"IF THE WORLD HATES YOU . . . "

Homily for May 5^th, 2018: John 15:18-21.

          “If the world hates you, realize that it hated me first,” Jesus says in today’s gospel.. Does the world really hate us? I’m sorry to tell you: It does. When we say, publicly and openly, that abortion at any stage of pregnancy, is the deliberate killing of a baby, a crime as grave as the killing of a human being at any age between birth and natural death, the world calls us misogynists, haters of women, enemies of their “reproductive freedom,” who are waging a war on women.

          When we say, publicly and openly, that marriage is exclusively the lifelong union of one man and on woman, rooted in our God given human nature, for the sake not only of uniting hearts and minds, but also for parenthood, we are called homophobes, bigots, enemies of equality as reprehensible as those who defended segregated schools, waiting rooms, and lunch counter in yesteryear’s Jim Crow South.

          The world hates us for saying these things and tells us: “You should be ashamed.” These teachings are not merely personal opinions, as a parishioner told me not long ago when I stated from the pulpit the Church’s teaching about marriage. They are the teaching of the Catholic Church.

          There is a way to avoid this hatred, and it is this: simply be silent about such matters. Then we can continue to go to Mass, and identify ourselves publicly as Catholics without arousing hatred; because the world knows, with a wink and a nod, that there are also “good Catholics”: sensible, modern people who don’t upset anyone by mentioning such matters; because such Catholics agree with those who hate us that the Church’s teachings are outdated, obsolete, and hence, for Catholics, optional and dispensable. Friends, nothing in our Catholic faith is optional or dispensable, any more than any one of the teachings of Jesus Christ is optional. It was Jesus’ refusal to compromise, or be silent, about anything he said that brought him to the cross.

One day each one of us will stand before God in judgment. One of the questions we shall be asked is this: Were you ever ashamed of the gospel? Did you keep silent about any part of it, or did you deny it, out of fear that you would make people uncomfortable or even angry? The answers to those questions will determine, one day, where, how, and with whom, we shall spend eternity. Think about that. More important, pray about it.

THE BOY WHO MET JESUS

Homily for May 4^th, 2018: John 15:12-17.

          “Love one another as I love you,” Jesus tells us in today’s gospel. Six years ago a book was published about a 15-year old penniless boy in the African country of Rwanda who had a special experience of Jesus’ love. The book was called The Boy who Met Jesus. The boy’s name was Segatashya. He had never been to school or a church. He had never seen a Bible. Resting under a shade tree one day in 1982, he was visited by Jesus, who asked Segatashya if he’d be willing to go on a mission to show people how to live a life that leads to heaven.

         Segatashya accepted the assignment under one condition: that Jesus answer all his questions  --  about faith, religion, the purpose of life, and the nature of heaven and hell. Jesus agreed to the boy’s terms, and Segatashya set off on what would become a most miraculous journey.

“What you need to know is this,” Segatashya told the book’s author. “Jesus knows us all to the very depths of our souls, all our dreams and worries, all hopes and fears, all our goodness

and all our weakness. He can see our sins and faults and wants nothing more than for us to heal our hearts and cleanse our souls so that we can love him as immea­surably as he loves us. When he sends us suffering, he does it only to strengthen our spirits so we'll be strong enough to fight off Satan, who wants to destroy us, so that one day we can bask in the glory of Jesus’ presence forever.”

            In the first reading last Tuesday we heard Paul telling the Christian community at Antioch:  “It is necessary for us to undergo many hardships to enter the Kingdom of God.”  I discovered those words myself  some 75 years ago. They have helped me through I couldn’t tell you how many trials ever since.

          “I no longer call you slaves,’ Jesus tells us in today’s gospel. “I have called you friends, because I have told you everything I have learned from my Father.” Segatashya must have heard those words, for he told the book’s author: “When I was with him, I never wanted to leave. If he asked me to come and be with him now, I would leave this world for­ever without the slightest hesitation. To be near him is to live in love; no words need be spoken. In his presence, your soul is at peace and completely joyous. Know that his love is real, and that it is eternal and ours to have if we love him and do his will on earth. Ask him into your heart, and all his graces are yours. He will refuse you nothing. If you were able to know only one truth in your life, you should know this truth: Jesus loves you.”

          Sadly, the young man who spoke those words was killed in the Rwandan slaughter of 1984. Our Christian faith gives us reason to hope that we’ll meet him one day in heaven.

"LAST HE WAS SEEN BY ME."

Homily for May 3^rd, 2016: 1 Cor. 15:1-8.

          “Last of all, he was seen by me, as one born out of due time,” Paul writes at the end of today’s first reading for feast of the Apostles Philip and James. To have personally seen the risen Lord was one of the original qualifications for the office of apostle. In just eleven days, on the feast of the apostle Matthias, chosen to replace the traitor Judas, we will hear Peter saying that the one chosen to fill out the number of twelve apostles must be “one of those who was of our company when the Lord Jesus moved among us, from the baptism of John until the day he was taken up from us.” Only such a person, Peter said, was qualified to be a “witness with us to the resurrection” (cf. Acts 1:21f).

          The eleven remaining apostles chose two men who fitted the requirements stated by Peter. By casting lots between them, they left the choice of the substitute apostle to God. They did everything correctly. Yet God seems to have had other plans. For after the day of his naming as an apostle, Matthias disappears into obscurity, and we hear nothing more of him.

          The man about whom we hear a great deal is the zealous defender of his Jewish faith, Saul, given the name Paul in baptism following his dramatic conversion to faith in Jesus Christ in the encounter with him outside Damascus.

From that day on Paul insisted that on that day he had seen the risen Lord. For after listing the other resurrection appearances – the one to “five hundred brothers at once,” and to the apostle James, known to us only from this passage – Paul says: “Last of all he was seen by me, as one born out of the normal course.” This qualified him, Paul always insisted, to be a “witness to the risen Lord,” and as such an apostle.   

Paul’s story is fascinating – another example of God disclosing himself, as he does over and again in Holy Scripture, as the God of surprises -- indeed the God of the humanly impossible.

"THAT MY JOY MAY BE IN YOU."

Homily for May 6th, 2018: Sixth Sunday of Easter, Year B; John 15: 9-17.

AIM: To show the hearers the way to Christian joy.

Was Jesus a joyful person? Or was he sad and serious? The gospels show us that he was both: serious, even sad, when that was appropriate; yet so filled with joy that he could say, in today=s gospel: AI have told you this so that my joy may be in you and your joy might be complete.@

What gave Jesus joy? The beauties of nature, surely. Which one of us has never rejoiced at a beautiful sunset? Is it conceivable that Jesus too did not rejoice in the beauties of nature? He had a special reason for joy that we cannot have: the knowledge that everything he saw, heard, and felt C the wind in his hair, the warm sun on his face and bare arm, the beauties of mountain, field, forest, and sea C that it all came from the hand of the One whom he called by that intimate word: Abba C which in Jesus= language means not just father but Daddy.

How Jesus must have rejoiced when little children clamored to be taken into his arms, or climbed onto his lap. And what joy he must have felt when he healed people: to see the cripple walking, the bent woman standing up straight, the blind seeing for the first time the beauties of the world all round them and the faces of those they had previously known only by touch and the sound of their voices. 

The deepest source of Jesus= joy, however, was his relationship with his heavenly Father. At every moment of his life, in every circumstance, Jesus knew that he was deeply loved by his Father C that he was, as we might say, the apple of his Father=s eye. Every day Jesus realized anew that wherever he might go that day, with whomever he spoke, in whatever situation he might find himself, he remained in his Father=s loving embrace. 

Jesus= consciousness of a special relationship with his heavenly Father started early. We see evidence of it when the twelve-year-old boy stayed behind in Jerusalem in order (as he told his parents after their three-day frantic search), Athat I might be in my Father=s house@ or as some translations have it, Aabout my Father=s business@ (Lk 2:49). Not even Jesus= anguished cry on the cross, AMy God, my God, why have you forsaken me?@ broke Jesus= awareness of his Father=s love and care.  Jesus was speaking the first words of Psalm 22, an anguished prayer for help in suffering. The psalm concludes with an affirmation of faith in God: AYou who fear the Lord, praise him ... For he has not spurned ... the wretched man in his misery ... but when he cried out to him, he heard him...@ In speaking the psalm=s opening words, Jesus was affirming also those final words of trust in God=s protection. Even amid the pains of a horrible death, Jesus knew that his Father continued to care for him. 

Jesus= greatest joy of all came after his resurrection. Raised now to a new higher form of life, Jesus was free from earthly limitations: he could appear even behind locked doors. Imagine the joy Jesus must have experienced at seeing the expressions of shocked disbelief on the faces of his frightened friends C soon turning to exultant jubilation as they realized it was truly the Master they had known and loved, gloriously alive again, victorious over our last enemy: death. 

We all like to surprise people. What fun those resurrection appearances must have been for Jesus; joyful for his friends, and even more joyful for him!  

Jesus wants us to have this joy too. He tells us this in today=s gospel: AI have told you this that my joy may be in you and your joy might be complete.@ What is he telling us? Two things: first, that he loves us, as the Father loves him. AAs the Father loves me, so I love you.@ Was that just long ago and far away?  Don=t you believe it!  Jesus is speaking these words right now C to you!

Second, Jesus tells us: ARemain in my love.@ How? Jesus explains at once: AIf you keep my commandments you will remain in my love.@ What is the commandment above all that Jesus is talking about? He tells us in the words that immediately follow: AThis is my commandment: love one another as I love you.@  Jesus goes on to explain the kind of love he is talking about: not a warm feeling inside, but a costly love which gives and goes on giving. ANo one has greater love than this, to lay down one=s life for one=s friends.@ That is what Jesus did for us. That is what he asks us to do for one another. 

Let me give you an example. A married woman I know, not in our parish, decided some thirty years ago, when her first child was born, to give up the rewarding professional career for which she had spent years preparing. She would devote herself full-time to motherhood. Many women in today=s society cannot afford that choice. She could, and did. In some quarters that is called Astaying at home and baking cookies@, and looked down on as a cop-out. This mother thought of it not as a cop-out but as a sacrifice C but a sacrifice she was glad to make. She is the mother today of three children, now adults, that many parents would kill for. On Valentine=s Day, years ago, her then 18-year-old son presented his mother and younger sister with a dozen red roses. He had bought them out of his allowance. Where does a high-school senior get the idea of making a sacrifice like that? I can tell you where this young man got it: from his mother. Her decision decades ago to forego the prestige of a professional career, and the second income it would have brought, in order to work full-time at the arduous task of motherhood was a real laying down of her life for others. As Jesus promised, that sacrifice has brought joy: to her, to her husband, to the children God has given them. The son who presented the roses is a graduate of the Naval Academy in Annapolis and now a captain in the Marines. His older brother is a graduate of a college that admits fewer than 7 percent of those who apply for admission.

There are many other examples of this laying down one=s life for others. We have some right here in our parish. You can tell these people by the joy on their faces C the joy which Jesus promised when he told us that he wanted his joy to be ours. 

More than half a century ago a wise and holy Englishwoman named Evelyn Underhill wrote about joy as follows:

This is the secret of joy. We shall no longer strive for our own way; but commit ourselves, easily and simply, to God=s way, acquiesce in his will and in so doing find our peace. 

There are people here today who have experienced the truth of those words.  If you are not yet one of them, Jesus Christ is inviting you to begin C right now!

"I AM THE TRUE VINE."

Homily for May 2^nd, 2018: John 15:1-8.

“I am the true vine, and my Father is the vine grower.” Some Bible scholars think that Jesus spoke these words as he crossed the Temple courtyard with his eleven still faithful friends after the Last Supper. It was Passover time, so there would have been a full moon. The golden vine around the Temple wall, which symbolized God’s people, glowed in the moonlight. Pointing first to himself, then to the vine, Jesus says: AI am the true vine, and my Father is the vine grower ...@

In calling himself the true vine, Jesus implies a contrast. God=s people, the vine he had brought out of Egypt and planted in a new land, had not been true. Jesus had been true. His death the next day would be Jesus= final act of faithful obedience to his Father=s will. He was calling the little band of friends accompanying him to imitate his faithfulness ABy this is my Father glorified, that you bear much fruit and become my disciples.”

  To do this, they must remain united with him. ARemain in me, as I remain in you. Just as a branch cannot bear fruit on its own unless it remains on the vine, so neither can you unless you remain in me.@ The person who remains united with him, Jesus says, Awill bear much fruit.@

AMy Father is the vine grower,@ Jesus says. He cares for the branches of his vine in two ways: by pruning those that bear fruit, and by cutting off and burning the unfruitful branches. Jesus= words about these unfruitful branches being thrown into a fire and burned are an implied reference to Judas, who was even then betraying the Lord.

The vine grower=s treatment of the fruitful branches seems at first sight severe: AEvery one that [bears fruit] he prunes so that it bears more fruit.@ The image, easily understood by Jesus= hearers, who were familiar with vineyards and grapes, is that of a gardener pinching off the new green shoots on a vine, so that all the growth can be concentrated in the few early blooming branches which the gardener has selected to bear fruit. 

Faced in life with setbacks, injustice, or suffering B as all of us are, at some time or other B which one of us has not asked: AWhy me? What have I done to deserve this?@ Jesus= words in today=s gospel do not answer these questions. Instead his words challenge us to view setbacks, injustice, and suffering as opportunities to grow. He is inviting us to submit to the vine grower=s pruning, and so to glorify him by producing abundant fruit.

 

HARDSHIPS -- AND PEACE.

Homily for May 1^st, 2018: Acts of the Apostles 14:19-28; John 14:27-31a.

          Five years ago a book was published with the interesting title: The Boy who Met Jesus. It told the story of a 15-year-old penniless boy in the African country of Rwanda named Segatashya who had never been to school or a church, and had never seen a Bible. Resting under a shade tree one day in 1982, he was visited by Jesus, who asked Segatashya if he’d be willing to go on a mission to remind people how to live a life that leads to heaven.

         Segatashya accepted the assignment on one condition: that Jesus answer all his questions  --  about faith, religion, the purpose of life, and the nature of heaven and hell. Jesus agreed to the boy’s terms, and Segatashya set off on what would become a most miraculous journey. Some of what the young man learned confirms things we have heard in our two readings.

“What you need to know is this,” Segatashya told the book’s author. “Jesus knows us all to the very depths of our souls, all our dreams and worries, all hopes and fears, all our goodness

and all our weakness. He can see our sins and faults and wants nothing more than for us to heal our hearts and cleanse our souls so that we can love him as immea­surably as he loves us. When he sends us suffering, he does it only to strengthen our spirits so we'll be strong enough to fight off Satan, who wants to destroy us, so that one day we can bask in the glory of his presence forever.”

            Paul says something similar in our first reading: “It is necessary for us to undergo many hardships to enter the Kingdom of God.”  I discovered those words over 70 years ago. They have helped me through I couldn’t tell you how many trials ever since.

          “Peace I leave with you, my peace I give you,” we heard Jesus saying in the gospel.” Segatashya must have heard those words, for he told the book’s author: “When I was with him, I never wanted to leave. If he asked me to come and be with him now, I would leave this world for­ever without the slightest hesitation. To be near him is to live in love; no words need be spoken. In his presence, your soul is at peace and completely joyous. Know that his love is real, and that it is eternal and ours to have if we love him and do his will on earth. Ask him into your heart, and all his graces are yours. He will refuse you nothing. If you were able to know only one truth in your life, you should know this truth: Jesus loves you.”

          Sadly, the young man who spoke those words was killed in the Rwandan slaughter of 1984. Our Christian faith gives us reason to hope that we’ll meet him one day in heaven.

 

"WHOEVER LOVES ME WILL BE LOVED BY MY FATHER."

Homily for April 30^th, 2018: John 14:21-26.

          “Whoever loves me will keep my word,” Jesus tells his friends. He is speaking to the apostles at the Last Supper, after washing their feet. He did this to show them that he was sending them to serve others, and not to be served. That is what Jesus means by keeping his word: being servants of others. Jesus was speaking not just to those twelve men in the Upper Room at Jerusalem. He is speaking also to us. If we keep his word, he is telling us, his heavenly Father will love us, and both Jesus himself and his Father will love us and come to us, and make their dwelling with us. What a wonderful promise that is! And when Jesus promises something, he always keeps his promise.

          None of us ever keeps God’s word completely. All of us fail at times. That was why Mother Teresa – now St. Teresa of Calcutta – used to say: “God does not ask us to be successful. He asks us to be faithful.” When we fail, we need to remember what our wonderful Pope Francis never tires of telling us: “God never grows tired of forgiving us. It is we who grow tired of asking for forgiveness.”        

Speaking to a vast crowd of young people in Germany in September 2011, his predecessor, now Emeritus Pope Benedict XVI said: “Dear friends, Christ is not so much interested in how often in our lives we stumble and fall, as in how often with his help we pick ourselves up again. He does not demand glittering achievements, but he wants his light to shine in you. He does not call you because you are good and perfect, but because he is good and wants to make you his friends. Yes, you are the light of the world because Jesus is your light. You are Christians – not because you do special and extraordinary things, but because he, Christ, is your life. You are holy, we are holy, if we allow his grace to work in us.”

          Pope Benedict’s words were an example of something else that Jesus promises in today’s gospel reading, at the close. “The Holy Spirit whom the Father will send in my name will teach you everything and remind you of all that I told you.” On that evening with those young people in Germany almost seven years ago, the Pope of that time was doing just that.