Thy Kingdom Come!

 

4th Sunday in Ordinary Time

29-30 January 2022, St. Lambert Parish

Jer 1:4-5, 17-19

1 Cor 12:31—13:13 or 13:4-13

Lk 4:21-30

        They say that discretion is the better part of valor, so on his behalf I want to let you know that Deacon Thomas is keeping to his bed this weekend with what may just be cold or flu symptoms. I told him that even though he did not feel that bad and thought he could tough it out, that out of respect for the parishioners present at Mass he should not come to church. The only drawback, of course, is that this has put me on deck to preach at the last minute in his place. You can tell me after Mass how I did with the homily prepared on short notice.

Praised be Jesus Christ!

        Before I start, it might be good to point out a general, structural principle for the Lectionary in Ordinary Time (the selection of Scripture Readings that we use outside of the great feasts and times like Advent, Lent, Christmas and Easter). 2022 is the third year of the Sunday Cycle and so we are usually going to read from the Gospel of St. Luke. The Second Readings on Sundays are thematically unrelated. They are continuous readings mostly from St. Paul’s Letters and these days from his First Letter to the Corinthians. The First Readings from the Old Testament, this week from the prophet Jeremiah, seek to underpin or illustrate the Gospel which sets the tone or the theme for the particular Sunday.

        On the 4^th Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year C, St. Luke recounts “part two” of the scene in the synagogue at Nazareth, that is, the reaction of the people to Jesus proclaiming that He is the fulfillment of Isaiah’s prophecy about the Messiah. Different from last Sunday’s reaction of the people assembled for the reading from the book of the law in the Book of Nehemiah, the people in today’s Gospel reject Jesus the Word of God and attempt to throw Him off a cliff. From the mouth of Christ, we hear that He wasn’t the least bit surprised by them, He fully expected their negative reaction stating, “Amen, I say to you, no prophet is accepted in his own native place.”

        To my way of thinking, we need to take the Gospel account and these words, “Amen, I say to you, no prophet is accepted in his own native place,” as a challenge to ourselves regarding the Word of God. Time and again today you will hear preachers, but also serious Catholics in the social media, insisting or accusing that we have unthroned Christ the King in our day. People and even priests and bishops may no longer believe or certainly they do not behave as if the Catholic Church were any more than one of a possible number of religious confessions. They seem to be cool with the expression that freedom of religion has to do with being able to attend the church of your choice on Sunday. This happens at the expense of the teaching of the Second Vatican Council that the Church established by Jesus Christ subsists in the Catholic Church. The Council taught that there is one Church of Christ, and it is the Catholic one. We refer to all the various Protestant denominations as just that denominations, but not Church in the fullest sense of the term.

        When we do not hold to solid and constant Catholic teaching and especially as we lump all the various non-Christian religions (Judaism, Islam, Buddhism, and so forth) into this same pot of denominational expressions, then all of a sudden Christ is diminished. In America, where from the beginning we Catholics have always been a minority, albeit a very important one, that has generally and rightly translated into respect for one another. But as soon as we move out of the Christian sphere, which is our American heritage, then all of a sudden Jesus is no longer the Christ, God’s Anointed, our only Savior. In this sense we can say that Christ has been deprived of His Throne and Crown.

        “Jesus began speaking in the synagogue, saying: ‘Today this Scripture passage is fulfilled in your hearing.’”

        This no sooner being said and the people in the synagogue start denying the possibility of Christ’s words being truly prophetic, of their truly being the last word, so to speak, and the rule of their lives, as having come from the mouth of God.

        For the parish mission I preached over the weekend of the 2^nd Sunday of Advent, the priests of St. Michael Parish gave me the assignment not only to prepare the faithful for Christmas but also to address the scandal of the lack of faith in the true presence of Christ in the Eucharist affecting the Church generally today. There are a number of reasons for this crisis of faith in the Eucharist, but one I did not spend much time on at St. Michael’s, but which strikes me looking at the readings for today, is that of the nature of prophecy, both Old and New Testament, which is meant to be confrontational. In today’s First Reading, God speaks to the young prophet Jeremiah and tells him to ready himself for strife and rejection by God’s People unwilling to hear his words.

        “But do you gird your loins; stand up and tell them all that I command you. Be not crushed on their account, as though I would leave you crushed before them; for it is I this day who have made you a fortified city… against the whole land… They will fight against you but not prevail over you; for I am with you to deliver you, says the Lord.”

        Jesus walked away from that crowd from the synagogue on the brow of the hill outside Nazareth that had rejected Him and wanted to make an end of Him and silence Him, by pushing him over the cliff to His death. Eventually, in Christ’s own good time, after He had completed His prophetic mission, they through Satan’s pride thought to have put an end to Him and to have silenced Him, by mistreating Him and finally nailing Him to a Cross. His death, however, swallowed up sin and death, winning victory in His glorious Resurrection. Christ our King is risen!

        We have been brought up and rightly so not to insult, despise or lord it over our non-Catholic relatives, friends, and neighbors. Within the community of the Church, however, we are confronted by the Word of God for Who He is. The obedience of faith would have us give the Lord Jesus His due, His Kingship over every aspect of our lives. Don’t be deceived by those who claim to be Catholic and refuse to bow under the mighty Hand of God and His truth! This last week was the great march for life in Washington and elsewhere. There are no exceptions concerning the absolute respect we own to all human life from conception to frail old age. And there should be no surprise that we are rejected for choosing God’s part. We cannot take life given by God in the womb and preserved by His Will in both disability and severe illness. O Lord, Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven!

        Things should go as they did in open space before the Water Gate of the Temple in Jerusalem, as the people rejoiced in rediscovering God’s law and adhering to it. More often than not, though (“Amen, I say to you, no prophet is accepted in his own native place.”) familiarity breeds contempt and people deny the prophet his due.

        Pray for conversion to the fulness of faith in Christ, for yourselves, for your families and friends, for the Church of God! O Lord, Thy Kingdom come, Thy Will be done!

Praised be Jesus Christ!

PROPERANTES ADVENTUM DIEI DEI

Save Us from the Wrath to Come!

 

3^rd Sunday in Ordinary Time

22-23 January 2022 – St. Lambert

Neh 8:2-4a, 5-6, 8-10

I Cor 12:12-30

Lk 1:1-4; 4:14-21

Praised be Jesus Christ!

        “Then they bowed down and prostrated themselves before the Lord, their faces to the ground. Ezra read plainly from the book of the law of God, interpreting it so that all could understand what was read.”

        “Ezra read plainly from the book of the law of God…”

        That’s from our first reading from the prophet Nehemiah and our Gospel passage from Luke pictures the Lord Jesus in the synagogue of Nazareth reading and interpreting from the book of the prophet Isaiah. In both instances we’re talking about Sacred Scripture, both Old Testament passages, the first from the book of God’s law and the second from one of the prophets. In both cases we are talking about the Word of God. In the first case God’s word to his people is being interpreted by Ezra the priest scribe, obviously an authority in Israel, and in the other case by Jesus, the Son of God, Who is Himself the Word of God made flesh.

Granted, both of these situations are extraordinary. In the case of the prophet Nehemiah, God’s people had recovered the book of the law the observance of which had been neglected by their forefathers and the knowledge of which had gone lost to them. It must be said, from this reading it is evident that the people of Israel were a bit confused and overwhelmed at this recovery or discovery; they were filled with no small amount of emotion and regret. They had to be comforted and told not to be fearful or sorrowful but rather to rejoice and celebrate because by coming once again to an understanding of God’s law they were being taken back into their historical covenant, into their relationship with God their strength. At least for this Sunday, the passage from Luke’s Gospel does not represent an exact parallel; it stops short of giving us the second part, namely the people’s reaction to coming face to face with God’s Word. That part of the account will come next Sunday, as we continue reading from St. Luke’s Gospel. But already today, we note that Jesus very clearly proclaims Himself to the people of His hometown for Who He is:

        “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me because he has anointed me to bring glad tidings to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim liberty to captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, and to proclaim a year acceptable to the Lord.” …He said to them “Today this Scripture passage is fulfilled in your hearing.”  

        Sticking closer to Nehemiah so as to leave the Gospel part for next Sunday, my question is whether we are as moved by God’s Word as were those people standing there in the open place before the Water Gate.

I am not pointing fingers, but I am thinking of the scene in George Bernanos’ novel, Diary of a Country Priest, where an older priest advises a young priest not to open his heart to the people of his parish, especially to guard himself against the cruelty of the farm kids in his catechism class [Bernanos wrote his masterpiece back in 1936 in French and I have a copy in English of the 12^th edition printed in 2002. Just to say: It is a very popular book with much to say even yet today]. My point would be to let you know that people today share a lot in common with French peasants and petty nobility from back before WWII. Hearts can be fickle, but more to the point, people in every day and age can be ignorant of the faith, its power to transform and save us.

Another one of my favorite examples in the same vein is of a Dominican priest saint, St. Vincent Ferrer, who lived from 1350-1419, nicknamed “The Angel of the Judgment”. He traveled around the countryside in Europe preaching from makeshift pulpits set up in fields at the edge of villages and towns. He called people to repentance before the impending judgment of the world: his was the time of the Great Western Schism, when the Church was in very bad shape. Some other authors title St. Vincent the angel of the Apocalypse and many times in paintings you will see him depicted with wings. St. Vincent preached the fear of the Lord; he preached the coming judgment of all the world. He preached to big crowds and did not just threaten. He had a group of confreres who accompanied him, who would work then individually and in small groups to teach the people their basic prayers, even the Sign of the Cross, basic catechism and prepare them for the sacraments, Baptism for those who had not been baptized and Penance for those who had not been to confession in a long time.

From the time of Ezra reading the law, from Jesus and the Apostles themselves, over the course of 2000 years of Church history, the call has been for repentance but couched always in the terms of the book of Nehemiah.

“Do not be sad, and do not weep” – for all the people were weeping as the heard the words of the law. He said further: “Go, eat rich foods and drink sweet drinks, and allot portions to those who had nothing prepared; for today is holy to our Lord. Do not be saddened this day, for rejoicing in the Lord must be your strength.”

Today, just as in other periods, such as that before the time of Saint Vincent or later during the Enlightenment in Europe, when kings, emperors and petty nobles pressured priests and monks into limiting themselves to practical moral preaching about how to be good citizens and good farmers, neglecting prayer and penance, you commonly hear lay people complain that the Church, that Catholic preachers are not feeding them with the full Gospel. By the same token, many people are scandalized by the laxity of those called to exercise sacred ministry within the Church. The message is discredited because of the unworthy messengers.

My message to you today, would be to look to the book of Nehemiah for inspiration. His Excellency Nehemiah and Ezra, the priest scribe, were just as ignorant of what was in the book of the law as were the people who heard the book read that day. But both together were ready to let Sacred Scripture transform them in accordance with what was proclaimed in the assembly and interpreted for them by the Levites. Nehemiah and Ezra fulfilled their responsibility before God and His people, calling the people back to the observance of the law, back to living under God and thereby calling them back to God’s love and His abundant favor.

The Church’s liturgy of the Word today reminds us that we are called to do the same. As a watchman or a guard dog, to use two images from Scripture, I cannot be silent. Your priests and deacons, charged with preaching and teaching, cannot neglect to proclaim to you, to confront you and themselves at the same time with the fullness of the Gospel message. We must call you to repentance, to reform of life before the impending judgment. Unworthy as we are, if we don’t do it then who will call us back to the straight and narrow, who will tell us of God’s love and of what counts in life?

Knowledge of who God is in Jesus Christ, knowledge of your basic prayers, faithfulness to the Commandments and to the Precepts of the Church, genuine repentance, which involves renouncing sin and avoiding the near occasions of sin, having regular recourse to the Sacrament of Penance, all go a long way to assuring that just like those people so long ago in the open space before Jerusalem’s Water Gate, so we too can rather rejoice in the Lord Who saves us and sets us free from Satan’s pride for happiness with Him in this world and in the next.

Just one recommendation! It has been a month already since most of you made your confession for Christmas. Consider making a good confession now as a preparation for Lent which starts on Ash Wednesday, March 2^nd. It could make your 40 days of Lent more fruitful and help you make an even better Confession during Lent in preparation for Easter.

Praised be Jesus Christ!

Making Christ Manifest

 

2^nd Sunday in Ordinary Time

St. Lambert Parish, 16 January 2022 

Is 62:1-5

1 Cor 12:4-11

Jn 2:1-11

 

Praised be Jesus Christ!

        “For the Lord delights in you and makes your land his spouse. As a young man marries a virgin, your Builder shall marry you; and as a bridegroom rejoices in his bride so shall your God rejoice in you.”

        It is kind of rare to find people who think about their relationship with God using the language of Isaiah the prophet. To ask why that is, is not the point, but to note the fact is important and could challenge us to look more closely at how we understand faith’s role in our lives. Making room in our lives for an appreciation of this marriage imagery and the relational character of the life of faith which exists between God and us could make the faith which is ours more what it should be. Isaiah is speaking of a relationship between God and a nation, Zion or Jerusalem. We as Catholics have a communal identity as God’s people as well. Our faith must have a relational impact on our particular lives as part of that people, His Church, beloved of God in Jesus Christ.

“For the Lord delights in you and makes your land his spouse. As a young man marries a virgin, your Builder shall marry you; and as a bridegroom rejoices in his bride so shall your God rejoice in you.”

Can you believe that it is already the 2^nd Sunday in Ordinary Time? In the kind of circles I frequent, there is always lots of back and forth at this time of year about when Christmas is really over. Apart from various family traditions about when to take down the tree and store the crib scene for another year, everyone seems to have an opinion: Do you take things down on New Year’s Day? Is the Epiphany the last day to celebrate? Is it the Baptism of the Lord which closes the season? Or should Christmas have a lively place in our hearts, homes, and parish churches all the way through the feast of the Presentation in the Temple on February 2^nd?

        I bring this point up because of the readings assigned for this, the Second Sunday of Ordinary Time. I am thinking, yes, about this quote from the prophet Isaiah, but even more so about the Gospel of John recounting the miracle, His first, which Jesus worked at His Mother’s behest at the Wedding Feast in Cana, changing water into wine so that the party could go on. You see, Cana is central to the Christmas feast. It is as much Epiphany as are the Magi and the Baptism of the Lord by John in the Jordan. The divine office, the Liturgy of Hours at Evening Prayer for the feast, best recounts the great mystery of Epiphany in the antiphon for the Magnificat:

        “Three mysteries mark this holy day: today the star leads the Magi to the infant Christ; today water is changed into wine for the wedding feast; today Christ wills to be baptized by John in the river Jordan to bring us salvation.”

        Ordinary Time or not, in reflecting on the Lord’s first public miracle at Cana in Galilee, we are still very much in the spirit of Epiphany, of Christ’s manifestation. What is my point? Why do I bring this up? I suppose because I worry an awful lot about the Church fulfilling its mission. What is our mission as baptized people if not to make Christ manifest to our world? Different from the wise men and the star and even very different from the manifestation of Christ at the Jordan, a wedding party is a wedding party and very much a part, a beautiful part, of real life. Ultimately, I as a bishop, okay retired, but still an uppity up in the Church, I need to be showing Jesus, True God and True Man, to the world around me. That essentially is my mission. I have by reason of Holy Orders a role to play in making the Lord known, in glorifying His Name before the nations. Beyond good example, preaching and teaching is the lion’s share of my task. Baptized into Christ that is the job of all of you as well, to make Him manifest. We do it less by preaching but rather in real human terms as is evidenced in the language of this Sunday. By our lives we make Christ manifest and thereby treat everyone we encounter to the marvel of the water of humanity in those stone jars changed into the truly great wine of life at one with the Lord.

        “For the Lord delights in you and makes your land his spouse. As a young man marries a virgin, your Builder shall marry you; and as a bridegroom rejoices in his bride so shall your God rejoice in you.”

        If we believe all the surveys out there, it would be hard not to conclude that Catholic people, at least in the Western World (Europe and the Americas for sure), are more disconnected from life when it comes to the faith than they, than we have been in a long time. How long? In a sense the length of time doesn’t matter, and we can argue from the principle in Church law about custom as a source of law, which establishes that an immemorial custom is any one which has been held or practiced as long as anyone can remember or at least for more than 50 years [an immemorial custom]. I would contend that our disconnect has been forever. To make my point another way, many Catholics for over two generations at least haven’t had much of anything invested personally in the faith. They may identify as Catholics without giving any evidence of what that might mean in their everyday lives. The imagery of the romance of bridegroom and bride is lost on them.

        Oh! Archbishop! How can you say that? Easily! Ask yourself, even if it is not your favorite way of describing your faith if you can at least appreciate doing it by identifying with the bride and bridegroom imagery of the prophet Isaiah to describe your relationship with Christ in His Holy Church! Is that really necessary? Must it be? I think yes, even if wedding feasts are not exactly an everyday thing. If entered into rightly, the imagery of holy matrimony can be a beautiful and upbeat interpretive key for what we mean by “for better or for worse, in sickness and in health, until death do us part”. I am talking about living the faith so as to give witness of its truth and beauty to the world around us. I am talking about how we pass the faith on to our children. I have my childhood memories [more than 50 years ago] from both Mom and Dad of how they passed on or witnessed to the good wine of our Catholic faith! It was nothing flashy, but it was genuine, and they shared their faith with us very simply, naturally if you will, without being preachy or pretentious. I miss that as a general pattern in our families today. 

        “For the Lord delights in you and makes your land his spouse.” If I can appreciate God’s love for me, how He delights in me, how can I resist sharing it with those around me, who should be confirmed in that good news as well? The message we have to share is sublime, but we do so as naturally and normally as we can, even if what we have to share is the shockingly great news of how we are loved by God.

        “When the wine ran short, the mother of Jesus said to him, ‘They have no wine.’ And Jesus said to her, ‘Woman, how does your concern affect me? My hour has not yet come.’ His mother said to the servers, ‘Do whatever he tells you.’”

        The scripture scholars all have their pet theories about why Jesus responded as He did to His Mother. “Woman, how does your concern affect me?” Mary didn’t bat an eye: “His mother said to the servers, ‘Do whatever he tells you.’”

        It is not much of a message for this Sunday, but like Mary, we should not bat an eye in asking and being confident that the Lord can change our water into wine for the sake of the feast. Confess Jesus for Who He is, let Him be made manifest in your homes and in our world as the one who loves us and delights in us just like the bridegroom does in his bride.

Praised be Jesus Christ!

PROPERANTES ADVENTUM DIEI DEI

Living in the Truth and Human Flourishing

 

“Lord, to whom can we go? You have the words of eternal life." [John 6:68]

If I had to single out an existential quandary, which has been troubling me a lot and that I have faced and not faced time and again in this year just concluded, 2021, my first full year from beginning to end as a retiree, it would be that of how to decide whether to take someone, most anyone at his word. I know that sounds odd coming from someone who was not born yesterday and has had his experience both with stupidity and with human treachery, but that is just what makes it all so troubling. How do you get beyond Pontius Pilate's cynical "What is truth?" when dealing with people, be they strangers or not? Can I rely on any person's word, whether spoken, printed or uploaded?

So-called fake news is not even the half of what concerns me here. I guess that liars, people of bad will or intention, will always be. Into this basket I would also place materialists, the conniving and greedy, whose agenda has no room for the Lordship of Christ and for subjecting our world and our lives to His reign. They are, however, less my problem, because they can be more easily exposed and shunned for our own protection as well as for the protection of those whom we love. I am even less worried about being led astray by the petty and foolish. My difficulty has to do with other groups, and which are sometimes labeled as well-intentioned and worthy of respect. I am troubled by all those givens, confidently possessed, defended, and proclaimed by a middle aged to older sort of conservative establishment, ready to tolerate way too much for the sake of not confronting the status quo in government, business, and labor, not to mention what we are supposed to believe is mainstream Catholicism.

Above all, I guess, I am troubled by those who take their stance for and against others based more on fealty or comradeship and less on what I would think was personal integrity and an uncompromising search for truth. Jockeying for the advantage, testing loyalties, and the frequency with which others are accused of betrayal seems to trump authenticity and personal integrity.

It appears that mine or someone else's pearl of great price does not interest or give pause to those who seemingly hold the high ground, be it intellectual or moral. This supposedly friendly opposition, masquerading as allied forces, will not move beyond fortress walls and revise positions perhaps imposed upon them in their childhood or youth and never revisited.

I just read an article by someone I know as a totally integral person, whom I know I can trust. I cannot join her as she proclaims the pontificates of John Paul II and Benedict XVI to have been undermined by reason of their failure to confront and do battle with what many brand as neo-modernism. She castigates neo-conservativism and outlines a program for rallying to the banner of tradition in defense of the fullness of the faith. I suppose her experience of betrayal leads her to cancel not only what shows itself ugly in our times, but which ends up being branded as its logical precedent and equally culpable. Book burnings no longer make sense, but her search seems to be for some sort of damnatio memoriae.

What I miss in her position and in that of many others is the witness of St. Vincent Ferrer, O.P. “The Angel of the Judgment” [1350-1419], who was less into church politics and totally consumed by his preaching. I am still looking for that kind of saint in our times.

Join me in storming heaven for another "angel" like St. Vincent to call people to conversion before the great day of wrath!

PROPERANTES ADVENTUM DIEI DEI

 

In the Arms of a Nurturing Mother

 

40 Hours Devotions, Talk #3

Monday, Dec 6^th, 7:30pm, St. Michael

Mary the Mother of the Eucharist: Nurturing the Life of Grace

 

Praised be Jesus Christ!

Holy Mary, Mother of the Word Incarnate, pray for us!

St. Nicholas, pray for us!

        As Catholics, we firmly believe that nurturing the life of grace works best in conjunction with Mary, the Mother of God and our Mother. If you have problems or hesitancy in believing in the Son, ask the Mother for her aid! That advice holds especially when it comes to professing faith in the Real Presence of Christ in the Holy Sacrament of the Altar. We need to leave no stone unturned in our quest to grow in faith. We need to have confidence that the gift of faith is not one of which we should despair, certainly not given that our Mother Mary is around and wants us to know her Son. Good mothers, true mothers are the first and best at nurturing the lives of their children. Mary can nurture the life of grace within us. Just know that she is the one in your life, in every aspect of your life, to whom you need to turn things over. Why did Pope Saint John Paul II take as his motto Totus Tuus (which could well be translated, “I am all yours”)? Because he was confident that Mary, for the love of her only begotten Son, Jesus, would carry her son, Karol Wojtyla as well.

The motto Totus Tuus was JPII’s way of expressing his understanding and acceptance of the total consecration to Jesus through Mary, taught by St. Louis-Marie Grignion de Montfort. The saint lived in France from Jan 31, 1673 - Apr 28, 1716. He was only 43 when he died but left behind several religious orders he had founded and his writings on true devotion to Mary and total consecration to her Son through her. His description of true devotion to Mary is not the easiest reading and so I won’t go into it today. If you are interested, there are not only English translations of the saint’s writings out there, but also other authors who have written to popularize the teaching of St. Louis-Marie.

Instead, we will take it a little bit simpler and so to start our talk, let’s go to Calvary for the definitive statement from the Lord Himself, Who made such a consecration through Mary possible and explained where it and we belong in the life of the Church with Mary. There upon the Cross the Lord Jesus entrusted to us the Blessed Virgin Mary, His Immaculate Mother, and entrusted us to her care! There is no doubt that Jesus, dying on the Cross is asking a full mother-son, son-mother commitment from both Mary and John, the Evangelist. We read about it briefly from John’s Gospel 19:25-27:

“Meanwhile, standing near the cross of Jesus were his mother, and his mother’s sister, Mary the wife of Clopas, and Mary Magdalene. When Jesus saw his mother and the disciple whom he loved standing beside her, he said to his mother, “Woman, here is your son.” Then he said to the disciple, “Here is your mother.” And from that hour the disciple took her into his own home.” [Harper Bibles. NRSV Catholic Edition Bible (p. 1012). HarperCollins. Kindle Edition.]

My message to you and to all Catholics of good will is simply this: “Take Mary into your own home!” If you have not so far in life and you do, then your life will change. Through intimacy with Mary you will come alive in Christ; you will come to know God and rejoice exceedingly in Him.

At the foot of the Cross, John, the beloved disciple, stood in for all of us as he was entrusted by the dying Christ with care for His Mother. The Church teaches us that. At the same time, there at the foot of the Cross, Jesus gives John and us into Mary’s arms. The meaning of the passage was clear for John, as he took her into his own home. The Church teaches that its meaning is clear for all of us as well. Since that moment on the Cross, Mary is Mother for us all and we are her children in Christ. The Catholic faith is a Marian faith. To truly believe, to be Christian and therefore Catholic we must hold to Mary. Entrusting ourselves to the Blessed Virgin is neither an option nor a frill when it comes to living the true faith. Relying on Mary to intercede for us with her Son does not diminish Christ’s role in our lives. The Church’s teaching on the communion of saints is all gain. It takes nothing away from Christ’s Lordship or His power to save.

Speaking of the title given to our talk today, the idea of naming Mary the Mother of the Eucharist is nonetheless sort of puzzling. What is the sense of that particular title for the Blessed Virgin, for Mary the Mother of God? Why do I ask? Partly because I should, as the title and its traditional explanation may seem somewhat convoluted to older people who have lived more in the 20^th century than they have in the 21^st. I say that full well knowing that this title is a beautiful expression of the doctrine of the Real Presence of Christ in the Eucharist. What ultimately is the sense of talking about Mary as the Mother of the Eucharist? She has so many other titles. What does this one add? We know her as the Mother of Christ, and we firmly believe that her Son, true God and true Man, is present Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity in the Eucharist. Logically, just as Jesus says, “This is My Body”, so Mary can say of the consecrated Host “This is My Son”. Even getting that far would be a great enrichment to our understanding of her title, Mother of the Eucharist, and a genuine aid toward growing our faith in Jesus present and active in the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, enduringly present in the Holy Sacrament of the Altar.

Mary’s other titles of Motherhood are perhaps more evident and direct. Mother of God is clear. Mother of the Word Incarnate is also profound and immediate in its sense. It fits especially well with Christmas: and the Word was made Flesh and dwelt among us. Other titles? Mother of Jesus, even Mother of the Church, we can understand all these titles if we but approach them with simplicity and openness. But why call Mary the Mother of the Eucharist? I suppose in a sense because in our day the title is helpfully subversive. It does an end run (football language) around all the opposition and lack of love shown to Mary over the last century and puts her back at the center of the Eucharistic action and the great Mystery of Faith. Mary is as inseparably bound up with the Eucharist as she is with Calvary. Stupid and sometimes wicked people have either ignored Mary over the last century or they have actually plotted to deprive her of her central role in the plan of salvation. Fatima was especially important to disarming the enemies of Mary and of our Church. Even so, it has been a long uphill struggle to win over hearts. This tragic prejudice, especially since the late 1960’s, has already denied generations of children of a healthy and uncomplicated love for Mary, thus hindering them on the path to Christ in the fullness of the mystery of His Being.

“When Jesus saw his mother and the disciple whom he loved standing beside her, he said to his mother, “Woman, here is your son.” Then he said to the disciple, “Here is your mother.” And from that hour the disciple took her into his own home.”

* * *

Nurturing the Life of Grace!

To go back to my talk from Sunday evening, the miserable results announced by the Pew Research Survey concerning the faith of Catholics today in the Real Presence of Jesus in the Eucharist is compounded by the all too real erosion of people’s understanding of our obligation under pain of mortal sin to assist at Holy Mass on all Sundays and Holy Days of Obligation. Since time immemorial, law has been used to teach Catholics what St. Justin Martyr proclaimed before his judge in that first age of persecution of the Church, namely, that as Christians we cannot live without Sunday, meaning without the Holy Eucharist. But for Sundays in our time, even though the law is still on the books, I guess now especially since COVID, we are talking about 20% attendance at Sunday Mass by people who profess themselves Catholic, even here in God’s Country, in South Dakota. Holy Day attendance, other than for Christmas Day, has so eroded that if we take the case of the Feast of the Ascension, the US Conference of Catholic Bishops, presumably to sort of save face for the failing numbers, took a vote and half the dioceses in the country transferred the Ascension from the Thursday to the nearest Sunday. They capitulated!

People no longer take Holy Days seriously, unfortunately. When I was a child, the US had 6 Holy Days of Obligation and both England and Italy had even more (8, I think). The observance of Holy Days in our time gets even more difficult because of the invention of vigil or prefestive Masses: Saturday night for Sunday or the eve for the Holy Day. Just to give you an alert, this Wednesday, December 8, the Feast of the Immaculate Conception is not only a Holy Day of Obligation, but it is the patronal feast of the United States. How many people will remember and fulfil their obligation? I won’t ask for a show of hands from those who have the Holy Day Mass on their family calendar for this week, even though I surely hope that everyone does. Let me say it differently! I am always pleasantly surprised by people who have the Holy Days of Obligation down on their family or personal calendar. Enough said!

At the beginning of my first talk, I said my goal for these days would be “…to restore, revive, expand belief in and devotion to the Eucharist according to the mind of the Church”. At some point or another I also said that our faith is of a piece; it is integral. If my Catholic identity is not founded on faithfulness (treated as necessity) to attendance at Sunday Mass, how do I ground my faith in the Real Presence? If I am not a person of prayer, making my morning offering first thing when I get up, blessing my meals, examining my conscience at night before bed, cultivating my faith in the Incarnation by praying the Angelus and staying close to Mary by praying at least some part of her rosary each day, then how can I be able or ready to encounter Jesus present in the Holy Eucharist? It is truly a matter of sensitizing ourselves straight across the board to the things of God.

Our Lady of Fatima, explaining the First Saturday Devotion to Lucia, described one of the requirements very simply as keeping Mary company for 15 minutes on that day. Earlier we described prayer as lifting our hearts and minds to God. That simple definition helps us understand just how constant prayer, prayer without ceasing, is indeed possible. Failing faith in the True Presence has not little to do with failing to be mindful of the Lord as otherwise and always part of our lives. Personal prayer grounds and nurtures faith in the Lord Who gives Himself to eat in the Eucharist.

During my whole life as a priest, since 1976, I have tried myself, and I have been edified by the example of many good priests, old and young, who have tried their best to win people back to the sacrament of Penance. Up until the Council most good Catholics, let’s say average Catholics, went to Confession once a month. I had a great uncle who went to confession every week or two weeks and he was not alone in the 1950’s. Sadly, back after the Council it was not uncommon for priests to discourage people from Confession and lots of parishes went to systems of confession by appointment only, which meant never. We need to get back to Confession not only for serious sin, but as a form of spiritual direction aimed at our growth in holiness.

Why the low percentage of faith in the Real Presence? Belief in the Real Presence presumes the clear understanding that we cannot presume to receive the Lord in Holy Communion in the state of mortal sin. Moreover, we should be using regular confession to fight habitual venial sin in our lives and thereby to grow in holiness, that is, to grow closer in love and devotion to our great God in Jesus Christ.

St. José Maria Escriva de Balaguer, the founder of Opus Dei, taught especially the men of his group to get back to the old-fashioned ways in the Spain of his childhood of preparation for receiving Holy Communion. Since before the Council most people were hesitant to approach the Lord in Holy Communion without first going to confession, he reminded the men to go all the way and prepare like the fathers and grandfathers had done: confession on Saturday and then take a bath. Sunday morning shave and clean up, put on your Sunday best and maybe even a bit of cologne. No doubt the results for a Pew Research Survey back then would have been quite different than now when people tend to dress down to come to church.

Et Verbum Caro Factum Est! The Word was made Flesh and dwelt among us! One of the mindless consequences of COVID has been to further erode the faith in the necessity of our Sunday encounter with Jesus really and truly present in the Eucharist. Not only were our churches closed at some point, but all kinds of scare tactics with disinfectant protocols were imposed. My sister who lives in Switzerland told me that in her parish, she tried to take on as a greeter at Sunday Mass the duties that were imposed upon them by the state with the complicity of their bishop, taking down contact information, checking for a mask, and squirting disinfectant on people’s hands at the door. She gave up, however, when she found one lady in her group who stationed herself with her spray bottle at the head of the Communion line and insisted on spraying people’s hands again just before they received.

Father Morgan at the Cathedral did tell me of one good thing that came out of the COVID distancing. At our Cathedral people were asked to come up and stand to one side of the center aisle, with the Communion rail between them and the priest or deacon. Almost naturally then, some of the people knelt down and received Communion on the tongue. They continue to do so now even after the restrictions have been lifted. In Bern I had a goodly amount of contact with former Swiss Guards of all ages and came to understand how these men, especially the younger ones, wanted to express their faith in Jesus really and truly present, not only by bowing before coming up to Communion, but by going down on their knees before the priest and receiving their Lord on the tongue. To my way of thinking, it is a free world and people should always feel free to express their devotion by receiving Communion in the traditional manner. Priests or deacons who discourage such signs of devotion are only undermining the faith in Christ really and truly present in the Sacred Host. Let’s title this section especially for the priests and deacons as: Don’t Stifle the Spirit!

At this point, I am kind of asking myself how I have done in terms of my goal, “…to restore, revive, expand belief in and devotion to the Eucharist according to the mind of the Church”. I hope I have not been too blah, blah, but have given you something to ponder over. In terms of the other request from the pastoral team that these 40 Hours Devotions help prepare the parish for Christmas, I think that is part of the whole. The more prayerful I am, the more attentive I am, and hence the more fully I enter into the mystery. I hope I was somewhat encouraging to get you to confession to prepare your heart to receive the Savior King at Christmas.

No need to tell you that preparing for Christmas cannot simply be equated with getting into the Christmas spirit. Even so, we know that people who are overcome by the hectic of the season cannot really enjoy Christmas. That is one of the reasons I have given up on writing Christmas cards. They get on my nerves for various reasons and doing a clever mail merge to send them out by email leaves me even colder. In the Nunciature, I had my secretary to prepare the obligatory cards and envelopes for the bishops of the country and for the mother superiors who would write, plus to prepare the thank you’s for things like the gingerbread shingle from the company that had our roof maintenance contract. No, what I mean by preparing for Christmas is allowing your prayer to engulf you. During Advent it means to really let those O Come O Come Emmanuel’s resonate in your heart.

This is the first year I think in my life that I have had to set up my own Advent Wreath at home. Up until now someone has always done it for me. By chance, just a couple days before the First Sunday of Advent, I got a little holy card in the mail. It has a picture of Mary walking with a staff in hand and is entitled “The Evening Before the Birth of Christ”. On the flip side are four little prayers for lighting the Advent Wreath, one for each week. “” Now if you pray that and your grace before meals you are set. Without effort you have a good thought and maybe even a bit of focus for your meal.  

  Let me thank you for your attentiveness and assure you of my prayers for you especially in this beautiful Advent Season. Let Mary come and place the Christ Child right in your lap.

Praised be Jesus Christ!

Holy Mary, Mother of the Word Incarnate, pray for us!

St. Nicholas, pray for us!

 

Age Appropriate Adoration

 

40 Hours Devotions, Talk #2

Monday, Dec 6^th, 9:30am, St. Michael

He grew in Wisdom, Grace, and Stature: Aging and adoring the Eucharistic Lord. (Talk geared towards our seniors)

Praised be Jesus Christ!

St. Michael the Archangel, pray for us!

St. Nicholas, pray for us!

I thought we should begin with the passage from the Gospel of Luke 2:41-52, which (I presume) inspired your pastoral team’s choice of titles for this talk {He grew in Wisdom, Grace, and Stature}.

“Now every year his parents went to Jerusalem for the festival of the Passover. And when he was twelve years old, they went up as usual for the festival. When the festival was ended and they started to return, the boy Jesus stayed behind in Jerusalem, but his parents did not know it. Assuming that he was in the group of travelers, they went a day’s journey. Then they started to look for him among their relatives and friends. When they did not find him, they returned to Jerusalem to search for him. After three days they found him in the temple, sitting among the teachers, listening to them, and asking them questions. And all who heard him were amazed at his understanding and his answers. When his parents saw him, they were astonished; and his mother said to him, “Child, why have you treated us like this? Look, your father and I have been searching for you in great anxiety.” He said to them, “Why were you searching for me? Did you not know that I must be in my Father’s house?” But they did not understand what he said to them. Then he went down with them and came to Nazareth and was obedient to them. His mother treasured all these things in her heart. And Jesus increased in wisdom and in years, and in divine and human favor.” [Harper Bibles. NRSV Catholic Edition Bible. HarperCollins. Kindle Edition.]

        If you were ever looking for proof that there is something over the course of the centuries and millennia in the life of the world which we can call a human constant, at least in terms of developmental psychology, this passage we just read has pride of place in pointing one out and deserves to be quoted. Here in this passage, we meet Jesus the perfect 12-year-old. There is not a well-adjusted 12-year-old in the world today who would be surprised by the behavior of the young God-Man. “Child, why have you treated us like this? Look, your father and I have been searching for you in great anxiety.” He said to them, “Why were you searching for me? Did you not know that I must be in my Father’s house?” Jesus is not behaving like an adult in this passage, but rather like a 12-year-old, who wouldn’t think to talk through with His parents His decision to remain in the Temple. One of the struggles parents have with a younger, not yet technically a teenage son is to bring him to understand that being grown-up implies talking through lots of things for which we really don’t need permission.

So! How is this talk supposed to go today? Granted, there could be value in sorting through the Fifth Joyful Mystery of the Rosary, Jesus found amongst the elders in the Temple, but for us here in church today given that the rest of the title for this talk reads: Aging and adoring the Eucharistic Lord, maybe we should leave adolescent developmental psychology aside. The bigger question to address would seem to be what does this passage have to do with senior citizens?

We’ll come back to it again at the end, but my encouragement to you would be to render the Lord age-appropriate worship. Our call is to give witness to Jesus really and truly present here in the tabernacle in a way that is different from that of a twelve or even of a twenty-year-old (I could even say a 40-year-old). Aging and adoring the Eucharistic Lord!

        Every year around Thanksgiving one of my classmates from the North American College in Rome, class of 1976 (He is a priest of the Archdiocese of Dubuque), puts together and sends out our class newsletter, which offers us updates on all those who choose to stay in touch by writing in to him. I say that, because very few of us write every year and some never contribute to the newsletter. This year for the first time, Father also attached an updated necrology to the newsletter. More than a quarter of my classmates have passed on.

I am basically happy to get the letter each year, whether the individual letters from classmates are interesting or maybe not so much. It has been 49 years since we first met each other in Rome. Some of us have become lifelong friends and some not. Some of the entries are no less annoying coming from men over 70 years of age than the men themselves were back in seminary in their early to mid-20’s. Even so, I look forward to each edition as the better part of the letters are really a joy and, friends or not, these men have been an important part of my life.

One of the men, a good friend of mine back then, (I think he is suffering from Parkinson’s) lives most of the year with his brother and sister-in-law up in North Carolina and occasionally drives down to his diocese in Florida for meetings, doctoring and what not. He’s a very colorful figure and always was. In the seminary he used to tease me a lot, but I really enjoyed his attention. This year he waxed eloquent about the significance of finding ourselves in the autumn of our lives as a metaphor for facing our common health challenges and especially for him facing his own which are tougher than most. With his disability I am sure he is more pensive than I would be about the inevitability of physical and mental decline, and yes, of death. As he tells it, he was driving back to North Carolina just as the fall colors were in all their glory. His reflection was on the particular beauty of the autumn of our lives, comparable let us say to the beautiful fall colors of North Carolina. All the aches and pains of age aside, he wanted us all to take courage from the powerful imagery he penned into his letter to the class.

        He grew in Wisdom, Grace, and Stature: Aging and adoring the Eucharistic Lord.

        To be good at Eucharistic adoration, to do it right takes effort, just like a good marriage does. Eucharistic adoration is prayer at the highest level. Just like when you pray to the unseen God, so especially when you worship Him present before you under the forms of bread and wine, you need to invest without expecting return for your efforts. The Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, much like Christ’s sacrifice once and for all on Calvary, His Crucifixion and Death, costs us more personally than it builds us up. Just look at Mary, John and Mary Magdalen there at the foot of the Cross! Assisting at Mass, we are drawn into Christ’s action. If, outside of Mass, we give ourselves over to adoring God in Christ Jesus present in the Sacred Host, we are pondering His Sacrificial Love which saves us, brings us life in fullness.

First and foremost, in order to give glory to God and enter into the mystery of our salvation in Christ, other than being a person honestly striving for holiness, you have to be a person who prays. I won’t say that you have to be certified as a blackbelt when it comes to praying, because there is no jury or manual of certification for prayer. Besides, eager and good pray-ers are never content with their own performance. They are always critical of themselves, just like the good husband never judges himself worthy of his beloved wife, the mother of his children. As with so many things in life, so also with prayer, it is not finesse or my personal prowess in prayer that counts. Achievement and success are categories appropriate to competitive sports but not necessarily relevant to happiness in life. Let me repeat the statement again! To be good at Eucharistic adoration you have to be a person who prays and who prays without ceasing. When I left Kyiv, Ukraine for Bern, Switzerland, because of a customs ruling, I had to leave behind my favorite icon, the first one I received as a gift there. Even though there was not an ounce of gold on it and the holy image was not done by some great artist, just because it was over 80 years old, I could only have taken it out of Ukraine with a license from its owner. As the priest who gave it to me had recovered it from the trash, there was no way possible. I have my memories! What I loved about it was that it was an image of Christ the King, seated on His Throne. On the open book in His Hand, you could read the admonition “Pray without ceasing” written in everyday Ukrainian (…). Never cease praying or pray constantly. That is our task in life entrusted to us by Christ Himself. Always have your heart and mind fixed on the Lord.

Let me insist on that point, that we must be people of prayer, for reasons which are intimately bound up with advancing or advanced age! Prayer, among other things, is basically about lifting your mind and heart to God, and adoration declares God to be Who He is, our Creator, Redeemer, and Friend. At some point, I am sure no later than high school I learned that adoration means giving God His due. Already years ago, since forever really, we as Catholics have been clear that giving God His due means adoring Him and He only as God is deserving of our adoration. The more English and less Latinate word for adoration is worship, which as every Catholic knows does not apply to the saints, not even to the Blessed Virgin Mary. Our honor for the saints and for the Mother of God is called not worship but veneration. We do not worship, but rather we venerate Mary and the saints. We express our love for the saints, our brothers and sisters in Christ, who have fought the good fight and won the race. We pray to them yes, but in a different way than we pray to God. The saints are now in glory with God and can intercede for us before the Heavenly Throne. Mary, in a special way as our mother from the foot of the Cross, can intercede with her Son for us.

        I want to insist on the central importance of prayer, of living consciously in the presence of God and making the Lord the focus of our lives: heart, soul, mind, and strength. Apart from the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass as important as it is, being the source and summit of Christian existence, Perpetual Adoration can help us in our prayer, can help us draw close to God. Different from the Mass, Eucharistic Adoration with ongoing Exposition in the monstrance is more of a big city, downtown kind of thing. It usually means or takes on the form it has at the monastery of our Adoration Sisters here in Sioux Falls up by the Cathedral. After early morning Mass each day, the priest exposes the Blessed Sacrament to the view of the people in the monstrance set on high above the tabernacle; the sisters take turns keeping silent watch before our Eucharistic Lord all day long and the chapel is open all day for people who want to drop in and pray.

I know parishes or cities around the world without a community of religious who guarantee that watch before the Lord. The lay people themselves are the ones who organize a schedule of people to be in church for the hours of exposition. In Switzerland, I was invited for anniversary celebrations by groups of Perpetual Adoration at the city level in both Freiburg and Sion. To be able to do that, you have to be able to guarantee that people will be there to watch and pray before the Lord. Perpetual Adoration is a value in itself, but in recent years it has also been the source of countless vocations to priesthood and the religious life. Lots of younger priests will tell you they found their vocation in prayer before the Blessed Sacrament.

Holy Cross Parish in Hutchinson, Kansas, where my mother lived, had a very successful program of Perpetual Adoration. The people of the parish had their adoration chapel open all day and all night throughout the whole year. The people themselves organized it, and over the years the parish priests were firm supporters of the effort. The older priest, who was there when they began, was very soft-spoken but fervent in faith. He believed that Perpetual Adoration was one of the reasons Holy Cross had been spared from storms, especially tornadoes, over the years. The good priests, who came after him, were just as supportive of this effort which the people of the parish themselves carried. My Mom’s hairdresser and her husband, a carpet layer, were not even registered in the parish but faithfully kept their hour, one day a week, and they did it at like three in the morning. For most of the hours of adoration the organizers had two people signed up. Mom volunteered for an hour each Sunday afternoon, which was actually the hardest time to find people to cover. Quite often she would be there alone. Occasionally, something would happen that the person or persons for the next hour, or maybe their substitute, would not show up. Mom would just stay on then for another hour until someone came. Everyone knew that you could not leave Jesus alone, outside the tabernacle on the altar, unwatched and unguarded.

        Here in our part of the world where the Church is predominantly rural and farming used to completely absorb people’s lives, we have more common and older traditions for adoring Our Eucharistic Lord. Men used to tip their hats, and everyone would make the Sign of the Cross when they passed by a Catholic Church on the street. When churches were generally open all day, before vandalism and crazies became so common, believing people would often stop into church to make a visit to Our Lord in the tabernacle. During my years as nuncio in Ukraine, riding in the car with bishops or priests in various parts of the country, none of them would ever miss making the Sign of the Cross when they drove past a church.

        Not too long ago, I was visiting with an older woman, who had moved to South Dakota to be close to her son and grandchildren. They live in a small town outside of Sioux Falls. She was distressed because here, different from where she had been living in another state near a community of retired priests with Mass every day, here she no longer had daily Mass and Communion. Her priest had another parish to care for as well, so each parish got daily Mass two days per week. The woman drives, so I asked her why she didn’t drive to another town on the off days for Mass. Sadly, her fixed income would not allow the extra gas money, and truth to be told, at her age and health, I don’t think her son wants her driving on the highway. Doing her own time in the parish church before the tabernacle, keeping Christ company, probably best fits her bill. Aging and adoring the Eucharistic Lord.

        What is age-appropriate adoration? Remember the perfect 12-year-old! One of my brothers-in-law, when he was traveling on the road selling, used to work it out where he could stop each day, when not for Mass, then to spend his hour before the Blessed Sacrament. I know people still on the job who make a point of leaving early for the office so they can stop for a brief visit to Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament or who make a brief detour on the way home from work. I know others who could not stay for weekday Mass, but could come to confession, which Father offered daily before morning Mass. Thoughtfulness and creativity find ways to draw near to the Lord, when not in an Adoration chapel, then in a parish church, which (please God!) is open and accessible for folks to make visits to the Lord.

        Retired and you still have your vehicle? Make an appointment with our Eucharistic Lord just like you would to meet a friend for coffee or for lunch! Make a stop at church on your way to pick up groceries! Don’t give Father the silent treatment! If something is not right, let’s say the church entry is too dark or there’s a mat there or missing which puts you at risk of stumbling, then speak up! When Jesus cleansed the Temple, people noted His action and quoted Scripture to say, “Zeal for Your House consumes me”. 12-year-olds have theirs and we as senior citizens have ours!

        If you are homebound, then pray! Turn off all the noise, maybe withdraw to your room away from other people in the house to spend time with the Lord of your life! That fits in with my statement about prayer as the gateway or presupposition for Eucharistic Adoration! To be good at Eucharistic adoration you have to be a person who prays.

Praised be Jesus Christ!

St. Michael the Archangel, defend us in battle! Be our protection against the wickedness and snares of the Devil! May God rebuke him we humbly pray and do thou, O Prince of the Heavenly Host, by the power of God thrust into Hell Satan and all the evil spirits who prowl about the world seeking the ruin of souls! Amen!

40 Hours Homily - Renewing Faith in the Real Presence

 

 SECOND SUNDAY OF ADVENT

St. Michael Parish – 40 Hours Devotion

Saturday, Dec. 4^th, 4:00pm Mass - Sunday, Dec 5^th, 9:30am Mass

Bar 5:1-9

Phil 1:4-6, 8-11

Lk 3:1-6

Praised be Jesus Christ!

        The Alleluia verse proposed for the Second Sunday of Advent reads: “Prepare the way of the Lord, make straight his paths: all flesh shall see the salvation of God.”  

That is basically Advent in a nutshell and with very little need for unpacking. “Prepare the way of the Lord, make straight his paths: all flesh shall see the salvation of God.” (Before going on with my homily, I better add a little parenthesis.)

        [I am really quite pleased to accept the invitation of your pastor and pastoral team to lead 40 Hour Devotions here at St. Michael this weekend. I do so, as they have suggested to me, with two intentions in mind: 1) To prepare you all for Christmas, our annual celebration of the great feast of the Lord’s Incarnation, and 2) by way of the classic 40 Hours focus on Eucharistic Adoration, to seek to stir up in your hearts that faith which is ours as Catholics in the Real Presence of Jesus, truly God and truly Man, in the Eucharist, the Sacrament of the Altar, He the Lord being present here Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity.

        Regardless of how much time you are able to dedicate to 40 Hours this weekend, I would ask you to pray intensely for the success of our parish devotions. With what intention? That hearts may be changed! That sinners may repent! May everyone at St. Michael’s come to deeper faith in the Lord Jesus born for us and for us given! May Christ reign in our hearts and in our homes this Advent and for Christmas!]

        “Prepare the way of the Lord, make straight his paths: all flesh shall see the salvation of God.”

        Advent and this Sunday’s readings bring an insistent question to my mind. Over the course of history, I wonder who has had a tougher time believing in the victory of our God over human events: Was it Jerusalem? The chosen people to whom the Prophet Baruch addressed his book in the Old Testament, they, a city under siege, a people carried off into exile, but nonetheless promised the impossible: “… for God is leading Israel in joy by the light of his glory, with his mercy and justice for company”? Remember! In the Book of the Prophet Baruch, we are talking about God’s People at an all-time low in their history and yet they are told by the prophet that God is coming to save them. The Prophet Baruch talks about glory, mercy, and justice for them from God, Who is leading Israel in joy…

Advent and again our question! Was it tougher to imagine: hope and excitement for Jerusalem back in the Old Testament because of God’s promised victory for them or hope and excitement for Catholics today, despite the fact that many are filled with anxiety and maybe have serious doubts as to whether they should be confident in St. Paul’s promise to the Philippians: “I am confident of this, that the one who began a good work in you will continue to complete it until the day of Christ Jesus”? We are faced with the challenge of believing and hoping in the power of God to save, to reign victoriously not only in a spiritual sense, but truly over our lives and our world. Baruch told Jerusalem they would recover from the present devastation and be back on top again. Paul described an ongoing work in the lives of his listeners which would reach completion in the day of Christ Jesus.

To complicate matters even further, let us turn to the passage just proclaimed from Luke’s Gospel for today! Just what is it that would accredit the message of John the Baptist, spoken in the desert, by this ragged, emaciated figure, dressed in a camel’s hide and physically barely surviving, living off of locusts and wild honey? Just how are we to believe John’s claim that … “all flesh shall see the salvation of God”? Who was John the Baptist to make such promises in God’s Name?

        There is no doubt about it: the readings assigned for this Second Sunday of Advent are upbeat and full of anticipation. But how do we get past that which is seen and suffered, day in and day out, to the truth that it is God Who does the good work in us. The Lord Jesus brings all to fulfillment, to fruition.

        Part of the reason that I am sort of fixated on this idea that the primary action is God’s, that He brings the captives back from exile (thank you, Baruch), that He brings the work He has begun in you to fulfillment (yes, St. Paul), that John the Baptist was indeed the last and greatest prophet preparing the Lord’s victorious way, is that not few sensible Catholics are skeptical about that being the case. To say it another way: Just as in other times in the history of God’s People, so today we find ourselves in a spiritual wasteland, an arid place where people do not seem to pray much at all and as such show very little evidence of true, deep, and lifegiving faith.

        While I was working on this homily, I happened to listen to one of my favorite podcasts, by a younger husband and father, whose point was that as lay Catholics you don’t have time to waste. You are putting your children at risk, if you are investing time and effort in a parish, which may be a toxic environment at worse or at best a dud without heart or soul. My man urged his listeners to shake the dust off their feet, leave a lukewarm parish behind, and move in search of a true faith community. How does this square with St. Paul? “I am confident of this, that the one who began a good work in you will continue to complete it until the day of Christ Jesus.”

        I understand my man’s point of view, but disagree that that requires that we must, necessarily and in the first place, pronounce judgment on others.

        One of the very powerful scenes in the Book of Daniel shows the prophet quietly defying the king’s orders not to pray to anyone but the king for a given period of time. Daniel, despite those orders, continues to go home, close his door, open a window toward Jerusalem, and pray in private to the Lord for the deliverance from captivity of his people and the restoration of Jerusalem. The rest of the story we know. Daniel’s enemies denounce him to the king, who throws him into the lion’s den, but God delivers Daniel from the jaws of the lions when the king could not, the king feeds all of Daniel’s enemies to the lions and confesses the supremacy of Daniel’s God to his whole kingdom.

        Moral of the story and the message for this Sunday? In good times and in bad, but especially in adversity, we need to trust absolutely in God’s power to save. Our steadfast prayer amidst suffering and persecution has not to do with resignation but with hope. We cannot be slack; it is no solution. Our prayer, our engagement is what places us on God’s side; it is our choice, not so much to empower God as to open our hearts and lives to His victorious reign.

“Prepare the way of the Lord, make straight his paths: all flesh shall see the salvation of God.” Or to use the words of St. Paul? “I am confident of this, that the one who began a good work in you will continue to complete it until the day of Christ Jesus.”

Praised be Jesus Christ!