Christmas Homily 2018

Christmas Homily

2018

Touch the Lepers

            One of the most dreaded diseases in the ancient world was leprosy. Even in the 1800s in America, leprosy was incurable and caused immense suffering. A person would lose circulation in their skin, causing it to rot while they were still alive. They would often lose fingers and toes, become deformed and hideous in appearance. Since no one knew how it was spread, the standard treatment was to isolate the person and send them to live in leper colonies. In the States, the major leper colony was on a small Hawaiian island called Molokai.

            These poor abandoned people, so suffering, had been forgotten by most of society – but not the Church. A religious community in Belgium heard of the plight of these forgotten souls and a priest, Fr. Damien de Veuster, volunteered to go and minister to the people.

            Upon arriving, he was given strict instructions not to touch the people, for fear of contamination. He was horrified to find the conditions appalling – the stench was so strong that he was forced to start smoking pipes to drown out the smell. The people lived like animals – their disease made it difficult to use tools so they lived in caves and foraged for food like rats. So Fr. Damien dispensed with the advice he was given and began to care for the people in practical ways – to bind their wounds, feed them, help them to build houses and a church and a school, to bury their dead. He knew he could not minister to them unless he lived like one of them. He shared their food and their drink, lived alongside them, and shared their lives. In turn, they loved him and trusted him completely.

            Because of how closely he worked with the lepers, he did eventually catch the disease. At the time, members of the government and even Church leaders criticized him for not taking more precautions with such a deadly disease. But he responded, “To win over the lepers, I became a leper myself.” He died of leprosy and is now known as St. Damien of Molokai.

            Now, one may wonder why I started my Christmas homily by talking about an awful disease and a heroic saint who ministered to the sick. But to me, what St. Damien did is exactly what God did by taking on flesh and living among us.

            We are sick with a deadly disease. It goes by many names – greed, lust, pride, envy, selfishness – but it has the same root: sin. This disease was slowly killing us, making our lives fall apart even as we walk around and breathe air and pretend like we’re alive. We’ve been separated from the very Source of Life Himself. We traded our dignity as sons and daughters of the King and instead began to live like animals. We needed…a Savior.

            And this Savior could have been aloof. He could have just dropped down Bibles from Heaven. He could have only sent angels and prophets. But He didn’t. “To win over the souls of men, He became a Man Himself.”

            He wasn’t afraid of our sin. He wasn’t disgusted by our miserable state. He came down and entered into the mystery of humanity – the joys, sorrows, hard work, pain, education, friendship, emotions, and even the death that we all must endure. Christmas is God on a rescue mission for His beloved children, disfigured and degraded by the disease of sin. Love desires to become one with the Beloved, no matter what the Beloved looks like.

            The whole point of this divine condescension is for our human restoration. As St. Augustine said, “God became man so that man could become like God.” What a trade! He took on our humanity, and offered us His divinity. Through our faith in Him, through following in His footsteps, we become vessels of Christ and someday, in Heaven, will be totally united to Him.

            Why do rags-to-riches stories always stay with us? Think of stories like Cinderella, or the Frog Prince. We have this nagging sense that human beings are more than meets the eye. There’s a deep truth there – we know that we are supposed to live for more than just bills and doctor’s appointments and traffic jams. We know that we are supposed to be the living image and likeness of God. And God took on our image and likeness at Christmas, so that we could take on His image and likeness.

            So – what’s the takeaway? How do we open ourselves to His transformation happening in us? It comes from our union with Him in three ways. The best way to be in union with Him is through the Sacraments – frequent Confession and weekly Mass attendance, where we receive Him in the Eucharist which is His true Body and Blood. It’s only through His grace living in us that His healing can change us. Secondly, we seek Him daily in prayer. Jesus came down two thousand years ago so that we can have a daily, living relationship with Him now. Read Scripture, spend time in silence and nature, pray the Rosary, or simply speak to Jesus from your heart – the important part is that we touch base with Him daily. Finally, seek to follow Him in your daily life. He wants to make us virtuous men and women, filled with His kindness, patience, purity, and love – so make your daily life about following His example.

            My friends, there’s only one hope for us to be healed of the disease of sin – to turn to the God who entered into our messy world, becoming a part of the human race with all its flaws and foibles, to bring our souls to Heaven. That hope is Jesus Christ – born for us at Christmas.