Homily for the Week of November 24, 2013

The Solemnity of Christ the King, 2013

2 Samuel 5:1-3

 Psalm 122:1-2, 3-4, 4-5

 Colossians 1:12-20

 Luke 23:35-43

         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 have 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.

         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 right before he died.  Usually, a criminal carried the cross on which he would be nailed an in front of him was a soldier who carried a sign written in Greek, Aramaic and Latin  giving the reason why this man was crucified. But Pontius Pilate decided to change this tradition by he himself writing in charcoal the words Jesus of Nazareth King of the Jews on the top of the cross on which Jesus was nailed.  On some of the crosses you see these words are abbreviated by the letters INRI.

         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.

         But Jesus had none of what we usually associate with a kingly lifestyle. We honor a person who has none of the ways of those kings.  Just try to image the scene when Jesus was publicly named a king: 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.

         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.

         We Christians and Catholic place the cross in prominent places in our homes and often use it as part of what we might wear. But for centuries followers of Jesus were often laughed at for putting their faith in a man who died on a cross. They were embarrassed by the cross because it was considered a punishment best suited for slaves, murderers, and members of the lowest class. Christians were mocked for worshipping a criminal and his cross. But these same Christians began to make the sign of the cross on their forehead and making the sign of the cross like we do today. Objects were blessed by making the sign of the cross over them. By the fourth century the cross was viewed with pride as a symbol of what Jesus suffered for all people. And the crucifix became part of Christian culture.

        

Homily for the Week of November 17, 2013

Thirty-third Sunday in Ordinary Time, 2013 year C

Malachi 3:19-20a; Psalm 98:5-6, 7-8, 9; 2 Thessalonians 3:7-12;  Luke 21:5-19

         Everyone of us face problems we may never be able to solve. Many of them have to do with relationships. Sometimes we try to solve them emotionally rather than by thinking and reason. 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. So too it is with our reading of the Bible. The Bible has to be read by looking at different features of the part we are reading.. First we have to look at who were the authors. The writers of the Bible were always responding to something.  In most cases the author was answering someone's question about a particular situation or about Jesus. As an 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 the personal meaning a passage has for us will vary depending on what is going on in our lives right now. For example a passage about a healing miracle will have a certain meaning for someone who is terribly ill and another meaning for someone who has never been seriously sick. 

         This information on the circumstances surrounding an event is very helpful for approaching today’s readings. Our first reading is from the book of Malachi and our Gospel passage was written by Luke.  They were all both 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.

         Paul faced an interesting problem with the Catholics in Thessalonica. which he describes in our second reading. Many of the Catholics there were so convinced that Jesus would return within their lifetime that they were beginning to abandon the normal tasks of life including their  jobs. Many stopped working. They were afraid that if today or tomorrow was the last day, they did not want to be doing something bad. Paul reminds them that regardless of our last day we still must take care of our daily work and responsibilities.  We must carry out our responsibilities right up until the day of our death. Paul was so serious about this that he told the Christians not to support anyone who would not earn their keep.

         Our Gospel today was written by Luke at 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 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.

         Jesus never promised his followers then or now freedom from trials, from sickness or even from natural disasters like what happened recently in the Philippines.  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 10, 2013

HOMILY: Thirty-second Sunday in Ordinary Time, 2013 C

2 Maccabee 7:1-2, 9-14

 Psalm 17

2 Thessalonians 2:16-3:5

 Luke 20:27-38

         We usually think that all Jews of first century Palestine believed the same things. To appreciate today’s Gospel we should understand that the Jews of Jesus’ day were as divided in their beliefs as are modern day Christians.

         One of the biggest divisions in Judaism was between the Pharisees and the Sadducees. The Sadducees accepted only the written tradition of the first five books of the Bible as God’s Word. The Pharisees, on the other hand, accepted both the written and the oral traditions of the 46 books of the Old Testament Bible plus the writings of some of the Jewish rabbis.. Pharisees believed in life after death; Sadducees did not. In today’s Bible reading, some Sadducees confront Jesus over His shared belief with the Pharisees regarding life after death. We Catholics call this everlasting life.

         People in the United States have mixed feelings about death.  On one hand, we spend lots of time and money trying to 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 delaying our day of 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 have to face the death of someone we know well or probably the sadness of all: the death of a young child.  Or we 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.

What Jesus did is to tell us clearly that the life to come is nothing like the life we know now. 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. 

         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 has been. 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.

         Our Catholic 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.

         At this time of the year as nature begins to shut down for a few months, our Catholic religion is reminding us of the temporary nature of all things and of our own mortality. But in today’s Bible readings it also reminds us of the hope we have, that God is not only the God of the living but also the God who continues to create. Through Jesus God  is also creating a new world, he is calling us to a new life. This new life is not  just something we can expect to get automatically, which our present day culture tries to lead us to believe.  It is a place we are all invited into, but whether we enter depends on our free choice as to whether we follow the way of Jesus has shown us. Jesus  has made that very clear: I am the way he told us. It is not just an intellectual assent Jesus is asking of us; it involves being willing to hear Jesus telling us what we must do and must not do.

Homily for the Week of November 3, 2013

Thirty-first Sunday in Ordinary Time, 2013
Wisdom 11:22--12:1
Psalms 145:1-2, 8-9, 10-11, 13, 14
2 Thessalonians 1:11--2:2
Luke 19:1-10

How many times have we judged and found ourselves to be wrong? We often have a very hard time accepting a core American belief that a person is innocent until proven guilty. We see this especially when we read the stories of trials of individuals whom we may know. We easily make a judgment on the basis of of limited and incomplete information,

Today, like last Sunday, Jesus tells us a story about a tax collector. As I mentioned last Sunday tax collectors were hated, and chief tax collectors were the most hated. Tax collectors kept a percentage of the taxes they collected as a salary. If a tax collector wanted a raise he could simply overestimate the amount of taxes owed and then keep his legal cut and the illegal overage.

Today we are told about a tax collector whose name is Zaccheaus. He is a short guy who wants to see Jesus. He lived and was a tax collector in Jericho, not the Jericho on the Rand Hill Road, but Jericho which is about 23 miles from Jerusalem. Persons who lived in Jericho were among the wealthiest Jews and Romans. Jericho was the vacation resort for the wealthy Jews and Romans. It is perhaps the oldest city in the world dating to about 4000 years ago, and the lowest city on earth at 770 feet below sea level. It was known for its palm trees and also for the balsam trees. It was said that the smell of balsam perfumed the air for miles around Jericho. Wealth meant lots of taxes. Zacchaeus was a chief tax collector so he also got a cut from the other tax collectors. He had become rich by filling his own pockets with money extorted in his work. But he was also hated. He collected taxes for the Roman military government which was occupying Palestine.

Like last Sunday’s Bible story Jesus seemed to be hanging out with people considered unacceptable by the rest of the community, especially by the religious leaders. The people who could afford to live or vacation in Jericho were not the sort who were looking for what Jesus had to offer.

But Zacchaeus was missing something. He was missing someone. Despite his great wealth and his important position in the government, Zacchaeus was poor, and he knew it. He was a prisoner of his self-centered life. He was looking for someone to set him free. But he was a short man. He needed to see Jesus but could not because of his size. So acts in a most unbecoming way. He climbs a sycamore tree. When Jesus sees how far out on a limb Zacchaeus has gone, Jesus calls out to him: COME DOWN QUICKLY, FOR TODAY I MUST STAY AT YOUR HOUSE. Grumbling and criticism of Jesus for staying with a sinner immediately follow. But the risk Jesus takes for Zacchaeus is worth it. And Zacchaeus came down the tree.

But when Jesus reached out to him, Zacchaeus changed. The people had judged Zacchaeus to be the worst of all tax collectors. But then, when they stood with Jesus, they discovered the error of their judgment. The crowd had judged and condemned the man based on what they thought they knew, not on the truth. Once at his house Zacchaeus confesses to Jesus. He wasn’t the bad person everyone thought he was. His wealth was not an obstacle to holiness. He gave half of his possessions to the poor. If he had extorted money from anyone he would give 4 times what he might have taken. Jesus does not ask Zacchaeus to leave behind his profession nor to give away the rest of his possessions. Rather, he meets him in the place of his seeking and opens up a saving way forward within his circumstances.

Might there be a little Zaccheaus in each of us?. Though Zacchaeus wanted to see Jesus, it is Jesus who sees him first, and invites himself to his house. In seeking to find Jesus we are often found by him. Jesus often told us that he came to seek and to find the lost. But Zacchaeus is also found because he was willing to be laughed at by others. Jesus celebrates a conversion. Zacchaeus is praised by Jesus, not necessarily for practicing any particular Christian virtue, but by living up to the Law of Moses and Abraham.

Like Zaccheaus each of us are wealthy in many significant ways--in our life and talents, in our opportunities, in our friendships, in our Catholic faith. And so we need to ask ourselves whether we are as generous as was Zacchaeus in using our gifts. Most people did not like Zaccheaus. But Jesus recognized something good in him. How do we treat those we do not like? or
who may have different opinions than we have? Some kids treat these persons by bullying them. Do we ever use our strength and power to intimidate others?

It should also be noted that Zacchaeus , this little fellow, knew that somehow his life was incomplete without Jesus. And he did not allow his short stature to become an excuse for not seeking Jesus. Jesus wants to be a guest in all our houses. Our desire to welcome him will easily cancel any feelings of unworthiness that may hold us back.

Each day is the “today” of Jesus’ inviting Himself into our lives. Jesus welcomes us back from whatever distance we have wandered. He welcomes us back to the relationship with His sisters and brothers. Jesus welcomes us back to who we really are in God’s eyes and invites us to see ourselves anew and live that newness. Zacchaeus was not without sin, but when he faced Jesus, he changed. Jesus always reaches out to us, especially in times we don’t expect it. And that also will change us.