Friday, November 7, 2014

"YOU CANNOT SERVE GOD AND MAMMON."



          The sayings of Jesus which Luke has collected into today’s gospel reading are comments on what we heard in yesterday’s reading. That was about the unjust steward who realized that he was about to lose his job because of mismanaging his employer’s property. To assure himself of friends who would be indebted to him, and might offer him future employment after he was let go, he calls in the people who owe money to his master’s estate and settles their debts for fifty cents on the dollar. To our surprise Jesus commends the steward “for acting prudently.” Jesus does not praise the man’s dishonesty. He praises his prudence. Realizing that the knife is at his throat, the man acts, desperately, to ensure his future.    
          Today’s gospel continues Jesus’ teaching about money, for which he uses the ancient Hebrew word mammon. This culminates in the sayings, “No servant can serve to masters. … You cannot serve God and mammon.” Jesus is not saying that money and possessions are bad. Nothing that God has made is bad; indeed everything that comes from God is good. It participates in some measure in the absolute goodness of God the Creator. What is at stake is how we use money. Used to support people and causes we love, money is good. Given the central place in our lives by trying to amass more and more and more, money makes us unhappy and frustrated (as people who give money the central place in their lives soon discover) – because we find we can never get enough.
          Jesus’ personal religion taught the law of tithing: giving the Lord out of gratitude, the first claim on our money and possessions. For most Catholics that seems so out of reach to be almost preposterous. There is one place in our country, however, where tithing is a reality: the diocese of Wichita, Kansas. There, after decades of teaching, tithing is all but universal. One consequence is that whereas all other dioceses are struggling to maintain Catholic schools in the face of today’s rising costs, all the Catholic schools in the Wichita diocese are tuition free! Another consequence: the Wichita diocese has almost as many seminarians as does our own archdiocese of St. Louis – which has five times the Catholic population of Wichita.   
        Think about that, friends. Above all, pray about it.  

Thursday, November 6, 2014

THE UNJUST STEWARD



Homily for November 7th, 2014: Luke 16:1-8.         
“The master commended that dishonest steward for acting prudently.” From antiquity Bible commentators have disputed about who is meant by “the master.” Is he the man’s employer – or Jesus himself? It is difficult to believe that the praise can have come from an employer who has just told his steward – we would call him a manager -- that he is about to be fired. So the praise must come from Jesus himself. How is that possible? Clever the manager may have been. But honest? Hardly. How can Jesus praise what all can see is a swindle?
          Jesus does not praise the manger’s dishonesty. He praises the man’s ability to recognize his desperate situation. For him, it is now or never. Jesus addresses the parable to those who remain indifferent to his message. The story is Jesus’ attempt to shake them out of their complacency. His message confronted them with the need to decide: for him, or against him. To postpone this decision, to continue living as if nothing had changed, with the attitude of “business-as-usual”, was in fact to decide against Jesus. That meant disaster. Trapped in what looks like a hopeless situation, the manager cleverly finds a way out and acts while there was still time. It is this cleverness and enterprise which Jesus commends, not the man’s dishonesty.
Jesus Christ asks us for the same decision today: for him, or against him. It is not a once-for-all decision – something like learning to ride a bicycle: once you’ve learned, you know it for life. Our decision for Jesus Christ needs to be renewed every day.
For those who are trying to renew their decision for Jesus Christ every day, joy awaits, beyond our imagining: eternal life with Him who alone can fulfill the deepest longings of our hearts.

Wednesday, November 5, 2014

"YOU ARE THE TEMPLE OF GOD."



Dedication of St. John Lateran: November 9th, 2014.
Ezek. 47:1-2, 8-9, 12; 1 Cor. 9c-11,16-17; John 2:13-22.
AIM: To help the hearers understand our calling as God=s temples.

          Is the Bible a Christian book? Just about any of us would answer this question in the affirmative. Of course it=s a Christian book, we would say. While that is not wrong, most of the Bible is not about Christians at all, but about Jews.  Even the New Testament is almost entirely about Jews. Jesus was a Jew, like his mother Mary and St. Joseph. Jesus= twelve apostles and almost all his first followers were also Jews. 
The Jewish people possessed, in Bible times, a special place of worship: the Jerusalem temple. It was built by King Solomon, son of the great King David. The  temple was the earthly dwelling place of the God who had chosen them from all the peoples on earth to be his own. As a mark of his special favor God had given them the Ten Commandments: not a fence to hem them in, but ten words of wisdom which, if followed, would lead to happiness and fulfillment for the people and each individual. 
As a devout Jew, Jesus worshiped regularly in the Jerusalem temple. The building he knew was not the one built by Solomon, however. That had been destroyed several centuries earlier by enemies who conquered Jerusalem and carried its inhabitants off to exile in Babylon. After their return to Jerusalem the people built a new temple on the site of the old one.
It was this rebuilt, second temple, which Jesus knew. There he was brought as an infant to be dedicated to God. There, at age twelve, he was found by his anxious parents after a frantic three-day search. There, as we heard in the gospel reading, he overturned the tables of the money-changers, rebuking people for turning God=s house into a marketplace.
That temple did not long survive Jesus. Not forty years after his death and resurrection Jerusalem was again plundered; this time by the Romans, who pulled down the temple that Jesus had known, and in which Peter and the other first Christians continued to worship even after Jesus= resurrection and ascension. Now, Paul writes in our second reading, we are God=s temple: ADo you not know that you are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwells in you?@
Today Catholics all over the world celebrate the dedication of a Christian temple: the Church of St. John Lateran in Rome. Though less well known than St. Peter=s basilica, St. John Lateran and not St. Peter’s is the Pope=s cathedral as Bishop of Rome. It is customary in every diocese or local church throughout the world to celebrate the dedication of the cathedral, the bishop=s church. We celebrate this feast in St. Louis on October twelfth.  Because the Pope is the chief shepherd of the whole church, we celebrate the dedication of his cathedral each year on the ninth of November. Only when that date falls on a Sunday, however, do most Catholics become aware of the observance.                                           
The preface to the eucharistic prayer, which we shall hear in a few moments, helps us to appreciate the significance of today=s celebration: AIn your benevolence you are pleased to dwell in this house of prayer in order to perfect us as the temple of the Holy Spirit, supported by the perpetual help of your grace and resplendent with the glory of a life acceptable to you.”  Even as we celebrate the dedication of a building, therefore, the church=s public prayer reminds us that the most important temple is the one built not of stones, but of people. 
The parish which I formerly served as pastor used to attract many visitors. They would often remark: AFather, you have a beautiful church.@ To which I always replied:
AThank you. And we think the building is nice too.@
The church is people before it is a building. AThe temple of God, which you are,@ Paul writes in our second reading, Ais holy.@  AHoly@ means Aset apart@, removed from ordinary use, set apart for God. It is in this sense that a chalice is holy. It is not an ordinary cup. It is used only for the Lord=s Precious Blood. This building in which we worship is holy: it is not a dance hall, an auditorium, or a theater. It is set apart for worship.
We too are people set apart. When did that happen, you ask? In baptism!  The Catechism says: ABaptism not only purifies from all sins, but also makes the neophyte [the newly baptized person] >a new creature,= an adopted son of God, who has become a >partaker of the divine nature,= member of Christ and co-heir with him, and a temple of the Holy Spirit.@ [No. 1265]  The whole of the Christian life, therefore, is not a striving after high ideals which constantly elude us. It is living up to what, through baptism, we already are: temples, dwelling places of God=s Holy Spirit.
Today, therefore, we celebrate not merely the dedication of a building: the Pope=s cathedral in Rome. We celebrate no less our own dedication as people set apart for God. What that means in daily life St. Paul tells us in stirring words in his letter to the Philippians: AShow yourselves guileless and above reproach, faultless children of God in a warped and crooked generation, in which you shine like stars in a dark world and proffer the world of life@ (2:15)
Dear sisters and brothers in the Lord: there is no call higher than that, no life more worth living.

"MORE JOY OVER ONE SINNER .. . "



Homily for November 6th, 2014: Luke 15:1-10.
          Had Jesus said, “There is joy in heaven over one sinner who repents,” we’d say: “Well sure.” But that is not all that Jesus said. He added a word to that sentence. “There is more joy in heaven,” he actually said, “than over ninety-nine people who have no need of repentance.” How do we respond to that? I think the first response that comes to most of is: “Now, wait a minute. Shouldn’t there be some joy at least over the ninety-nine who have need of repentance?” 
          To answer to that question we need to ask another: Who are these ninety-nine who have no need of repentance? Do you know anyone like that? I don’t. Oh, I know many people who think they have no need of repentance. But they are wrong. How can there be any joy over people who are so mistaken about their true spiritual state? We all fall short at some time, and in some way. We all need to repent, the saints included. Catholics have always believed that the only person who has never sinned, and has therefore no need to repent, is the Lord’s mother, Mary.
          The two parables in today’s gospel tell us that God’s love for us is not measured, limited, or prudent. It is, judged by human standards, over the top, reckless. For a shepherd to leave the whole flock of sheep untended, in order to find just one who had strayed, risked turning a minor misfortune, the loss of one, into a major disaster: the dispersal of the whole flock. For the woman who has lost a single coin from the family’s meager savings to throw a party which surely cost far more than the one coin lost and then found, was crazy. Could Jesus have remembered his mother doing something like that during his boyhood? It is quite possible.
          The two parables are Jesus’ answer to his critics’ complaint at the beginning of today’s gospel: “This man receives sinners, and eats with them.” What for those critics was a scandal is, for us, good news. It tells us that however far we stray, the Lord is close to us. His love for us has no limit, and no end. That is the good news. That is the gospel.

Tuesday, November 4, 2014

COUNTING THE COST



          Homily for Nov. 5th, 2014: Luke 14:25-33.
AIf anyone comes after me,@ Jesus says, Awithout hating his father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple.@ In speaking about Ahating@ those dearest to us, Jesus was using a Semitic word which meant simply detaching one=s self from someone or something. He was saying that He must come first.
AWhich of you wishing to construct a tower,@ Jesus begins, Adoes not first sit down and calculate the cost?@ It was the dream of every small farmer in Palestine in Jesus= day to have a proper tower on his property. During harvest time he could sleep in the tower, keeping watch for trespassers and predatory animals, to insure himself against loss.
Valuable as such a tower might be, Jesus= hearers also knew that it would be folly to start building one without first calculating whether the available resources were sufficient to complete the job. If not, the farmer would have nothing to show for his hard work but some useless foundations. And his friends would laugh at him for his imprudence.
The second parable begins differently: not Awhich of you ...@, but Awhat king ...@ That too was easy to understand, even though none of Jesus= hearers were kings with an army at their disposal. Common to both parables is the sentence about first counting the cost. If you want to be my disciple, Jesus says, count the cost. First reflect. Then act. So let=s reflect. If following Jesus Christ really means putting him first B ahead of money, possessions, success, ahead of those we love most B if Christian discipleship means that, which of us could say with confidence that we had the necessary amount of self-denial and staying power?
Does that mean that we should not try to follow Jesus Christ? Of course not. It does mean, however, that we should never try to do this in dependence on our own resources alone. If today=s gospel is good news, it is because of what it does not say: that there are resources for Christian discipleship available to us which are adequate. What we could never achieve on our own, we can achieve if we depend not on our own strength, but on the strength that comes from God alone.   
That is why Jesus tells us in several places to become Alike little children.@ Little children are naturally dependent on others. It never occurs to them that they can make it on their own. As children grow, we encourage them to become more and more independent. That is fine in the things of this world.
In spiritual things, however, and hence in our relationship with God, we must unlearn that spirit of independence which, in worldly affairs, is the difference between childhood and maturity. When it comes to following Jesus Christ, we dare not trust in our own resources. Jesus never asks us to fight against impossible odds. He does not want us to build with inadequate resources. That is why he gives us his resources. They are always adequate. If we trust in the power which God alone can give us, we are safe. We can build with confidence. We can fight confident of victory.

Monday, November 3, 2014

PROCRASTINATION



Homily for November 4th, 2014. Luke 14:15-24.
          Some Scripture commentators suggest that the host in the parable we have just heard was a tax collector. His party is an attempt to break into society by inviting the leading citizens of the town and providing lavish entertainment. His guests have all told him, in the offhand way that people do, that  they’d be happy to come to his house. “Any time,” they’ve all said. When the invitations arrive, however, it turns out that these acceptances were insincere. The excuses offered are so flimsy as to be almost pathetic.
          Jesus’ hearers would have smiled as they heard of the frustration of the host’s plans. He thought he was going to make a big splash. Now all his guests have stood him up. The man’s growing anger enhances the humor of the situation. He resolves to repay the insults of his intended guests with an insult of his own. He will give a party for people whom those originally invited hold in contempt. That will show them! 
          The parable, like many others, contains a warning — but also good news. The warning is the exclusion of those first invited. They represent Jesus’ critics: people confident that the best seats at the banquet were reserved for them. They assume that there will be other opportunities, other invitations. Too late, they discover that this was their final chance.    
          The parable’s good news is contained in the description of the substitute 
guests. They are a portrait of Luke's own Christian community: “the poor, the blind, the crippled, the lame.” The parable’s good news is its assurance that God welcomes not just the fit and strong, people whose good moral character makes them role models and leaders. The Lord who was reproached in his earthly life for welcoming sinners and eating with them continues to do the same today. To claim a place at his table we need to show him not our successes but our failures; not our strength but our weakness; not health but sickness.
          Preaching on this parable back in 2006, Pope Benedict XVI told about bishops from Western countries, Europe especially, telling him on their visits to Rome about how people refuse the Lord’s invitation to his banquet. Yet at the same time, the Pope said, “I also hear this, precisely from the Third World: that people listen, that they come, that even today the message spreads along the roads to the very ends of the earth, and that people crowd into God’s hall for the banquet.”
          Are you among them?

Sunday, November 2, 2014

"INVITE THE POOR, THE LAME, THE BLIND."



Homily for November 3rd, 20914: Luke 14:12-14.
          “When you hold a banquet,” Jesus says, “invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind.” He directs these words to his host, whom Luke describes as “one of the leading Pharisees,” clearly a person of social prominence. We get an idea of the other guests at this Sabbath dinner from Jesus’ words about those his host should not invite: “your friends, your brothers or sisters or your relatives, or your wealthy neighbors.” Those were the people Jesus saw when he looked around him at this dinner. “They may invite you back,” Jesus says, “and you have repayment.”
          Invite people, Jesus is telling his host, who cannot repay you. When you do that,  “you will be repaid at the resurrection of the righteous.” What Jesus clearly means is that then God will repay you. And his repayment is the only one worth receiving.
            Instead of inviting people from whom you can expect gratitude and some kind of repayment, Jesus says, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind. If you do that, Jesus continues, you will be “blessed indeed.” That means, you will be truly happy; for you will receive a reward which is infinitely beyond the greatest of earthly rewards, since it will come from God himself.
          Jesus reinforces this teaching with his own example. When does he do this, you ask? He does it at every Mass! We who are Jesus’ invited guests here at the table of Jesus’ word, and the sacramental table of his Body and Blood are spiritually poor. Our sins cripple us and make us lame. And too often we are blind to the greatness and depth of his love for us. St. Augustine says that God loves each and every one of us as if, in the whole world, there were only one person to love.
          So this little story, about Jesus attending a dinner with a group of elite guests, turns out to be Good News for us. It tells us, once again, that Jesus loves us with a love that will never let us go.