turn to God, we pray to him so that we can really live.  Sometimes it’s a prayer of thanks we offer up.  Sometimes it’s sorrow for having made yet another stupid mistake.  Sometimes it’s a tearful prayer because we’re at our wits end.  Whatever the reason, we make the prayer of the psalmist our own: “To you, O Lord, I lift up my soul.”

And in lifting up our souls, we join ourselves to the One who is constant.  From before time began until long after time ceases, God lives.  And as God lives, so do all who belong to him; so do all who say from the heart: “To you, O Lord, I lift up my soul.”   

Homily for 2 Jun 2015

2 Jun 2015

“Repay to Caesar what belongs to Caesar.”  Yes, we should pay our taxes and follow the laws of this country.  We should vote responsibly and be concerned about the social and political issues of our time.  We should pay attention to things like money and have a good business sense as a parish, as families, as individuals.  We live in the world.  And so, yes, we need to repay to the world what belongs to the world.

But we are also citizens of heaven, children of God.  And so, to us and all his followers Jesus says: repay “to God what belongs to God.”  And what belongs to God other than: devotion and time in prayer; an open ear, a supple spirit; thanks and praise.  It belongs to God, above all, to be loved and adored.  And, of course, we also love and adore God present in others around us—all others around us.

The Lord knows we are exiles.  We’re travelers just passing through this life.  We come from the Holy Trinity and we’re on our way back there.  We’re just passing through.  And the snare that threatens us on our way is when we become too concerned with the things of the world.  They’re important, of course: laws, taxes, money, politics.  They’re part of our human society and culture.  But they, too, are passing.

While we live in the world, we mustn’t forget that we are first and ultimately citizens of heaven.  God himself is the Law of our land.  He himself is the Spirit of freedom and goodwill that moves us to act.  He is our leader; our ever-just, always good, eternally supportive leader. 

We live in the world, and we repay to the world what belongs to the world.  But we are also citizens of heaven, children of God.  And so, in all we do, no matter what we’re focused on, we mustn’t forget God.  We mustn’t forget to repay to God what belongs to God.