Homily for the week of November 21, 2010

The Solemnity of Christ the King, 2010

2 Samuel 5:1-3

Psalm 122:1-2, 3-4, 4-5

Colossians 1:12-20

Luke 23:35-43

During the past week I stopped by one of the local stores. I happened to overhear a woman who was standing not far away who apparently met someone whom she had not met for a long time. She said: Henry, I am so happy to see you after all these years. My, how you have changed. I remember you as being tall and you seem so much shorter. You used to have a pale complexion and it is really so ruddy now. Good grief, how you have changed in five years. Finally, the man got a chance to talk, But my name isn't Henry. To which the woman calmly responded: Oh, so you've changed your name too.

If the importance of a word or concept in the Bible were to be judged by the number of times it was used, then certainly the word KING would the greatest place of honor. There are no less than 6,318 references to kings or kingdoms in the Bible. However, for nearly all of us the notion or idea of king has little meaning since this country broke away from England in 1776. In the United States we've never known a king. Perhaps the only remnant of kings and queens is in our American high schools when students chose a classmate to be crowned the king and queen of the Junior Prom.

Many years ago an Italian artist worked for a long time on a very large piece of marble. After years he gave it up, saying I Can't do anything with this. He threw it away. Forty years later another Italian artist from Florence by the name of Michaelangelo found the marble in a pile of rubbish. He immediately saw that he might be able to do something with it. After three years of carving he produced one of the world's greatest sculptures known as David.

This is the King David, son of Jesse, who lived 2500 years before Michaelangelo, who is talked about in the book of Samuel. He is the David that wrote many of the prayers known as psalms. In his early life David had no faith. He murdered persons whom he did not like, and went against most of the 10 commandments that had been given to his Jewish ancestors. His father did not think he could be a leader so he left him in the fields to take care of the sheep. But somehow God saw the possibilities in the young farmer David. He changed his way of life, and decided that he could do good for the people in his country. He brought enemies together to talk about peace, and they did. He led them to God. David never wanted to take this honor for himself praying that everything is from God. But they insisted that he be known as their King David.

In a few weeks from now we will hear the Bible tell us that a person by the name of Jesus will be born in Bethlehem who will be from the kingly line of David.

Normally when we think of kings and queens we picture castles and crowns, jewels, pomp and ceremony. We think of riches, power, and glamour. Today we honor Jesus as our King. The first public record of Jesus being publicly named a king was the cross on which he was nailed. The Romans placed a sign above his head as he hung on the cross. Written were the lettersINRI, which in Latin mean: Jesus of Nazareth King of the Jews. When you go home today, look at the crucifix on the wall in your kitchen or living room and you will find those letters: INRI.

We honor a person who has none of the ways of those kings. Just recall the scene: his throne was a cross, his crown was made of thorns, his servants were his executioners, and the people closest to him were common criminals. The cross shows us the kind of king Jesus is: he is one who cares for us right to the end. He cares enough to suffer and to even give up his life for those he loves. He cares enough to be misunderstood and rejected. He cares enough to seem a failure. He is a king who cares, and is prepared to make any sacrifice for the sake of those he loves.

Jesus was and is a contradiction to any who try to live as he taught us. His disciples thought they would get all kinds of power from him. He would give them the best letter of reference, or best jobs, or make them MVPs on His team. But what does he tell them: Anyone who would be first must be last, the servant of all.

Today's Gospel reminds us just how personally Jesus fulfils his saving mission on earth. Only in Luke's' Gospel do we find this incident in which Jesus guarantees the salvation of one of the criminals crucified with him, the familiar Good Thief. This thief, referred to as Dismas, prays to Jesus as both are dying and says to Jesus: JESUS, REMEMBER ME WHEN YOU COME INTO YOUR KINGDOM. Jesus remembers him and tells him YOU WILL BE WITH ME IN PARADISE.

Jesus focuses on the necessity for us to follow him day by day. In the midst of all difficulty and bad times, we find hope, words of encouragement, new life comes to us. Within ourselves we find a renewal when new ideas let go of the bad and painful. Old habits of sin must be destroyed if the newness of Jesus is be part of us. Our future is one of constant renewal. We are always in the process of renewing our responses to the will of Jesus for us. We renew our spiritual life, not by world shaking actions, but by actions that show we are thankful and loving: by reading a book to a child; by listening to an elderly parent; by listening to a young person who feels alone; by leading prayers at home at meal time; by teaching your children or grandchildren about Jesus; by making Advent a time of preparation for the birth of Jesus, and not just a time to buy more and more gifts.

If Christ were in this church today he would be advising us that in God's kingdom even the guilty can find welcome, no matter what their crimes, lifestyles and misdeeds.

On the cross Jesus gave comfort to repentant thief even as he extends comfort to us as we hang on our own crosses. No matter what we have to bear in life, no situation is beyond Christ's healing power.

Homily for the week of November 14, 2010

Thirty-third Sunday in Ordinary Time, 2010 year C

Malachi 3:19-20a

Psalm 98:5-6, 7-8, 9

2 Thessalonians 3:7-12

Luke 21:5-19

Everyone faces problems they may never be able to solve. However, the most important aspect of solving any problem is looking at it within its context, that is, what are the factors that surround it or affect it. The Bible has to be read in several contexts. First we have to look at who were the authors. The writers of the Bible were always responding to something. In most cases they were answering someone's question about a particular situation or about Jesus. The question the passage is responding to is still a question we ask today. As and example in the Gospel I just read Jesus was asked: When will the end of the world happen? And how will we know when that is to happen?

This leads to a second important part of understanding a Bible passage: what is happening in our lives right now? The depth of personal meaning a passage has for us will vary depending on what is going on in our lives today. Reading about a healing miracle will have a certain meaning for someone who is terribly ill and another meaning for someone who has never been sick.

This information on the circumstances surrounding an event is very helpful for approaching today’s readings. Our first reading from Malachi and our Gospel passage from Luke were all written with an eye toward the future. The purpose of these passages is to help us understand and cope with events occurring now and to help us find hope in our future when God will prevail over everything.

Our first reading is from the book of Malachi. Malachi was a chronic complainer. Yet he says that God is like the sun. It is the same sun that warms us in winter but that can give us a serious sunburn in summer. God too is experienced in different ways. The evil experience him as a blazing oven; the good as a healing ray to give them spiritual warmth. And Malachi tells us that a day is coming when God will show his divine face to all who are living. Malachi wanted to remind us that ultimately God is in charge and that God will set all things right. It is this reminder that helps us endure. He reminded the people that while things are bad in this world, we are not really of this world. We can endure because this life is not the one we were born for. We were born for life with God in heaven.

No doubt many people, and maybe some of you, have great fears in our nation today. Our primary fear is an economic one. With the huge deficit, we fear what might come. We worry about what will happen if the nation goes bankrupt. We think, “What about Social Security and Medicare? Will they be there for me?” This fear is not unreasonable.

Our Gospel today was written by St.Luke’s as a time when people were also living in fear. Accepting Jesus Christ had forced a change in lifestyle. Many were afraid of the Roman authorities who did not like Jesus. Some were leaving the Jesus out of fear of persecution or even death.

Numerous fundamentalist preachers on and off TV, keep telling us that we are in the last days, and that the end of the world is coming soon. How do they know this? Because they take a sentence here and a sentence there from the Bible and determine that the current events show that the world as we know it is passing away. The early Christians also thought that the world would end in their lifetime.

These self proclaimed authorities. of course, ignore other passages such as in our last reading today, where Jesus warns us about false alarms. Jesus cautions us that we must be more concerned about living our faith day by day than worried over the date of the end of the world. Jesus says of these false prophets: DO NOT FOLLOW THEM.

A week ago more than 50 Iraqis and 3 Catholic priests were shot to death in an attack in a Catholic church in Baghdad as the people were participating in Sunday Mass.

Jesus never promised his followers then or now freedom from trials or even from disasters. He did promise that he would be with us amid disasters. Jesus made that promise from his own experience. That experience was finalize on the cross.

Often we think God acts one way for good people and another way for bad. We often believe that if the Lord isn't doing what we want, we simply have to change from bad to good and he will give us what we need.

But today's three readings give some different advice. We see a God who is always doing good things for his people whether they are themselves good or bad. His actions come across to us in different ways because we respond to them in different ways.

Jesus does say, though, that before that last day comes we will have to live according to our belief. He says we are called to endure patiently. Jesus is our model and our hope. That is why we are here today. We need a weekly spiritual transfusion from Jesus that will give us the strength to endure the humanly unendurable; to hope where we see no hope; to continue the journey when we feel our strength is at an end.

Today and this week let us think about our own lives. Think of the opportunities we have to do little things that no one even notices. Picking up a piece of trash and disposing it properly. Smiling at someone who seems down. Thanking a clerk at a checkout counter. Visiting a neighbor who is lonely or is grieving. Being pleasant with co-worker. Giving a positive response. Being kind to a classmate who has just been bullied. This is how we fill our heart so that when the time comes, we take it with us. Best of all Jesus is always with us to help and encourage us.

Homily for the week of November 7, 2010

Thirty-second Sunday in Ordinary Time, 2010 C

2 Maccabee 7:1-2, 9-14

Psalm 17

2 Thessalonians 2:16-3:5

Luke 20:27-38

A small boy asked his father: Dad, what will happen to you when you die? Oh, that's easy to answer, came the confident reply. "I just go out like a light." There was a moment's silence while this was digested. Then came the second question: But Dad, what if there is someone waiting to switch you on again?

People in the United States have mixed feelings about death. On one hand, we spend lots of time and money trying hold off the moment of death. We add safety features to cars and homes, go on the latest diet or exercise craze, and take life-enhancing herbal supplements -- all with the hope of starving off death a few more years. On the other hand, movies and television often feature violent death to attract viewers. Death seems to fascinate us --as long as it's someone else's death.

Most teens and most adults would rather not think too much about their own death. This usually isn't hard to do, because most people in our country rarely have to address the reality of death. Yet everyone once in a while we have to face the death of someone we know well. Or maybe have to face the possibility of our own death because of an accident or a serious illness. At time our minds race with the thought: what will happen to me when I die?

Facing our own death isn't easy. It can be sobering, even frightening to face the big unknown. Some people are thrown into despair and even depression thinking about death. Our Catholic faith has answers to the question of death, as do most religions. But we have the advantage because the person who supplied those answers has actually died and risen again. Believing in Jesus' promise that we will rise to a new life does not completely take away the sting of death, but our faith does help us understand that death is not a final ending but a new beginning.

This past Tuesday we celebrated our belief that the souls of the faithful departed are in God’s merciful presence. Is death simply the end, like putting out a light or snuffing out a candle. If there is life after death, what is it like? We have all asked questions like these. It is right to consider them on this November weekend, when the natural world of vegetation has died, and as we remember Veterans Day. It is good to hear the words of Jesus about life after death.

All our Bible readings today have a forward look. They describe a today out of which a future flows. Because it is our present faith in God that ensures our enduring life.

There is within the human spirit a will to live—not only our earthly life, but beyond it. Most people want to be remembered for having made a difference in the world during their lifetime, no matter how long that life will be. Sometimes we muse about what we would want on our tombstone. For what do we most want to be remembered? For people in Jesus’ day, it was important to leave their mark in the world through the children they left behind.

The notion of resurrected life only began to emerge some 200 years before Jesus. Ideas varied about what it would be like. In the first reading today, we see the belief expressed that only the just would be raised, not the wicked. In other texts we find the notion that both would be raised, the former for eternal reward, the latter for everlasting punishment.

By Jesus’ time, there were two large sects within Judaism: the Sadducees and the Pharisees. The Pharisees had come to believe in a resurrection of the body. Jesus told them that life after death is not the same as life on earth. What Jesus promised is that life with God is the very thing for which we are born; therefore, it will be a happiness we cannot imagine. We can no longer die for we will be like angels.

Jesus replied that there was no need to think about heirs. The dead will be children of God. Marriage to preserve a name will have no place. Life after death is not an extension of life on earth, but a radical renewal of life that knows no more death.

There is an ancient play called EVERYMAN. In it God sends Death to the hero to tell him that his life is over. When the hero recovers from shock, he asks Death to give him a few minutes to invite his friends who are Money, Fame, Power, and Good Works to go with him into the after life. Death agrees. To the hero's dismay, however, the only person who accepts his invitation is Good Works. The rest refuse. The point is that as we pass through death from this life to the next, one thing alone will matter-- our Good Works.

Dr. Elizabeth Kubler-Ross, a psychiatrist has interviewed hundreds of people who have been declared clinically dead and then revived. These people commonly report experiencing a kind of instant replay of their lives. Many have told her that when it comes to this point only two things are relevant: the service they gave to others, and love. All those things we think are important, like fame, money, prestige, and power are not at all important.

Our religion teaches us that death is not an end to life, but the passage to a new life that will have no end. In Baptism we began a relationship with Divine Love. Love does not end, nor do loving relationships die. They may change, but they continue.

Our Catholic faith teaches that there are three distinct modes of existence in the next life, and we identify these places as heaven, purgatory and hell. Where we go after death is very much our choice. No one is predestined to heaven or to hell. God is a loving God and acts to save everyone. But some choose not to be saved and to reject God. Hell is the inheritance of all who wilfully turn away from divine love through what is known as mortal or deadly choices for which we have not asked forgiveness. Hopefully, our choices take us in the direction of God. Usually we will know that we have made the wrong choice if we feel uneasy, bored, selfish, restless. But we will know that we have made the right choice if we feel good about it: if we experience, joy, peacefulness, harmony, love, patience, kindness, faith, generosity. While on earth Jesus is with us regardless of our choices. We make the right choices through his help. If we make the wrong choices he holds out his hands to forgive us.