Are You Living the Mission?

 

Deacon Dave · Are You Living the Mission?

Homily for the 8th Sunday of Ordinary Time, Feb. 27, 2022. Gospel of St. Luke 6:39-45. Theme: Are You Living the Mission? 

Every significant world religion has a particular passage taken from their holy books which expresses who they are as a people; a kind of “mission statement” as to how they live out the faith they profess with their lips. And each of them also have a special time of year particularly devoted to prayer and repentance, renewing their commitment to God as they understand Him. 

The mission statement of Judaism, for example, is expressed in the Shema, a prayer that says “Hear, O Israel, the Lord is our God, the Lord alone…” and then it goes on to remind the Jews of their obligations to God. And every year - from Rosh Shanna to Yom Kippur - the Jewish people observe 10 days reflecting on how they have lived out their relationship with God and others. Islam’s mission statement is called the Shahada, which is a very short profession of faith proclaiming: “There is only one God and only one prophet of God, Mohammed.” Their penitential time of year is the month-long Fast of Ramadan, which calls the Muslim people to submit both their bodies and souls to purification. 

What about Christianity? If a Jewish or Muslim person asked, would you know what our mission statement is? It is taken directly from the Gospel and every Christian should know it by heart. We call it The Great Commandment because that’s what Jesus called it: “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength. And you shall love your neighbor as you love yourself.” The Great Commandment expresses the very heart of Christianity and therefore, it should be enshrined in the heart of every Christian. 

This is what the four short sayings of Jesus in today’s Gospel are meant to tell us. They call us to an honest self-evaluation of how we are living out our love for God in our relationship with others. This collection of the Lord’s sayings summons us to have clear spiritual vision, to look into our own hearts and lives to see what needs to change, what needs to be reformed and purified. And of course, this is why the Church gives us our special time of year for spiritual renewal and purification: the holy Season of Lent which will begin this Wednesday. It is like having an annual spiritual check-up so that we can honestly evaluate how we are living the Great Commandment. It’s a time to refocus on our relationship with God, to look to the example of Jesus our beloved Brother and Lord, and to submit ourselves in mind, body and soul to the purifying action of the Holy Spirit within us. 

The short but direct-to-the-heart teachings of Jesus that we hear in today’s gospel are purposely proclaimed on this Sunday before Ash Wednesday, so that they can guide us in putting together our personal spiritual program for Lent: 

 Jesus says the bind cannot lead the blind…how is our spiritual eyesight? Are we trying to see life from God’s point of view by reading the Scriptures and pondering them in our hearts? Try reading from the Scriptures a bit more this Lent. 

Jesus says to remove the beam from our own eye …do we know what constitutes that beam in our eye? Are we aware of what behavior or attitude is blocking us from loving God with all that we are and from loving our neighbor as ourselves? Start making a review of the day before you go to sleep. Evaluate where you succeeded and where you need to improve in living as a Christian. 

Jesus says that what we cherish in our hearts is what really guides our decisions and actions in life…So, let’s ask ourselves with gut-honesty: do we hold the Great Commandment as the treasure of our hearts? Is it the guiding light of our relationships? 

Try doing the following simple spiritual practice this Lent: Memorize the Great Commandment and recite it twice a day throughout Lent, so as to enshrine it in your heart. Recite it first thing in the morning to remind you to make choices consistent with being an instrument of Christ’s Love during the day. Then repeat it at night as a kind of examination of conscience, as a way to review your day to see where it was lived well and where improvement is needed by God’s grace. 

By doing this we can hopefully and gradually learn to make love more real and effective in our everyday lives. This simple program can help us put into practice these words from St. Mother Teresa of Calcutta: “It is easy to love the people who are far away. It is not always easy to love those close to us. It is easier to give food to relieve the hunger of a stranger, than it is to relieve the loneliness and pain of someone unloved among our own family. Bring love into your home for this is where our love for each other must start.”

The Blind Leading the Blind by  Pieter Bruegel, 16th century Netherlands

Do I Smell Like a Rose?

 

Deacon Dave · Do I Smell Like a Rose?

Homily for the 7th Sunday of Ordinary Time, Feb. 20, 2022. Gospel of St. Luke 6:27-38. Topic: Do I Smell Like a Rose? 

During his college years in England, the famous Hindu activist, Mahatma Gandhi, began reading the New Testament out of curiosity. Jesus’ words made a deeply positive impression upon him and he was especially fascinated by the Gospel passage we heard proclaimed today: “But to you who hear I say, love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you.” He told a friend, “If you Christians lived these words of your Master, you would become a significant force for peace and justice throughout the world.” 

Having read the Gospels, Gandhi was inspired to do a bit of exploring into the possibility of becoming a Christian himself. So, he decided to attend a Sunday service. When he reached the doors of a local upscale Episcopalian church, he was stopped by a clergyman who said to him, “Where do you think you are going, you (here insert a derogatory slang word for a person of color). There’s no room for your kind in this church. Get out of here or I’ll have my ushers throw you down the steps”. Gandhi’s path to Christ had been road-blocked and detoured by the scandalous behavior of someone who claimed the name of Christian. 

After he became famous, he was once asked what would be the best way to spread the transforming message of Christ in the modern world? Newspapers? Radio? Television? Or in our day, we could add social media? He shook head and replied: “A rose does not need to preach. It simply spreads its fragrance on its own. The fragrance is its own sermon.” 

And so that made me ask myself a few questions: How many people have I turned away from Christ because of my lack of courtesy or gossip or other un-Christian behavior? Does my Christianity smell like a rose, attracting others by its fragrance to investigate the person and message of Jesus? Or does it smell more like a stinking drive down HWY 5 by the cattle fields of Harris Ranch? 

You see, the problem isn’t that we don’t know what Jesus is teaching us. The problem is that we do not choose to live it. We all know what it means to love, to treat others with kindness no matter who they are, and to forgive those who offend us even when it’s tough to do. We know what it means to not judge the reasons for a person’s particular actions because we cannot see into their minds, into their hearts. We know that only God can look into those secret chambers of the human person, and thus, only God can truly and honestly judge each one of us. 

Yet we fail rather consistently to put into practice what we preach and I am at the front of that line! We are interiorly drawn to live like Jesus but we find ourselves falling short of the mark in our exterior actions, even if we start off the day with the best of intentions. The Scriptures tell us that the reason for this moral weakness is what we call “the wound of original sin”, a path of least resistance within all of us when it comes to doing what is right and choosing what is good. 

But it was precisely to heal this wound that Jesus came to us as Brother, Savior and Lord. He is not a cruel Master who teaches us a lifestyle that is impossible to live. Rather, He promises to be with each one of us always, to live within each one of us, making it possible for us – by His divine presence and power within us - to say “yes” to love and mercy, to say “yes” to forgiveness and unity. And not to just say “yes” with our lips, but with the concrete actions of our behavior. 

It is primarily through the Sacrament of the Eucharist, the Real Living Presence of the Risen Lord Jesus in Holy Communion, that this divine power and in-dwelling comes to us. When we receive this sacrament with faith and mindfulness and not simply out of routine or habit – we are filled with spiritual power enabling us to love and to live as true Christians. We know how much we need Jesus to live within us so that we do not become a road-block or a detour in someone’s path to Christ. We know how badly we need Jesus dwelling within us always, so that his grace can help us become like roses, whose sweet fragrance of Christianity captures the attention of those around us and attracts them to the person and message of Christ.

Blessings & Woes

 

Deacon Dave · Blessings & Woes

Homily for the 6th Sunday of Ordinary Time, Feb. 13, 2022. The Gospel of St. Luke 6:17-26. Topic: Blessings & Woes 

Struggle, sacrifice, self-denial…. These are all a part of our lives and not just when things go wrong or when we have to go through some trial or difficulty. Oftentimes, we intentionally embrace these things when we want to better our situation. For example: If we want to advance in our occupations, we put in extra effort and time to prove our dedication and competence. If we want to improve on our appearance and health we will embrace a strict regimen of proper nutrition and commit ourselves to a program of physical exercise. If we want something bad enough, we willingly chose sacrifice and self-denial in order to come out on the other side with the joy of accomplishment and a better form of living. Jesus is telling us in today’s Gospel that we should have the same enthusiasm, the same commitment and the same determination about our spiritual growth and development. 

If we value and want to improve our spiritual health and well-being, we must willingly and intentionally embrace the struggle, sacrifice, and self-denial that come with choosing to live according to the way of Jesus. Today’s Gospel presents us with the most basic of his teachings that have come to be called the Beatitudes, a word that means “Blessings”. These are attitudes and behaviors that describe Jesus himself, and include such things as trust, mercy, humility, kindness, justice, patience and fidelity to God no matter what the cost. They define and describe who we are as Christians. And as we hear in today’s Gospel, the Beatitudes have both a negative and positive dynamic. They are a blessing for those who embrace them but a condemnation for those who refuse to do so. 

The Beatitudes teach us that those who make material possessions, self-promotion and the pursuit of pleasure their motivation in life will end up with just those superficial things and nothing more. If their whole focus in life is what this world has to offer, then when their life in this world comes to its end, so will they. Why is this? Because God was not their focus. Heaven was not their goal. The needs of others were not their concern. And so, such people will get what they lived for: an eternity in which there is no room for God and no experience of relationships rooted in real love. It’s what we have come to call “Hell”. 

On the other hand, Jesus teaches that those who do embrace the struggle, the sacrifice and the self-denial required in observing the Beatitudes will also get what they lived for: blessings from God in this life and happiness with Him forever in the next. Why? Because despite the difficulties they encountered, they chose to be faithful to a lifestyle inspired by Jesus. Besides the many opportunities they had to live what is called “the good life”, they chose a lifestyle that was simple, sacrificial and giving. Having been touched by Christ and changed from the inside out, they embraced a life focused on loving God and neighbor instead of primarily oneself. 

In addition to being a description of both Christ and Christians, the Beatitudes are also the foundation of what we call the “social teachings of the Catholic Church.” This means that the Gospel has - or should have - an effect on how we live and behave as neighbors and citizens in society. If we think that religion is something confined to Sunday worship and concerned primarily with our personal morality, then we are greatly mistaken in our understanding of Christianity! It is absolutely impossible to define and interpret Jesus and the Gospel in this way. The overriding majority of Jesus’ teachings are utterly inseparable from social responsibility and the Scriptures clearly inform us that love for the God whom we cannot see is proven by our love for the neighbor whom we can see. 

With this in mind, I find it very interesting and very revealing that Jesus starts off by naming poverty as the first Beatitude, that it receives pride of place. I think it’s important for us to understand what the Gospel means by the term “poverty” because when many of us hear this we get confused and even turned-off. As 21st century Americans, when we hear “poverty” we think of “destitution”, you know, living at the poverty-level, with not enough to eat or to wear. But this is not at all what Jesus means in this Beatitude.

Gospel poverty means simplicity of life, being content with what one needs and not being suffocated by an over-accumulation of the things one wants and then so often wastes. It’s a Beatitude that is especially important and necessary in today’s culture that is so steeped in materialism and driven by consumerism, the desire for more, more, more. As Christians, we are called to embrace a simple lifestyle which, while allowing for what we truly need, also makes room for the just needs of others. Handling our finances in this Gospel spirit means that we are not saving or spending all of our money for ourselves, but are giving a fair share to relieve the suffering and needs of those who don't have it so good. 

You know, this makes me think of some of the home renovation shows that I enjoy watching. They will often highlight a newly enlarged walk-in closet that's as big as a bedroom, filled with so many clothes and a whole ocean of shoes. It makes me wonder how in the world the residents of that house can even keep count of what they have, let alone even get around to wearing all that they have stored up. Meanwhile, others in their town go around with barely enough food to survive, without sufficient funds to buy necessities, or without proper clothing to wear. As Christians, we must admit that there is something so very wrong with that picture. It’s such a glaring contradiction of the first Beatitude, and so polar opposite to the way of Jesus. 

So, for our own sake, for our very salvation and for the sake of our neighbor, let’s take to heart the words that Jesus speaks to us in today’s Gospel: Blessed are you who struggle. Blessed are you who sacrifice. Blessed are you who embrace self-denial for love of God and others, for you shall be forever rewarded in the Kingdom of Heaven. But woe to you who have served and pampered yourselves in this life. Woe to you who have lived without thought for your needy brothers and sisters, By choosing to have your consolation and comforts here and now, you have forfeited them forever in eternity.

I Surrender!

 

Deacon Dave · I Surrender!

Homily for the 5th Sunday of Ordinary Time, February 6, 2022. Readings: Isaiah 6:1-8; 1 Corinthians 15: 1-11; Gospel of St. Luke 5:1-11. Theme: I Surrender! 

When we hear the words, “I surrender” or “I give up” we tend to think of the humiliation of defeat, the loss of power or lack of control over our lives. Most of us fight hard against saying these words because we want to avoid being thought of as weak or be seen as incompetent or incapable. And yet, one of the many paradoxes in Christianity, in the teachings of Jesus, is that we can only become spiritually strong when we admit that we are interiorly weak; we can only be lifted up to greatness after we acknowledge the reality of our utter nothingness before God. This is precisely the lesson that all three of the holy men in today's Scriptures teach us. Each one had an up-close-and-personal experience of God which totally transformed their lives. Each one had a life-changing encounter with God that moved them from the heart to surrender their own self-image and ideas in order to become vessels for God’s work and true servants of his people. 

In our first reading we drop in on the prophet Isaiah during a profound vision of God in all his glory. Isaiah lived about 700 years before Jesus. He was hesitant to take up the prophet's mission of calling the people to repent of their sins, to turn away from their destructive behaviors. He felt inadequate to the task because he was aware of his own sinfulness and thought, “Who am I to tell others to turn away from sin?” He knew that saying “yes” to God’s call would bring bitter opposition, rejection and ridicule into his life. And so his fear of social rejection made him hesitant to do what needed to be done. But in beholding the Lord’s glory he surrendered to God saying, “Here I am Lord, send me.” And as a result of his surrender, Isaiah became the greatest prophet of the Messiah in the entire Old Testament. And to this day, almost 3,000 years later we still repeat at every Mass the words that he heard sung by the angels around God’s throne, “Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord God of Hosts, heavens and earth are full of your glory…” 

Our second reading presents us with a reference to the conversion of St. Paul. Before this life-changing event, he was very much the polar opposite of Isaiah. He was full of himself, cocky, stubborn and arrogant. Paul was convinced that he was God’s agent and answer to the problem of an annoying little branch of Judaism called the Way, whose members believed Jesus of Nazareth to be the promised Messiah. Surrendering was the very last thing he was likely to ever do, so God had to literally knock him to the ground and give him temporary blindness so that he could see exactly who and what he had become. Long story short, Paul did surrender his over-exaggerated sense of self and was transformed, as he points out to us in today's reading, into an apostle of Christ, perhaps the greatest missionary of the Gospel the Church has ever seen. 

Lastly, in our Gospel today we read about the initial conversion experience of Simon-Peter. As we know from so many other stories about him Simon was a headstrong, impetuous, self-sufficient, totally “alpha” kind of guy. He knew the family fishing business like no one else and wasn’t about to be told how to do it more effectively by a carpenter from Nazareth. But for some reason, perhaps it was the look in Christ’s eyes or the tone of his voice, or maybe self-sure Simon thought he would teach this carpenter a lesson, he decided to give in, to surrender. And lo and behold! Simon and his partners end up with the biggest catch of fish in their careers! He surrendered with as much passion and gusto as he had at first resisted, saying, “Depart from me, Lord, for I am a sinful man.” Simon surrenders the strong-man facade he has built around himself and acknowledges who and what he truly is at heart. He leaves everything behind to follow Christ and will go on to become Peter, the first pope, the rock upon which Jesus will build his Church. 

It seems to me that all three of these holy men speak to us about our need to get rid of any false self-images and give up any self-serving plans that we have. They call us to open our hearts in humility and step forward with trust in what God has in mind for us. All three were already connected with God but on their own terms. Isaiah had set limits on what he would or would not do for the Lord until he was overcome by God’s glory. Paul considered himself God’s gift to Israel and this pride kept him spiritually blind until physical blindness opened the eyes of his soul. Simon-Peter personally walked and talked with Christ, but he shows us that knowing Jesus is quite different from actually having a personal relationship of trust in him. 

So I think today’s liturgy should move each of us to examine our minds and our hearts, to reevaluate our relationship with Christ. Do we truly see that we are weak in spirit and need his grace to lift us up? Can we be humble enough to give up our own ideas and plans about how God should act in our lives, so that he can truly do what he wishes to do with us and for us? The transformation of ourselves into something beautiful for God, so that we can become what he has created us to be, is indeed possible and the Lord wants to do this for each one of us. But it requires that we turn our lives and our wills over to the care of God every day and be ready to surrender, to give up, our even own ideas and plans as did Isaiah, Paul and Simon-Peter.