Your Life is Hidden now with Christ in God

 

EIGHTEENTH SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME

31 July 2022, St. Lambert

 

Eccl 1:2; 2:21-23

Col 3:1-5, 9-11

Lk 12:13-21

 

Praised be Jesus Christ!

        “But God said to him, “You fool, this night your life will be demanded of you; and the things you have prepared, to whom will they belong?” Thus will it be for all who store up treasure for themselves but are not rich in what matters to God.” // “Vanity of vanities, says Qoheleth, vanity of vanities!”

        Among other things, summertime is marked by class reunions. Generally, these events get mixed reviews depending on whom you talk to. Some joy, some indifference, and, yes, some dread! I am going to go out on a limb and declare that the older we get the better our class reunions. I mean that in the sense of our Gospel for today. “But God said to him, “You fool, this night your life will be demanded of you; and the things you have prepared, to whom will they belong?” Thus will it be for all who store up treasure for themselves but are not rich in what matters to God.”  Class reunions inevitably end up being times to take stock of how our life project has been going. It is in this matter especially that I am convinced that the older reunions are the more positive ones. That is very simply because if the years don’t necessarily make us wiser, they can make us milder and maybe happier, by knocking off our rough edges and relativizing our expectations. For men and women of good will, that materialism typical of youth and those career goals that go with it lose their importance, especially those projects pushed on children by overly ambitious parents. Whether we for ourselves have reached those youthful goals or just become more realistic about our capabilities and the opportunities available to us, with age there seems to be more time for living and, if we are believers, the things of God can actually take on more importance in our lives.

        Now, let me be clear! You are thoroughly entitled to contradict my experience when it comes to reunions and insist that your fifth or tenth or twentieth high school reunion were all fantastic. But in my case being out of the country for most of my adult life, I only managed to make one, my 20^th reunion, and it was a heartbreak for all sorts of reasons and in all sorts of ways. My point would be that in the life of a Christian, of a believer, of a good Catholic with the aging process can come a greater measure of serenity grounded in the detachment which accompanies our life experience, especially our failures and mistakes. They used to call that process the “school of hard knocks”.

Apart from those class reunions I missed, I did have the joy of experiencing the progress which had taken place in the lives of a goodly number of former classmates on the occasion of my ordination as a bishop in November of 2004. That was 36 years after our graduation from O’Gorman. Thirty-some of my class of 200 were present that day in the Cathedral and many, especially men, took the time to write good and thoughtful letters to me thereafter and shared some powerful reflections about their life experience at that point in their lives. I was impressed by the grace the women had acquired and the wisdom and humility of many of those men.

        I am a firm believer in the old maxim from that TV hair color commercial, “You’re not getting older, you’re getting better”. As the anxious career goals of our late teens and early twenties give way to other priorities in our own lives, we gain constancy, and we can find joy. As we give up trying to pressure our children into achieving and instead start hoping and praying that they will grow up happy, healthy, and holy, we still may have our worries, but at least now maybe for the right reasons.

        If I had to say it, this is where the message from our second reading, from St. Paul to the Colossians, comes in.

        “Think of what is above, not of what is on earth. For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ your life appears, then you too will appear with him in glory.”

        As a young priest I can remember men coming to confession for Easter who would straight out say, “Father, I really don’t know why I am here except for my Easter duty, as I don’t have any sins.” You rarely hear that anymore, but I suspect the reason is that those sinless ones have drawn the logical conclusion of not needing confession and have decided they don’t need church or Christ anymore either. I guess they answer to themselves, but to no one else. Granted, they may not be criminals or particularly wicked in the moral sense, but Paul’s words have no real meaning for them. “For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God.”

        To a certain extent I guess I live from my memories. From my class in high school I have all kinds of recollections of young men and women who were just plain good; these are the memories that tend to surface. In another sense, however, I live very much in the present and rejoice in the witness of virtue: upright living and constancy in sacrifice after the manner of Jesus Christ for the sake of spouse and children, for the sake of the life of the world.

        A number in my class are talking about a 55^th reunion in 2023. The argument for not waiting for our 60^th is mostly because we have begun dying out in significant numbers. I rather suspect that the eagerness has more to do with the number of wise and virtuous men and women they would love to see again and spend more time with this side of heaven. That is good, but important is that we have our sights set on Christ.

“Think of what is above, not of what is on earth. For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ your life appears, then you too will appear with him in glory.”

        In the lives of the saints, we come across many who were single-hearted in their attachment to Christ from a very tender age and maybe even you could say they were too good for this world as the Lord called them home while they were still very young. Others experienced a profound conversion, leaving behind soldiering and the ways of the world to embrace Christ and make atonement through penance for the excesses and distractions of youth. I personally take hope in those saints who lived long and constant lives marked by abundant goodness. Whatever our path in union with Christ, may we be a source of encouragement for one another in the Lord!

        “But God said to him, “You fool, this night your life will be demanded of you; and the things you have prepared, to whom will they belong?” Thus will it be for all who store up treasure for themselves but are not rich in what matters to God.” // “Vanity of vanities, says Qoheleth, vanity of vanities!”

Praised be Jesus Christ!

PROPERANTES ADVENTUM DIEI DEI

Never Lose Patience! Never Give Up!

 

SEVENTEENTH SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME

23-24 July 2022, Tea and Parker Parishes

Gn 18:20-32

Col 2:12-14

Lk 11:1-13

 

Praised be Jesus Christ!

        “Please, let not my Lord grow angry if I speak up this last time. What if there are at least ten there?” He replied, “For the sake of those ten, I will not destroy it.”

        People who are familiar with the Scriptures, especially with the Book of Genesis, have to be flabbergasted over this dialogue, over Abraham’s bargaining, pleading for God to spare Sodom and Gomorrah. The only logical explanation for Abraham insisting with God seems to have been family interest. Abraham must have pressed God for the sake of his nephew Lot, who chose to move away from his uncle and take his people and his flocks down into what was then a lush valley around Sodom and Gomorrah. The idea was that at a distance from each other the numerous flocks of both men could better prosper than when they were crowding each other. Abraham gave the younger man the choice of where to go to settle and Lot picked the valley. Lot did not seem to be aware of or maybe was just not impressed by the excesses of vice which gripped these two towns. So now it comes out that these two towns by their evil deeds were crying out to God for vengeance because of their extreme wickedness. Despite Abraham’s best efforts to move God to mercy, in the end God destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah. He rained down fire and brimstone annihilating everyone and everything but Lot and his children. Lot lost his wealth and his wife, but got out by the skin of his teeth, thanks to God’s favor to our father in faith. Abraham had tried, but God’s judgment prevailed. The towns could not be spared as there were not even ten good people in the place.

         We know and believe from our upbringing that God rewards the good and punishes evil. Interestingly enough, however, to get that timeless message across is not why the Church has assigned this part of Genesis 18 as the first reading today. This Sunday in its liturgy the Church uses this passage from Genesis to illustrate God’s willingness as a loving Father to hear and answer the prayers of His children. Abraham was indeed favored by God and the Church wants us to know that so are we. Very simply stated, our prayers are heard by God, they do work, because God wills it so.

This first reading from Genesis complements our Gospel from Luke Chapter 11 where Jesus teaches His disciples to pray with the words of the Our Father. This Sunday’s Gospel ends up with Jesus teaching: “If you then, who are wicked, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will the Father in heaven give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him?” God has chosen us in Baptism, and He favors us out of love despite our unworthiness. Jesus assures us that the Father hears and answers our prayers. We need but engage Him with confidence as did Abraham long ago. “If you then, who are wicked, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will the Father in heaven give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him?”

        Our Gospel passage today starts out with the disciples saying, “Lord, teach us to pray!” Jesus basically responds, “Say the Our Father!” Then Jesus goes on to encourage His listeners by giving them a real pep talk about what prayer does, what prayer can or should mean for them in their lives. Sadly, this truth is one most of us struggle to embrace. To say that another way: most people hesitate to ask God’s help. Not only that, but when they encounter people who do ask and ask God’s help with insistence, they feel a bit embarrassed. There’s a whole body of catechesis even, which tends to discourage our prayers of petition and supplication in favor of praise and thanksgiving. Praise and thanksgiving are fine, but God does not really need them. The words of Christ are before us to show that God wants to encourage us to ask of Him, to thereby praise Him, by declaring our dependence upon Him Who rules the universe and all it holds.

        Granted, there is something psychological about this hesitancy to ask God’s favor, but it also indicates a weakness of faith in God’s presence and power to save. We may be willing to ask other people for their prayers, but we don’t really expect that God will either answer us or answer the person we asked to pray in our favor. We are a long way from believing that God hears and answers His friends the saints, both those in the calendar and saintly, holy people whom we encounter in life. We have a hard time with the notion that God works miracles in answer to the prayers of His holy ones, both from heaven and here on earth. I can remember as an adolescent being embarrassed by the prayers after Mass for good weather and bountiful crops, thinking it somewhat useless to bother God with our prayers for sufficient rain and a good harvest. Typical adolescence, you might say, but it can carry over into adulthood. Try praying for a sick child or for someone gravely injured in a car accident! Here too, there seems to be embarrassment about pestering God. People don’t seem to believe enough or to imagine God as close at hand. And it is of no help at all when someone shouts at us and shakes a finger, “Oh, ye of little faith!” And yet, God would have us ask. He would have us insist a bit with Him, press Him, if you will, just like Abraham.

        In the traditional prayer of the Church or in monastic communities and big convents, there is daily prayed something called the Roman Martyrology, which has an entry for every day of the year. A big part of the book obviously are the saints who died as martyrs for the faith and are commemorated on certain days of the year. In that little book, with its short paragraph for each day, there are many more saints mentioned than actually have a proper feast day in the Church calendar. Notably, besides the martyrs there are also remembered those who were outstanding in holiness, a fact evidenced by the miracles which accompanied them already in this life, but which have multiplied since death. The Martyrology is an eloquent witness to all of the powerful intercessors, friends of God, who have been at work in our world, healing or simply making things better.

        Abraham knew enough not only to pray to God but to insist with Him. Jesus in the Gospel is absolutely reassuring about how God like a good father that stands ready and eager to give us all we need in answer to our prayers.

        The other day an old friend told me a family story of his about a relative, a young expectant mother whose doctor gave her the results of prenatal tests which showed evidence that the baby was very sick and with numerous birth defects. Not despairing, the family began praying, asking family and friends to pray, and on good advice called a rather special priest to come and pray over the mother and her baby, which he did with great confidence. Almost immediately the mother started feeling better for the first time during her pregnancy and when they did her sonagram by her next regular exam, the doctor found everything to be just fine. When the time came, she gave birth to a healthy baby boy, who continues to grow and be happy and to bring joy to his family. I believe the testimony of my old friend.

        God does answer prayers. He works wonders. I have seen more than I can count in my life. “And I tell you, ask and you will receive; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you…”

        That does not mean that we should pretend to pray away all death, suffering and hardship from life. God did not relent on Sodom and Gomorrah despite Abraham’s prayers. Nonetheless, Abraham engaged God and God saved Abraham’s nephew.

        This Sunday’s message? Very simply, pray! Don’t give up on God!

Praised be Jesus Christ!

PROPERANTES ADVENTUM DIEI DEI

At the Feet of Jesus Attentive

 

SIXTEENTH SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME

Saturday, 16 July 2022

Gn 18:1-10a

Col 1:24-28

Lk 10:38-42

 

Praised be Jesus Christ!

        “There is need of only one thing.” (These are Jesus’ words to Martha from today’s Gospel) “There is need of only one thing.”

When it comes to being a believer, we live in an age when it is rare to encounter people with all the right priorities or who live out the conviction that we as Catholics cannot do less than strive wholeheartedly for personal sanctity. A certain worldliness is all too common not just on TV but even among the real people we might encounter in society and perhaps even in our parishes. From experience, I have to say that sadly I am forever encountering nice people who are basically pretty slack, who in their daily living are less than attentive to the will of the Divine Master. Please note I am not talking about big sinners or some kind of criminals. I am referring to people within the community of the baptized who don’t seem to be enthused, who are not moved by love. What this amounts to is what may be termed lukewarmness and experiencing it in our lives, especially within our own family circle, can be demoralizing for adults and a scandal for children. It is indeed a tragedy to discover that somebody might not be on fire with the love of Christ. I rather suspect that this ambivalence toward virtuous living is what above all else has a negative impact on faith practice among these same Catholics (regarding Mass attendance, regular confession, almsgiving) and what amounts to indifference to Christ is what puts the official Church at a disadvantage when it comes to proclaiming Christ and leading people around us to faith.

Personal sanctity is not optional in the Christian life, and it basically has to do with being personally devoted to the living God, looking for His Face, hanging on His every Word. This insight or intuition is perhaps the primary characteristic of the faith in our times. One of the sustaining pillars of the teaching of the Second Vatican Council, as well as of a lot of the popular religious movements in the Catholic Church today, is its message on the universal call to holiness. That is to say not only priests and nuns, but all of the baptized are called to holiness of life. What does that mean really? What does it mean – to be or to become holy? In the words of Jesus Himself from the Gospel: “There is need of only one thing.” Let us discuss the universal call to holiness if ever so briefly from that point of view! In the words of Jesus: “There is need of only one thing.”

        During Ordinary Time the first reading at Sunday Mass from the Old Testament and the Gospel passage which is generally a continuous reading, this year from St. Luke, complement one another in some fashion. This Sunday both offer accounts of table hospitality being offered to God in the context of the family!

In Genesis it is hospitality from Abraham and his wife Sarah shown to strangers passing by. Our father in faith insists that these three rather mysterious men whom we can recognize as God Himself (or as angel messengers from God) stop to rest by Abraham’s tent in the desert. In St. Luke’s Gospel, we learn of the hospitality from Mary, Martha and Lazarus shown by them to God the Second Person of the Blessed Trinity. Different from Abraham, the brother and his two sisters were dear friends of Jesus the Lord, no strangers at all. Both accounts describe attentive service to the guest, and Luke’s Gospel brings home the fact that what is pleasing to God above all else and useful for salvation is not so much the food service but the attentiveness to the guest which accompanies it: “Martha, Martha, you are anxious and worried about many things. There is need of only one thing. Mary has chosen the better part and it will not be taken from her.”

        Protocol and hospitality were very much a part of my life as an ambassador, as an apostolic nuncio. We all know there is a proper way to treat a guest. When things are done by the book, a formal dinner or a reception is always an agreeable occasion, but not necessarily very satisfying for the guest of honor. If you are like me all things being equal, you could care less about great food, great drink, and impeccable service, although these things have their place. What makes or breaks an evening at someone’s home or at a certain venue is rather your being invited there to be with a friend or in the case of family with loved ones open to spending time with you. The same is true of God in Christ. He longs for our attention.

        It seems clear enough to me that these Scripture passages are held out for us by the Church in its liturgy to teach us something about how God operates, and above all that He is willing to have contact with us, to show us His will, and to answer our prayers. The Genesis passage is interesting in that regard. “They asked Abraham, ‘Where is your wife Sarah?’ He replied, ‘There in the tent.’ One of them said, ‘I will surely return to you about this time next year, and Sarah will then have a son.’”

        Abraham certainly did not have any ulterior motive in welcoming the three men to rest in the shade by his tent. As it turned out, his generous step in their direction was all that was needed to open the way to the fulfillment of God’s promise of descendants to Abraham and Sarah. “I will surely return to you about this time next year, and Sarah will then have a son.”

        Jesus taught that the Great Commandments, the fulfillment of God’s Law, are two. First: You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength! And secondly: You shall love your neighbor as yourself! Isn’t it strange how something as simple and natural, even if perhaps today uncommon, as hospitality can so work as to dispose us to enjoy God’s good favor and thereby open us up to a sharing in His righteousness?

“Martha, Martha, you are anxious and worried about many things. There is need of only one thing. Mary has chosen the better part and it will not be taken from her.” No doubt Martha’s concerns about hospitality were correct and pleasing to God for His own good purposes. We read about the traditional understanding of the importance of hospitality in the Letter to the Hebrews 13:1-2: “Let mutual love continue. Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for by doing that some have entertained angels without knowing it.” But somehow in her frantic chasing around Martha missed the heart of the matter, namely attentiveness to Christ, that one thing needed to make all the difference. Mary sitting at the feet of Jesus was engrossed in Him, attentive to Him. The food and drink were fine, but ultimately secondary to this encounter. Jesus said as much to His disciples about His encounter with the Samaritan woman from John 4:31-34.   Meanwhile the disciples were urging him, “Rabbi, eat something.” But he said to them, “I have food to eat that you do not know about.” So the disciples said to one another, “Surely no one has brought him something to eat?” Jesus said to them, “My food is to do the will of him who sent me and to complete his work.

        Jesus wants Martha to stop fussing and to open wide her heart to Him as had Mary. Would that we could do the same! “Martha, Martha, you are anxious and worried about many things. There is need of only one thing. Mary has chosen the better part and it will not be taken from her.”

        Praised be Jesus Christ!

PROPERANTES ADVENTUM DIEI DEI