Friday, June 13, 2014

"LET YOUR 'YES' BE 'YES', AND YOUR 'NO' BE 'NO.'"



June 14th, 2014: Matthew 5:33-37.
          The Ten Commandments do not deal directly with oaths and swearing except to say, “you shall not ear false witness,” and “you shall not take the name of the name of the Lord, your God, in vain.” Jesus goes farther in today’s gospel, when he says, still speaking not as an interpreter of God’s law, but as himself the law-giver: “I say to you, do not swear at all.”
He goes on, then, to give examples of what he has just forbidden. Do not swear, he says, by heaven, by the earth, by the holy city Jerusalem, or by your head. The thought behind this list is that all these things are made by God, so swearing by them is really a way of swearing by God without actually pronouncing his name. Such subterfuges are unworthy of those whose lives are centered on God.
“Let your ‘Yes’ mean ‘Yes,” Jesus says, “and your ‘No’ mean No.’”
The person of integrity has no need to reinforce his Yes or No with an oath. When a man and woman come into God’s house to marry, there are no oaths. The priest or deacon who is presiding at the marriage asks the man simply: “John, do you take this woman to be your wedded wife?” He asks the woman, “Mary do you take this man to be your wedded husband?” Each of them answers, “I do.” With those simple questions and answers, the marriage is constituted. It is mutual consent, given without reservation or compulsion, which makes the marriage.
Similarly with a man being ordained as priest or bishop. Again, there are no oaths. The Church requires only that the candidate answer affirmatively to a number of questions about the duties of the office he is assuming. Once these are given, the prayer for the descent of the Holy Spirit, and the laying on of hands by the ordaining bishop follow.
In a beautiful passage in his second Letter to the Corinthians Paul tells us that Jesus is himself Yes personified. Here’s what Paul writes: “The language in which we address you is not an ambiguous blend of Yes and No. The Son of God, Christ Jesus, proclaimed among you by us ... was never a blend of Yes and No. With him it was, and is, Yes. He is the Yes pronounced upon God’s promises, every one of them.” (2 Cor.1, 18ff: New English Bible) To which we joyfully say: “Thanks be to God!”

Thursday, June 12, 2014

"YOU SHALL NOT COMMIT ADULTERY."



Homily for June 13th, 2014: Matthew 5:27-32.
          “You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall not commit adultery.’” Again, as yesterday, we hear Jesus using the passive (“it was said”) as a way to avoid speaking the name of God, which for Jews was forbidden. Scholars call this a “theological passive:” a way of saying, “God said,” without actually speaking God’s name. 
          The next sentence takes our breath away – or would, if we were hearing it for the first time. “But I say to you, everyone who looks at a woman with lust has already committed adultery with her in heart.” If the commandment really means that, which of us can claim to be wholly innocent? Priests often have to deal in the confessional, or in spiritual counseling, with people who are upset, even in anguish, over these words of Jesus. When the priest explains that lustful thoughts are only temptations, until we consent to them, deliberately invite them in, and dwell on them; and that a thousand temptations do not make a single sin, people with tender or scrupulous consciences ask: “But how do I know if I have consented to such thoughts?”
          The only honest answer to that question is: “We don’t know, and we can’t know. As long as we are trying to turn away from lustful thoughts, turning instead to God and others, we’re all right. The Lord doesn’t want us to torment ourselves with worry. He is not a strict policeman just waiting to catch us doing or thinking something bad. God is first, last, and always, a God of mercy.”
          A seminarian approaching ordination to the priesthood told the priest who had been nourishing the young man’s vocation all through seminary: “I have difficulties with celibacy.” The priest’s response: “Well, brother, join the club. If celibacy were easy, it wouldn’t be what it is meant to be: a sacrifice. So don’t be discouraged. Never, ever give up. And when you stumble or fall, as most of us do from time to time, go to confession.”
          Then the priest gave the young man some advice which is good not just for seminarians and priests, but for all of us:  “Remember what our wonderful Pope Francis never tires of telling us: ‘God never gets tired of forgiving us. It is we who grow tired of asking for forgiveness.’”

     

Wednesday, June 11, 2014

JESUS, THE LAWGIVER



Homily for June 12th, 2014. Matthew 5:20-26.
Today’s gospel continues our reading of the Sermon on the Mount, which started last Monday. Speaking about the moral law, based on the Ten Commandments, Jesus shows himself to be not an interpreter of the law, but himself the law-giver. Because perfect observance of all ten Commandments eludes us, interpreters prior to Jesus made exceptions to avoid an overly rigid, literal interpretation. Jesus regards such traditional interpretation not as false, but as inadequate.
He starts with the Commandment, “You shall not kill.” Note how he proceeds: “You have heard that it was said to your ancestors.” The one who had said that was, of course, God. As a pious Jew, Jesus was unwilling to speak the sacred name of God. So he uses the passive: not “God said,” but “it was said.” His Jewish hearers understood that what he really meant was: “God said.”
Jesus then shifts the ground from the act of killing to the emotion that precedes and causes it: anger. With the words, “But I say to you,” Jesus is speaking as only the giver of the law can speak. Modern psychology says that suppressed and unacknowledged emotions can cause neuroses and other mental illnesses. A modern understanding of Jesus’ teaching, therefore, is that we should acknowledge anger, but not act it out. Instead Jesus counsels us to seek reconciliation.
All Israel’s prophets had taught that there could be no true worship without justice. So Jesus gives a concrete example. “If you bring your gift to the altar, and there remember that your brother has something against you, leave your gift there at the altar, go first and be reconciled with your brother, and then come and offer your gift.” Then he gives a kind of “worst case scenario,” describing the possibly disastrous consequences of failing to reconcile. This too has a modern parallel in the example of the wise lawyer who advises his client to “settle out of court.”   
Jesus will go on, in tomorrow’s gospel reading, to deal with the commandment prohibiting adultery. There he sets the bar so high that few indeed can clear it. He thus makes clear that no one has a claim, in strict justice, to salvation. We cannot stand before God  appealing to our good conduct record. Instead we pray, as we do at the start of every Mass, “Lord, have mercy.”

THE THREEFOLD EXPERIENCE OF GOD



Trinity Sunday Year A.  Ex. 34:4b-6, 8-9; 2 Cor.13:11-13; John 3:16-18.
AIM: To explain the doctrine of the Trinity in terms intelligible to the hearers and fruitful for their lives.

          Can we describe God? Down through the ages preachers have asked this question; and never more than on this Trinity Sunday, when we preachers have the task of explaining what it means to say that God is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
          A story beloved of preachers tells of how the great fifth-century North African bishop St. Augustine strolled along the shore of the Mediterranean wondering how to explain the Trinity. As he did so, he saw a little girl going back and forth into the sea, filling a small bucket with water which she poured into a hole she had dug in the sand. “What are you doing, dear?” Augustine asked. “I’m trying to empty the sea into this hole,” the child replied. “How do you think that with your little bucket you can possibly empty this immense ocean into this tiny hole?” Augustine countered. To which the girl replied: “And how do you, with your small head, think you can comprehend the immensity of God?” No sooner had the girl spoken these words than she disappeared. 
          The story contains an important truth. God is a mystery: not in the sense that we can understand nothing about God; but that what we can understand is always less than what we cannot. Pope Benedict, who has a special love for St. Augustine, has put the little girl’s shell into his coat of arms as a reminder of the mystery with which God is surrounded. One thing we can understand, however, is how people have experienced God.
          Our first reading shows us Moses experiencing God in a cloud — a symbol of mystery, for in a cloud we cannot see clearly. The same divine cloud appears at Jesus’ Transfiguration, when his clothes and face shine with heavenly light. A cloud enveloped Jesus at his Ascension. At the Transfiguration Peter, James, and John experience fear, and bow down in worship. Moses does the same in our first reading. The witnesses to Jesus’ Ascension also bowed down in worship. This is the first way people experience God in the Bible: as the utterly Other, whose presence inspires awe and compels worship.
          At the very moment, however, in which Moses was worshiping the true God atop Mount Sinai, his people below were bowing down in worship to a golden calf: a deity of their own devising, who made no demands upon them; who symbolized a superhuman virility and power which, the people vainly imagined, they could harness to their own ends. This is idolatry — for the Bible one of the worst sins there is. We become guilty of idolatry whenever we suppose that prayer and other religious practices give us access to some supernatural power which we can turn on or off like the light switch; which we can use to get whatever we want. God always hears and answers prayer. But he does so in sovereign freedom: not at the time, or in the way that we want — or think we can dictate. God is never at our disposal. We are at his disposal.
          God’s appearance to Moses at the very moment when Moses’ people were committing the ultimate sin of idolatry shows that God is not only mysterious and fearful. He is also tender and compassionate. He is a God of love. This is how Jesus experienced God. Our gospel reading reflects this experience: “God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him might not perish, but might have eternal life.” 
          Jesus devoted the whole of his early life to helping people experience God’s love. He demonstrated this love through deeds of compassion. He illustrated God’s love through stories, his parables, which are still told and pondered twenty centuries later. And on Calvary he gave us the supreme example of love.
          Following Jesus’ resurrection and ascension, his friends came to realize that he had not left them. He was still with them, though the manner of his presence was different. They recalled that Jesus had foretold this:
          “I will not leave you orphans. I will come back to you” (Jn. 14:18).
          “I will ask the Father and he will give you another to be your Advocate, who will be with you forever — the Spirit of truth” (Jn. 14:15).
          “I shall see you again; then your hearts will rejoice with a joy no one can take from you” (Jn. 16:22). This joy at Jesus’ continuing presence is the third way people experience God.
          Pondering these three ways in which people experienced God, the Church developed the doctrine of the Holy Trinity. The God who is one is also three: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. This is the description, in formal religious language, of how we experience God. He is the utterly Other, who inspires awe and worship. But he is also a God of love, a love so amazing, so divine, so undeserved by sinners like ourselves that he kindles within us an answering love: love for God, love for our fellow humans. And whenever we experience God in either of these ways — as the almighty creator and Father of the universe whose presence inspires awe, or in his Son Jesus in whom we see unconditional love in human form — we are experiencing God in and through the power of his Holy Spirit. The Spirit is God at work in our world, and in our hearts and minds, here and now. The Spirit is God’s love: the love exchanged between Father and Son, the love poured into our hearts — not just to give us a warm feeling inside, but to share with others. 
          Our second reading, finally, speaks about this sharing: “Encourage one another, agree with one another, live in peace, and the God of love and peace will be with you.”
          St. Augustine’ words to the little girl are true. God is too immense to get into our small heads. But the threefold experience of God is within the reach of all, even of children. God discloses himself to us in these three ways to lift our eyes from earth to heaven; to make us, through the power of the Holy Spirit, what Jesus was and is: channels and instruments through whom heaven comes down to earth.

Tuesday, June 10, 2014

"FREELY YOU HAVE RECEIVED, FREELY GIVE."



Homily for June 11th, 2014:
          “Without cost you have received; without cost you are to give,” Jesus tells us. Another translation says: “Freely you have received, freely give.” Can you think of something that is all your own, and not a gift from God? What about your achievements: the money you have earned, the awards you may have received? Would any of that be possible without the talents and abilities God has given you? When you stop to think about it, everything we have is given to us by God. There is one exception: our sins. They are all our own. Everything else comes ultimately from God – not because we are good enough to deserve God’s gifts – for none of us is. God showers his gifts on us not as rewards for being good, but simply because He is so good that he wants to share his goodness and love with us. 
          What is the appropriate response? We can describe it in a single word: thanksgiving. Here’s a question we all need to ask ourselves from time to time: Am I a thankful person? If you are a prayerful person – and you would hardly be here if you were not – then you’re probably pretty good at asking God for things. Are you equally good at saying “Thank you,” when your requests are granted? If a long life has taught me anything it is this: grateful people are happy people – no exceptions!
I was born before universal air travel. Americans visiting Europe crossed the Atlantic by ship. In my childhood I remember hearing about the Pastor of a wealthy parish who regretted that so many of his parishioners were lost at sea every summer. When they asked him, How come? he explained: “Lots of my parishioners ask every June for Masses for a safe passage to Europe. Come Labor Day I can count on the fingers of one hand the number of Masses of thanksgiving requested for a safe return.”
What is the best way to thank God for all his gifts? The closing words of our gospel reading tell us: “Freely you have received, freely give.” In other words: we can’t keep God’s gifts, unless we give them away.” And it gets even better. When we do give them away, they come back to us. If you doubt that, just try it!


Monday, June 9, 2014

"YOU ARE SALT ... LIGHT."



Homily for June 10th, 2014: Mathew 5:13-16.
Jesus spoke in simple, everyday language that even children could understand. What could be simpler than the two images Jesus uses in our gospel reading: salt and light? In Jesus’ day soldiers received an allotment of salt as part of their pay. Because the Latin word for salt is sal it was called their salarium, from which we get our word salary. Even today, when someone doesn=t measure up or do his duty we say he=s Anot worth his salt.@ So when Jesus says, AYou are the salt of the earth,@ he is telling us that we are that ingredient in the world which, like salt, may be small in quantity, but which makes all the difference in quality..
Jesus also tells us: AYou are light C the light of the world.@ The first creation tale in Genesis says that creation began when God said: ALet there be light.@ When, in the fullness of time, God=s Son came into the world, he said: AI am the light of the world.@ (Jn 8:12) Pondering those words, and the story of creation in Genesis, Christians came to discern Christ=s role in creation. Hence we say in the Creed: AWe believe in one Lord, Jesus Christ, ... through whom all things were made.@
How dark the world would be if he had never lived! When Jesus says, AYou are the light of the world,@ he is not telling us to become the world=s light, any more than he tells us to become salt. As followers and friends of Jesus Christ, given a share of his life in baptism, we already are salt and light for the world. ABe what you are!@ Jesus is saying. 
Does that mean isolating ourselves from modern society? Some Christians favor that. They are good people. But they are mistaken. To isolate ourselves from others is like putting the lamp which lighted the small one-room house of Jesus= day under a basket. The people who heard Jesus knew that wasn=t what you did with a lamp. You put it on a lampstand where, as Jesus says in today=s gospel, Ait gives light to all in the house. Just so,@ Jesus continues, Ayour light must shine before others, that they may see your good deeds and glorify God.@ Why? Because God is the one who inspires us to do good deeds. And it is God alone who gives us the power to do good C to be what we are: salt to flavor and preserve; and light to shine in the darkness of our world.
Here at these two tables of word and sacrament the Lord first takes us up into his light and then sends us forth to pass on that light to others in a dark world, through a life of joyful service and generous love.

Sunday, June 8, 2014

A CHARTER FOR CHRISTIAN LIVING.



Homily for June 9th, 2014: Matthew 5: 1-12.
          “When Jesus saw the crowds, he went up the mountain, and after he had sat down, his disciples came to him.” In the biblical world mountains were considered places especially close to God. We still have an echo of this idea in the expression, “a mountaintop experience” -- a time in which God’s nearness is clearly felt. Jesus is about deliver a summary of his message. Doing so from a mountainside gives his teaching special weight. And he does so sitting, because in Jewish thought that is the proper posture for a rabbi or official teacher. As we read the gospels, we see that Jesus is a teacher like no other.
          He begins with what we call today the Beatitudes, because of the constant repetition of the word “blessed.” The Greek word which the gospel writer, Matthew, uses is makários. In English that means “happy.” No surprise there: someone blessed by God is happy. Jesus is laying out a charter for Christian living. Being truly happy, he says, requires being concerned about, and bonding, with those who live on the fringes of society: the sick, the lame, the poor, and the hungry. These were the people who heard Jesus most gladly. Many of them would have been in the crowd which heard Jesus there on the mountainside. 
          Jesus is also addressing his words to us. If he were speaking to us today, in our rich and comfortable land, I think he might say: ‘Stop complaining, get up and do something about the poor, the sick, the homeless, those among you who are discouraged, those who mourn.’
          He also wants us to use the Beatitudes as a mirror; to ask ourselves, ‘Am I poor in spirit? Am I humble and merciful? Am I pure of heart? Am I a peacemaker, or do I contribute to conflict through malicious gossip, cynicism, and hate?
          The final Beatitude, the longest and the only one addressed directly to Jesus’ hearers, shocks us – or it would if it had not lost its sharp cutting edge through repetition: “Blessed are you when they insult you and persecute you and utter every kind of evil against you falsely because of me.” How can Jesus call “happy” those who suffer such treatment? Because ill treatment and persecution bring us close to Jesus. And above all because “your reward will be great in heaven” – far greater than we can ever imagine.