Twenty-Second Sunday in Ordinary Time - August 28, 2016

Homily for Ordinary Time 22

August 28, 2016

Love Without Counting the Cost

 

            Have you ever watched those late-night infomercials? You know, the ones that try to sell you a gadget you didn’t know you needed, for only $19.95 (plus shipping and handling). Why is it that these gadgets aren’t enticing enough by themselves…they always have a classic “but wait! There’s more!” part where they promise that they’ll throw in something free? I mean, who cares that this newfangled piece of machinery slices and dices vegetables, waxes your car, and removes unsightly eyebrow hair…you ALSO need the gadget’s little cousin which files your taxes and pets your dog for you. Advertisers throw in that “extra” because they know we want to get our money’s worth!

            Whenever we buy something we’re always asking two things. First, how much is it going to cost? Second, am I getting value for my money? We want to pay very little but receive quite a bit. We say, “Hmm, that used car costs $2,000 but only has 90,000 miles on it…I can probably drive it for five years…is it a good deal?” We want to know that we’re getting a good deal, that we’re coming out on top, that we’re getting back more value on our investments, that the reward will be greater than the cost.

            Unfortunately some of us carry this mentality over into our relationships as well. We say, “What’s in it for me?” with our human relationships. We want to spend time with wealthy, successful people so that we can climb the career ladder – we call that “networking”. We cultivate a friendship with someone we hope will help us out in the long run. We are kind and patient for a friend…and secretly we hope that they will return the favor. I see this in married couples all the time – the wife is able to go away for a weekend with her girlfriends, so the husband expects to have a similar trip with his fishing buddies. The husband spends a hundred dollars on a new power tool, and the wife wants the same for herself.

It’s human nature to want to count the cost when we give. But this attitude is foreign to Christianity – Jesus tells us in the Gospel to give a banquet for those who can’t repay us. In other words, we must love without counting the cost!

There is a wonderful religious order of nuns in France called the “Little Sisters Disciples of the Lamb” which is unique because the order contains several sisters who have Downs’ Syndrome. With the help of the non-disabled sisters, those nuns with Downs’ Syndrome live a common life together in prayer, sacrifice, and manual labor. Their life is beautiful – it recognizes the dignity of all human beings, both those who are healthy and those with disabilities. And, I am sure, those non-disabled sisters receive so much love and affection from their disabled sisters…their life must be filled with abundant joy!

            We find that when we love and sacrifice without expecting anything in return, we end up getting more than we could ever have asked for. Those nuns who have given their life to serve their sisters with Downs’ Syndrome have received back far more love and joy than they give. As a wise priest once told me, “Where there’s love, sacrifice is easy.”

            So, let’s talk about how to give without counting the cost:

            First, giving to God. We have three things we can give to God – our time, our talents, and our treasure. We give God our time by spending it in prayer and worship. There is a great story of St. John Vianney, the patron saint of priests who was the pastor of a tiny country parish in France…he continually encouraged all of his parishioners to make sure Sunday was a day of rest and worship at Mass. There was one harvest season where the harvesters were working extra hard to harvest the grain on a Saturday night. The holy priest went out to the fields and asked them if they planned to take a rest on Sunday. The men refused, saying that storms were coming and they needed to get all of the wheat into the barn before the heavy storms destroyed the crops. The saint promised them that if they came to Mass and rested on Sunday, God would not allow a storm to touch their crops. Reluctantly the men agreed…so the next morning they came to Mass amidst black clouds that threatened rain. All afternoon they rested, fearful of torrential downpours that would wipe out their crops. But as it turned out, the storm cloud passed over them without destroying their crops, and they were able to resume harvesting on Monday, which turned out to be a beautiful day! They discovered that when they gave the proper time to God, He would bless their efforts and labors.

            Second, giving to others. We ought to strive to love without counting the cost – whether it is listening to a lonely relative when we could be busy, playing with our kids when we’d rather be watching TV, making food for a friend going through a tough time. Again, when we give to others, we give them our time, our talents (our love, energy, attention), and our treasure. We must make sure our motivations are pure, that we are giving because the other person is made in God’s image and likeness, and not just so we can “get” something from them. We should always choose to give to those who have little, so that it will be God who repays us – and He repays generously!

We will find that when we give without counting the cost, without expecting anything in return, we end up richer than in the first place – rich in God’s grace, rich in virtue, rich in rewarding relationships with one another. And those are the true riches that really count!

Homily for Twenty-First Sunday in Ordinary Time - August 21, 2016

Homily for Ordinary Time 21

August 21, 2016

Invitation

 

            Do you ever find an invitation laying on your table – and you can’t remember if you RSVP’d or not? That happened to me recently. Our bishop hosts an annual cookout for all priests in late August, and he sent all of us an invitation a couple months ago. Honestly I don’t remember if I replied or not, but all the priests got an email last week telling us that if we haven’t responded, we’d better do so soon! I had a moment of panic – did I respond? I don’t want to respond twice, that’d make me look foolish. But what if I forgot the first time? What if I show up and they never received my RSVP? Yikes!

            It’s only polite to respond promptly to invitations. And the Lord sent His Son to invite every human being – every person who ever lived, including all of us in the church this morning – to spend eternity at the wedding feast of the Lamb. It says in Scripture, “God desires all men to be saved.” The invitation is open to all!

            But not everyone RSVP’s. Jesus makes it clear that we don’t automatically go to Heaven when we die, contrary to popular belief. He is asked, “Will only a few be saved?” And He answers cryptically that many will not be strong enough to enter through the narrow gate. Hell is a real possibility – if it weren’t, what would Jesus have died to save us from? In 1917, Mary appeared to three shepherd children in Fatima, Portugal, and one of the messages she said to them was, “Pray, pray very much for sinners, because many people go to Hell because there is no one to pray and make sacrifices for them.”

            Hell is simply our rejection of God’s invitation. It isn’t God that condemns a soul to Hell – that person freely chooses to reject God’s invitation of eternal life. God has given human beings free will, and He respects our free choices, even if we choose to reject His life-giving invitation.

            But how do we accept that invitation? By having a living faith. We believe that Jesus Christ died for our sins, and then we seek to follow Him in our life.

            Notice I said a “living faith”. Faith must be lived – we cannot choose to sin and think that we have faith, or try to do the “bare minimum” and think we will be saved! In fact, certain actions of ours are, in themselves, enough to reject the invitation – those actions are called mortal sins. We often think, “Oh, I haven’t murdered anyone, I’m a pretty good person.” But there are many more mortal sins than just murder. Getting drunk or doing drugs, intentionally missing Mass on Sunday, porn or sex outside of marriage are all mortal sins that destroy the life of grace within us. When we do these things, we say with our actions, “I’d rather enjoy pleasure than the joys of eternity; I’d rather worship myself and my own desires rather than the God Who loves me and Who has invited me to Heaven with Him.” Mortal sins reject that invitation that God has placed in every human heart! But the good news is that while we are still alive, we can repent of them through Confession and change our RSVP to “YES!”

             There is a great story from the life of St. Teresa of Avila – she was such a remarkable woman; if you don’t know anything about her, go and check out her life. Some amazing stories there! She had been a nun for several years when, in prayer one day, God gave her a vision of Hell…and allowed her to see the place in Hell that was reserved for her! She was terrified by the vision and when she returned to her senses, she realized that she had been living a half-hearted, mediocre, lukewarm life. Her faith was not a living faith! But she immediately repented and became a great saint!

            Christ wants us to be saved, and He will give us every grace necessary for salvation. But we must respond to that invitation with our faith and with our life – living a life for Jesus, seeking holiness!

Twentieth Sunday in Ordinary Time - August 14, 2016

Homily for Twentieth Sunday in Ordinary Time

August 14, 2016

The Unpopular Gospel

            You may have read that a certain politician currently running for national office calls himself a “devout Catholic,” yet he has been consistently one of the most pro-abortion legislators in the senate. He styles himself “personally opposed” to abortion, but does not believe that his opinion should become law. How can a man like that believe privately that life is sacred but publically vote to make abortion more accessible?

            It’s very simple – he wants to be accepted by his voters.

            The time has come for us to stop hiding our faith out of fear of “offending someone”. Jesus’ scathing words in the Gospel are a wake-up call: He comes to bring, not peace, but division. In other words, if we’re just keeping quiet, not willing to rock the boat, trying to keep everyone around us happy by denying our Faith, then we betray Him and our Faith. True holiness and virtue has never been popular – and it’s even more unpopular now, since we live in a post-Christian culture. Our culture has rejected any semblance of Christian values – it is now a completely pagan, worldly culture, and anyone who dares to live for Jesus Christ will be seen as unpopular.

            A friend of mine with five kids just shared with me last week that she was in the grocery store with two carts filled to the brim with food. The girl at the checkout counter looked at her and said, (and I quote), “I would kill myself if I ever needed two carts of food for my family!” To which my friend replied, “Oh? Today’s only two carts…you should see when I need three!” My friend had chosen to follow Church teaching and be open to life – and a grocery store worker felt the need to criticize her!

            The reality is, we cannot be Christian and be well-accepted. To be a true Catholic is to be counter-cultural; to go against the tide. This is true on every topic – how we view marriage as something sacred between men and women, how we spend our time on Sunday mornings, what TV shows we watch and movies we take in. We must live differently from the culture if we hope to be faithful to Christ!

            And this is controversial. Today’s first reading features Jeremiah, the prophet who preached repentance to Israel. The nobles were so furious that Jeremiah spoke out against their immoral lifestyle that they tried to kill him by throwing him in a well. More recently, last week a French priest was martyred for his faith – killed for nothing more than being a disciple of Jesus Christ. It is never popular to follow Him, especially in today’s cultural milieu.

            So do not be afraid to be different, to live differently! So what if everyone around you is cursing and taking the Lord’s name in vain – don’t join in! A couple weeks ago a man was telling me that in a recent meeting the man’s boss exclaimed in anger, “Jesus Christ!” The man immediately blurted out “Is Lord!” So what if you’re on vacation with your family and everyone else wants to go out to breakfast instead of going to Sunday Mass – dare to be different, dare to be faithful. If everyone around you is politically correct and believes that putting on a dress makes a man into a woman, we cannot be afraid to point out the unpopular truth about how God created us male and female.

            People will tell you, “Don’t make trouble, just go with the flow”, but the only fish who go with the flow are dead fish – those who are alive swim against the current. We who seek living waters must leave the pollution of this world behind. And that’s precisely the benefit – Christ offers us living water, worldly values offer us pollution. Christ is the True Bread from Heaven; the world offers us poison. Christ shows us what true love is – the world offers us a cheap counterfeit. Jesus shows us that the meaning of our life is Heaven; the world tells us that life is meaningless and we should only live for ourselves. To choose Christ over the world, as difficult as it may be, is to choose life and joy over the emptiness and sadness that the world offers!

            And remember, we are not alone. Our second reading says that “we are surrounded by a great cloud of witnesses”. St. Paul, St. Thomas More, St. John the Baptist – pretty much every single saint had to live differently, at great cost to themselves. We follow in their footsteps when we reject the lies that our culture tells us and follow Jesus Christ.

            Christ tells us that He “comes to cast fire on the earth” – the fire of divine love. The rest of the world may think us insane, but once we have realized that true life is only found in following Jesus, we don’t care what the rest of the world thinks. We’ve found our way, our truth, our life…in Jesus. 

Homily for Nineteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time - August 7, 2016

Homily for Nineteenth Sunday of Ordinary Time

August 7, 2016

The Faith of Abraham

            Are God’s promises trustworthy?

            This question is one that all of us have to wrestle with. He promises us eternal life if we follow Him, He promises us abundant joy, He promises that He will never leave us, no matter how tough it gets…but so often, when we’re tempted, we forget about the promise of Heaven. When we’re suffering, we doubt the promise of His presence. Are His promises trustworthy?

On every page of Scripture, one fundamental question is asked: DO YOU TRUST GOD? From the time that our first parents decided that they trusted themselves more than God and disobeyed Him, most of the people throughout salvation history have said, No, God cannot be trusted. I’m going to take matters into my own hands.

            Abraham had to wrestle with the same question – only to an extreme degree. God promised some amazing things to him – children as numerous as the stars, the entire land of Israel, and that his name would be a blessing. God begins to fulfill these promises, finally giving Abraham a son, Isaac, despite the patriarch’s advanced age and the fact that his wife was barren.

            But then…God asked him to sacrifice his son. This is one of the toughest passages in Scripture, when God asks Abraham to sacrifice Isaac. Does God really want human sacrifice? Of course not – God wanted to see how far Abraham was willing to trust the promises of God. God had promised him descendants…then asked him to offer back his only son? Could Abraham still trust a God who would ask such a thing of him? Surely Abraham must’ve been thinking, God, how could you? You promised that I would be the father of nations. I love Isaac, my only son…

            But when push came to shove, Abraham answered, God, I don’t know how You’re going to come through, but I trust that You will. Our second reading says that Abraham even believed that God would somehow raise his son back to life – that is amazing trust! He offered back his only son…as a symbol of what God Himself would do, when God would sacrifice His only Son, Jesus Christ, upon the wood of the Cross for our salvation. Abraham’s trust was rewarded – not only did he receive his son back, he also received abundant blessings from the Lord.

            That same question is being asked of you and I – Do you trust God? Do you trust that He is real, that He is with you, that Heaven is real, that He is the only One worth pursuing? Look back over your own life and see how God has been faithful to you all along – the many gifts He has given you, the struggles He has brought you through…all of this should motivate us to trust Him with radical abandon. He is a good Father, and if He promises something, He will do it.

            A lot of us struggle to trust God, though, so we try to control our own lives. Instead of asking God where He would like us to go to college or where to work, we try to do it all by ourselves. Instead of letting God decide the size of our families and how many kids we have, we plan it out and try to control it. When we are faced with suffering, a lot of us immediately rush to find a way out (sometimes unhealthy or sinful), instead of perhaps asking where God is moving in all of this.

            This trust requires a whole new way of looking at the world. We have to give up control and instead allow God, His Word and His Church’s teachings to be in control. I’ve heard of people having Frank Sinatra’s song, “My Way” sung at their funerals – you know, the one that sings, “I did it my way.” I’m pretty sure we should be doing it His way instead!

            In the 1940s there was a young nun who was serving as a headmistress at a wealthy Catholic girls’ school. She was very happy, loving God, serving the students, and doing what she enjoyed. But on a train trip to her annual retreat, she heard God’s voice crystal clear: leave the school, go out into the streets, and serve the poorest of the poor. This young nun had no idea how to do that – she wasn’t a social worker and didn’t have the slightest clue what to do. But she obeyed God, with radical abandonment and trust. After she had received permission from her superiors, she left the school and began to wander the streets, teaching poor children and caring for people who were literally dying in the gutters. She trusted God, and in less than a month, Mother Teresa will become Saint Mother Teresa, as her canonization is on September 4 of this year.

            Do not seek to control your own life – you will drive yourself insane. Rather, surrender control of your life to God, seeking Him in His Word and conforming your life to the Church’s teachings. We can trust God because He is a good Father, Who is always faithful to His promises.

Sixteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time - July 17, 2016

Sixteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time

July 17, 2016

How to Make Jesus the One Thing Necessary

 

            There’s a wonderful story from the life of St. Francis Xavier, who was a close friend of St. Ignatius of Loyola, the founder of the Jesuit religious order. Francis was one of the first Jesuits, and he was sent to be a missionary in the Far East: India, Philippines, and Japan. In most towns, he would successfully convert the local tribal chief, which would cause everyone else to seek baptism as well. He said that after he would baptize the people, for days after that they wouldn’t leave him alone because they would continually pester the missionary to teach them prayers! He would teach them the creed, the Our Father and Hail Mary and Glory Be, and they would still not be satisfied!

            Even Jesus’ disciples asked our Lord the same question: “Lord, teach us to pray.” It’s a natural desire to want to learn how to pray. So let’s talk about some ways to pray! But first, let’s debunk two popular myths about prayer.

            MYTH 1: Prayer is all about getting things from God. Religious education teachers and parents are particularly bad at perpetuating these myths. They say things to kids like, “Oh, you’re having trouble in school? Just pray and God will help you.” or “Aunt Millie is sick, let’s pray for her.” I cringe when I hear statements like this! Of course, it’s perfectly fine to pray when you need something. But asking for things is not the entire point of prayer. God is not a divine vending machine where we go up to Him, put in our three Our Fathers and pick out what we need (healing, forgiveness, help on a test, more money, a better marriage). That is NOT prayer. Prayer is a relationship – and what kind of relationship would you have with anybody if you only asked them to give you things? Not a very good relationship, I’d say.

Prayer, then, is sharing your life with the Lord. The goal of prayer is union with God. We pray so that we can grow closer to Him, so we begin to think like Him, so we can offer Him our love and experience His own love in our souls. Look at the example of Mary in today’s Gospel – she is adoring Our Lord, soaking in His Words…and not asking Him for anything!

MYTH 2: Prayer is always boring. If prayer is always boring, you’re doing it wrong! A lot of people think the only way to pray is to “recite your prayers”. And yes, that can be boring. But there are better ways to pray where we can actually develop a living relationship with the Lord! Again, look at Mary in the Gospel – she is riveted, with rapt attention totally focused on Jesus – not bored or distracted like her sister Martha!

So, then, how do we pray? There are many ways, and as an old, wise priest once told me, “Pray as you can, not as you can’t!” Let’s talk about some ways to pray to develop a living relationship with God.

First, The Mass is the highest form of prayer. As St. John Vianney said, “The Mass is greater than all other good works and prayers, because all of our good works and prayers are the actions of men, while the Mass is an act of God.” At Mass, Christ is present in His Word and in the Eucharist – we have a real encounter with Him. He makes present on the altar His one sacrifice for sins. Really, at Mass, it is Christ Who prays for us – we simply unite our prayers to Him. All things being equal, the Mass is the best way to pray!

After the Mass, Eucharistic Adoration continues the Eucharistic worship that was begun at Mass. I can testify that Adoration changed my life. My home church started Perpetual Adoration (Eucharistic Adoration 24/7) when I was in high school. My family started to go for an hour each week. Through spending an hour in silent Adoration of Jesus, truly present in the Blessed Sacrament, something began to slowly seep into my soul. I started to change – I realized how much the Lord loved me, and how much I longed to be with Him, both now and in eternity. God speaks loudly in the silence of Adoration. We are blessed to have Adoration frequently in Stamford – every Sunday from 3-7pm we have Our Lord exposed in the monstrance at St. Mary’s Church, and there is also an Adoration chapel at St. John Fisher Seminary on Newfield Avenue which is open every day from 6am-11pm. In Adoration, we get to be like Mary, sitting silently at the feet of the Master!

But can we develop a real life of prayer at home? Of course. One great way is through reading Scripture. The Word of God is living and effective. But don’t read it like a novel – reading Scripture is different. Start with the Gospels, read a short passage, and then reflect on it – how is Jesus speaking to you? What does He look like, sound like? What character would you be in the story? For example, as we read today’s Gospel, would you be more like Martha – worried, anxious, busy – or more like Mary, reflective, centered, prayerful? Are the Lord’s words things that you need to hear?

In addition to reading Scripture, other spiritual reading is an indispensable for growth in the spiritual life. There are lots of wonderful books out there – right now I’m reading one called “This Tremendous Lover” about God’s pursuit of our souls…I highly recommend it!

Finally, the Rosary is a great way to pray, because the Rosary is looking at the life of Christ through the eyes of Mary. When we pray the Rosary, our lips recite the Hail Mary’s but our minds ponder the mysteries. Reciting the Hail Mary’s help to calm our minds while God speaks to us through the mysteries of Christ’s life – we remember His birth through the five Joyful mysteries, His ministry in the five Luminous mysteries, His suffering and death during the five Sorrowful mysteries, and His resurrection and Kingship in the five Glorious mysteries.

My friends, we all want a relationship with God. Prayer is the way to grow in it. More than just words, prayer is really communicating with the Lord, both speaking and listening. There are many ways to pray – find one that works for you and discover the “one thing” necessary that Christ speaks of in the Gospel – that “one thing” is union with God!

Fifteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time - July 10, 2016

Fifteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time

July 10, 2016

We Love Because He First Loved Us

 

            There’s an old maxim that still rings true: “You can’t give what you don’t have.” I used to have a philosophy professor who would declare, “You can’t get blood from a turnip!” For someone to give you a diamond, they must first own the diamond. It’s not enough to just wish to give you a diamond – wishes are cheap, while diamonds are expensive. So you have to own a diamond if you want to give someone a diamond.

            It’s the same way with love. If you are to love your neighbor, as Jesus tells us to do, we must first allow ourselves to be loved by God.

            I want to read this parable in a different way. On face value, it’s a parable about how we ought to treat one another with love and mercy. But on a much deeper level, it’s also a story of how God treats us with His love and mercy.

            You see, we are that man who went down from Jerusalem to Jericho. What a huge significance, these two cities – Jerusalem was the home of the Temple, the dwelling place of God. It was in Jerusalem that people came to worship the living God. In contrast, Jericho was one of the oldest cities in the world – a city that was essentially pagan. This man who travels from Jerusalem to Jericho is a symbol of humanity – we were created for intimacy with God in Jerusalem, and yet so often we have turned our back on God and on our citizenship of Heaven, and instead we’ve chosen to pursue the worldly, pagan things of this earth.

            So humanity, having left the safety of our friendship with God, got accosted and beat up. That’s a symbol of what our sins do to us – they make us miserable, beaten, addicted, unhappy. When little kids come to confession to me and confess that they have lied, I always ask, “Don’t you find that you got in more trouble with your lie than you would have if you just told the truth?” And the same goes for all of our sin – it always promises pleasure, but leaves us unhappy.

            Then come the priest and the Levite. These two men were a symbol of our guilt, because this beaten man looks at them and realizes how far he has fallen. He is no longer pure like the priest or faithful like the Levite (the Levites were the priestly class of Israel). God gave the Israelites their laws to help them realize how holy they need to be; but it also made them – and us – realize how unworthy we are!

            But then came the Samaritan. The Samaritan was a foreigner, much like when God Himself became a man and made Himself a foreigner in our world. God sees our misery and is moved with compassion. He pours oil and wine on our wounds – a symbol of the Anointing of the Sick and the Eucharist. He lifted the dying man up (much like Christ took our sins upon His back on the Cross), brought the man to safety in the inn (as we are brought to safety within His Church), and paid for the man’s healing. The price that Christ paid for our healing was His own Blood, a price more costly than anything in the universe!

            My friends, we can only love our neighbor well if we are convinced of the Lord’s love for us. We love because He first loved us, says St. John in his letter. I think some of us have a hard time accepting that God loves us. We think we have to earn it, that if we try harder and clean up our act, then God will be pleased with us. My friends, nothing could be further from the truth! The Samaritan didn’t say to the man, “I’ll help you, but first you have to stand up on your own two feet, and you have to climb on my animal yourself.” No! The Samaritan bent down into the misery of the man, and healed him. God is not afraid of your misery!

            So many of us say to ourselves, “God can’t love me because…” God can’t love me because I sin too much. Because I’m afraid of the future. Because my parents always told me I was no good. Because I’m not successful or wealthy or good-looking or talented. Because I’m lonely. Because I’ve done things in my past that I’m ashamed of, because I’m carrying burdens.

            My friends, God’s love for you is not dependent upon what you’ve done, what you’ve endured, what people have said about you. It is a free gift, totally free. He looks at you and sees a treasure worth more than the entire universe. He looks at you and sees someone worth dying for.

            And once we have really taken this to heart, then – and only then – can we love one another.

Fourteenth Sunday of Ordinary Time - July 3, 2016

Homily for Fourteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time

July 3, 2016

Kingdom of God

 

            So what is this “Kingdom of God” that all of these people are preaching? We hear that phrase so often but it’s rarely defined. So here is what it means: the Kingdom of God means that God is King over our entire lives – thoughts, words, actions, feelings, choices. We have given Him full reign over every aspect of our life. That is the Kingdom of God. Now, let’s break that open.

            First, the Kingdom of God comes through faith. And faith means more than just, “Yes, I know God exists.” Faith is saying, “Yes, I know God exists and I entrust my entire life to Him.” In the Letter of St. James in the Bible, St. James points out that merely believing in God isn’t enough – he says that “even the demons believe – and tremble!” So faith in its fullest sense involves entrustment of our entire life to God.

            This has daily practical effects. You have money in your bank account – have you asked God how HE would want you to spend it? You have free time – have you considered how God would want you to use it? You who are married – have you sought God’s guidance for your marriage? You young people who are making decisions about college or career – have you asked God what His path for you entails?

            There’s a great story in the Bible (1 Kings) about that. King David, who is called “a man after God’s own heart” (now there’s a compliment we should all strive to become worthy of!), asks God, “Lord, should I travel today?” And God responds! The Lord tells David exactly what he ought to do – go to a certain city, and meet with certain people there. For King David, the Lord was King of his life.

            Now, I’m not saying we need to ask God whether to have chicken or pork for dinner – that’s not what I mean. But if we want the Kingdom of God to reign in our life, it means that we want to please Him with every thought, word, and deed.

            But how do we know what pleases Him? We know through the Scriptures and through the teachings of the Church. For example, if you want to know what God thinks about money, there are plenty of places in the Gospels where Jesus speaks about it! He warns of the dangers of money, requires generosity of His disciples, and makes it clear that we are only stewards of His gifts. Through the Church’s teachings and the guidance of the Scriptures, God has revealed to us what pleases Him.

            The truth is, God is already King of the entire universe. He already owns your heart, your thoughts, your life by virtue of the fact that He is the Creator and you are His creature. Praying, “Your Kingdom Come” (as we do in the Our Father) is our way of recognizing God’s sovereignty and submitting to His loving rule.

            A priest who I know was once in Rome and, since he speaks Italian fluently, struck up a conversation with a local Italian man. They started talking about religion, and in the course of conversation, the priest asked the man, “Are you Catholic?” and the man immediately responded, “Si! Si! Certo!” (Yes, yes, of course!). The priest then asked him, “Do you attend Mass regularly?” To which the man replied, “Padre, sono Catolico…non sono fanatic.” (Father, I’m a Catholic, not a fanatic!). Some people think it’s odd or fanatical to let your entire life by ruled by Jesus Christ! But otherwise, who is in charge of your life? You? Your sin? The influence of the culture? We have to serve someone – serve Jesus Christ!

            It’s kind of like this example. Imagine that there was a kingdom being ruled by a kind, generous, fatherly King. He is a good man, always looking out for his subjects. Some of the people love him, follow his commands (which are for their own benefit anyway), and seek to please him. Others, however, try to rebel against the King – they make their own laws (which are always destructive), they try to overthrow the King, they angrily demand that THEIR will be done. Which of the two groups will live in peace and joy? Which of the two groups will experience the King’s favor? Of course, it is the citizens who submitted to the King in obedience and love. The other group will only experience misery and the King’s wrath.

            God is already King over the entire universe, which He rules by His love and mercy. We have the choice, then, to submit to His loving rule and commit our thoughts, words, deeds, and entire life to Him…or we could rebel like spoiled children, wanting our own way, finding only misery and wrath. The truth is, though, that if we are not willing participants in the Kingdom of God, then we are slaves of the Kingdom of Satan, of sin and lies!

            I think St. Paul sums it up best when he says, “For to me, life is Christ.” THAT is the Kingdom of God – allowing God to reign over our entire lives. Has the Kingdom of God come in your life?

 

            Here is the challenge I want to offer this week to become a better citizen of the Kingdom of God. The next time you have a choice to make – big or small – ask God what He would want you to choose. In this way we recognize His authority in our life, and we will seek to please Him.