November 6, 2016 - Thirty-Second Sunday in Ordinary Time

Homily for November 6, 2016

Thirty-Second Sunday in Ordinary Time

Choose Our King Carefully

            Today’s first reading picks up in the middle of a much larger story, one that sheds a great deal of light on our own situation as a nation. The book of Maccabees tells the story of what happened in the Holy Land around the year 160BC. The Jewish people had been living in their own land for four centuries, but always under some other nation’s rule. First it was the Persians, who were pretty tolerant of the Jewish customs and way of life. But the Persians were soon conquered by the Greeks under Alexander the Great. When Alexander died, his empire was divided up, and the area of the Holy Land fell under the wicked ruler King Antiochus Epiphanes.

            Antiochus had the goal of Hellenizing the entire world (in other words, make it all Greek). He wanted to unite the known world under one language, with one religion, one set of customs. While this was a good ideal, he enforced this unity through bloodshed and oppression. When he came to the Jewish people, he forced them to sacrifice to pagan gods, he demolished the Temple and set up a false idol in its place, and he put to death anyone who observed the ancient Jewish traditions.

            Today’s first reading details the deaths of seven brothers, all of whom were killed because of their faithfulness to God’s law. They kept their faith despite political and social pressure to cave in, and paid for it with their lives. In the end, there was a major Jewish revolt which eventually overthrew the power of Antiochus Epiphanes, cleansed the Temple, and restored freedom of worship – but not before many, many Jews died as religious martyrs.

            Our first reading demonstrates some of the painful consequences of living under an evil ruler. We are blessed, in America, that we have the duty to elect our rulers – but that also lays a heavy burden and challenge upon us.

            We stand, as a nation, at a crossroads. In two short days, we will have the duty to choose our next President. But this election is about more than just two people. In a sense, it’s about the soul of a nation – who are we, and who do we choose to become?

            I’ve seen a lot of debate over the past few months about whether or not America is a Christian nation. Interestingly enough, the Supreme Court already solved that question – in 1892, in the court case Church of the Holy Trinity vs. US, the Supreme Court unanimously declared, “this is a Christian nation.” In an earlier 1844 Supreme Court ruling in the Vidal vs. Gerard’s Executors case, the Supreme Court unanimously declared that it is beneficial for the public schools to “both read and be taught as divine revelation” the Bible. Moving to Congress, the Senate Judiciary Committee report in 1853 declared, “We are a Christian people…not because the law demands it, not to gain exclusive benefits, but from choice and education. And in a land thus universally Christian, what is to be expected, what desired, but that we pay due regard to Christianity?” Even our Founding Fathers agreed – Washington once said, “It is the duty of all nations to acknowledge the providence of Almighty God, to obey His will, to be grateful for His benefits, and humbly to implore His protection and favor.”

            One might argue, then, that times have changed. Perhaps they have – we are far more pluralistic of a society now than before. But have they changed for the better? As we have lost our Christianity, have we as a society and a nation become more just, more kind, more loving, more upright, more hard-working? I would hazard that we have lost much of our virtue that made us great. America is only the best nation on earth if its citizens are virtuous – without virtue, there is no greatness. And it is very difficult to be truly virtuous apart from Christ.

            And thus we come to the crisis that is this upcoming election. I don’t think we’ve ever had a perfect candidate, but this election proves to be a difficult choice because both candidates are profoundly flawed individuals.

            Yet some flaws are more grievous than others. There are certain non-negotiable issues that we, as believers in God, must agree with. Some things are grave moral evils that cannot be tolerated or advocated for. Prime among these are abortion, the redefinition of marriage, and the erosion of religious freedom.

            This is not to say that the other issues are unimportant. They certainly are – but people of good will may have different ways of tackling the issues. For example, all candidates want to eliminate poverty – no one in their right mind would advocate for increasing poverty! But we can disagree about how to do that – do we increase welfare? Provide better jobs? Encourage small businesses through tax breaks? Increase tax breaks for families that stay together? We are allowed to disagree about how to fix these problems in society. Or, for another example, there is an issue with the need to balance immigration with national security – here, too, we can disagree on how best to welcome newcomers while still enforcing the laws of our nation. Both must be held in balance, but there can be different plans on how to do that.

            With the grave moral evils, however, there cannot be any compromise. People of good will cannot be in favor of abortion – it is an “intrinsic evil,” which means that there is no possible reason why that could be a good thing, no matter what positive consequences might result, because it is a taking of a human life.

Please don’t misunderstand me – God is immensely merciful, and if there is any woman here who has suffered the trauma of abortion, the Lord is always ready and willing to forgive. There are many reasons why women go through with an abortion – fear, pressure, lack of knowledge – and the Lord knows your regret, and comes to heal you. But abortion itself is something that a society ought never to allow.

Unfortunately, we have many candidates for public office who support such intrinsic evils like abortion – and when a candidate supports the right to murder an unborn child for all nine months of pregnancy, can they be trusted with our nation? If a candidate had come out in support of the Holocaust, we would have dismissed them immediately as unfit for office. But many candidates support an even greater holocaust – the holocaust of abortion, which has claimed the lives of over fifty million children – five times more than the Nazi Holocaust!

            We might say, “well yes, but they have other good qualities.” Can any amount of good qualities wash blood off the hands of those who support such a barbaric practice? What good qualities can there be that can answer for the death of the innocent?

            In moral theology, we make a distinction between material and formal cooperation in evil. Material cooperation in evil means that we do not intend the evil that is committed – for example, a kitchenware salesman may sell someone a knife, and that person may end up committing murder with it. But the kitchen salesman is not guilty for participating in the crime – he is only “materially cooperating” with evil. On the other side we have formal cooperation, which means that we intend the evil action as well – like the person who drives the getaway car in a bank robbery is still guilty of participating in the crime. In the middle, however, we have proximate material cooperation – that is, we cooperate with evil by assisting it, even if we don’t intend it. For example, if the kitchenware salesman knew with certainty that the man buying the knife was planning to murder someone, then he has the moral obligation not to sell the man the knife.

            I apologize if that distinction is confusing, but it is critically important. We are faced with the choice of voting for a candidate who supports intrinsic moral evils such as abortion and the redefinition of marriage. To vote for them would be considered proximate material cooperation – in other words, even if we ourselves are pro-life, to vote for a certain pro-choice candidate would be cooperating in their evil – it would be enabling someone who has already publicly and consistently proclaimed that they would do everything in their power to allow the merciless destruction of human life. In such a case, we ourselves would be morally guilty for participating in their deaths. To put it far more bluntly – if a person thinks they have a good reason for voting for a pro-choice candidate, I hope they are able to explain that reason to all of the babies who will suffer because of our choice!

            This has been a particularly contentious election – and it is necessary to choose our leaders carefully. Those candidates who do not respect the dignity of human life, who try to eliminate religious freedom, and who support intrinsic moral evils cannot be voted for. This election is about the soul of our nation – we must pray and fast, that we may be under good leaders, leaders who have the heart of God. Let us return to our Christian roots – let us develop virtue once again as a nation – let us raise up good and holy leaders to lead us in the path of peace.

Thirty-First Sunday in Ordinary Time - October 30, 2016

Homily for October 30, 2016

Thirty First Sunday in Ordinary Time

Fool for Christ’s Sake

 

            St. Philip Neri was a sixteenth-century Italian priest who worked hard to bring souls to Christ. He started “The Oratory” – basically the first youth group in history – and through his personal holiness, started to lead thousands of people back to the Lord. But as his personal fame started to spread, he realized he needed to find some way to stay humble, even as everyone was noticing his holiness.

            So he decided to make people think he was crazy instead of holy! He shaved off half of his beard and trained a pet squirrel to sit on his shoulder. One time a very rich benefactor heard about the holy priest and sought to see him and donate large amounts of money to his work. The rich man was told that he could find Fr. Philip in the sacristy, preparing for Mass. He went back there and found the holy priest reading joke books (with only clean jokes, presumably!). The rich man was offended – but Fr. Philip had to read joke books because otherwise his Masses could last up to eight hours long – he would often get lost in love with God and lose track of time! Even with reading joke books to distract him, his Masses were still notorious for being well over two hours!

            Here was a man who never really cared what other people thought of him. Same with Zacchaeus – he was desperate to do anything to see Jesus. What a silly sight that must have seemed – here was this rich and notorious man, climbing a tree to see! It would be as if we saw a Wall Street banker, in full suit and tie, climb a tree to see a Eucharistic procession. We’d think that’s a little odd, perhaps a bit extreme…and at the same time, we might marvel at their faith.

            The Russian Orthodox Church actually has a rich tradition of people who are “holy fools” – they call them “yurodivy” and they are esteemed as saints in their tradition, despite their often bizarre behavior for the sake of Christ. We have saints who have done equally radical, often strange things for the Lord. For example, St. Francis was one time so assailed by impure, lustful temptation that to rid himself of it, he took off all his clothes and rolled around in the snow. Wow – yikes – and at the same time, what a great love for God!

            Zacchaeus clearly did not care what people thought of him. He wanted Christ, and Christ alone. Having heard the Lord’s saving message of repentance, the tax collector was ready and willing to do just that, no matter the cost. It seemed extreme, not just to climb the tree, but also to offer back four times what he cheated others – that too would get an amazed reaction from the crowd!

            Notice, too, Zacchaeus’ reaction to the crowd’s murmuring and complaining – the Gospel notes that he “stood there” – he was unaffected, unafraid of the opinions of the crowd. This, after all, is the crowd that in a few short chapters, would be crying out “Crucify Him! Crucify Him!” So what does other people’s opinion matter? Christ alone matters!

            So do not be afraid to be seen as a fool for Christ’s sake! Following the Lord has never been popular or the “cool” thing to do. For example, is it popular to tell people that you’re pro-life in today’s antagonistic climate? Will it be well-received to tell your child’s soccer coach that they will not be playing on Sunday morning when they will be at Mass instead? Will that cross around your neck become controversial at your workplace? If it isn’t at least a little bit uncomfortable to stand for Christ, we should consider whether we’re really living our faith with as much fervor as we ought!

            One final story of being a fool for Christ. I was teaching in a Catholic school one year and there was a kid named James who really loved the Lord. He was also one of the cool kids – an athlete, who everyone liked and respected. One day I saw him in the hallway with a sign around his neck that read, “LOSER”. I said, “James, take that off. You’re not a loser.” He replied, “I know, but I want to wear it so kids will make fun of me and not bully other kids.” I was impressed – someone not afraid of what other people will think!

            Better to be a fool in the eyes of the world than to give up the treasure of Christ!

Homily for Ordinary Time 30 - Oct. 23, 2016

Homily for Ordinary Time 30

October 23, 2016

Know Thyself

 

            One time a desperate mother made a long, arduous, three-day journey to meet Gandhi and ask his advice. Upon reaching the holy man, the woman begged him to help her with her son. “My son never sits still, he’s angry all the time and he’s failing in school and getting into trouble. What can I do with him?”

            Gandhi answered, “Come back in one month and I will give you your answer.”

            So the woman made the long trek home and the following month, made the arduous journey back to the holy man.

            Gandhi said to her simply, “All you need to do for your son is to stop feeding him sugar. He will be better off.”

            The woman angrily demanded, “That’s all? That’s all I have to do? Why did you make me come back, making that difficult journey? Why couldn’t you have told me that last time?”

            Gandhi replied, “Because last month, I was still eating sugar.”

            It was Socrates who often said, “Know thyself.” This is also the first principle in the spiritual life as well. To truly advance along the path of holiness, we first need to know who we are in the light of Christ.

            The Pharisee in today’s Gospel was completely deluded as to who he was. Yes, perhaps he was righteous, but he missed the fact that he was filled with pride, and that any virtue he had was a result of God’s grace and love. He deceived himself, thinking himself better than he truly was. Because of that, God’s grace could not work in his heart.

            In contrast, we see the tax collector, who knew himself well. He recognized that before God’s immense holiness, he was a sinner. But he also knew that he had the potential to be redeemed – thus, he could make that prayer for mercy confidently before God.

            So who are we before God? Two aspects we need to consider:

            First, we are infinitely loved and infinitely loveable. We don’t have to do anything to earn God’s love or “earn” Heaven – His love is a free grace, one that is bestowed upon us freely simply because He created us. We are not accidents, we are not merely here because of random chance. No – as Pope Benedict said so beautifully, “Each of us is the result of a thought of God. Each of us is willed. Each of us is loved. Each of us is necessary.” God doesn’t make junk – we’re here because He loves us.

            But we hold this reality in tension with the reality that we are sinners. We have all fallen short of what we could be. This is also where we must know ourselves – where our weaknesses are, where we could be more Christ-like, where we need conversion. We don’t consider these things to make ourselves feel bad or guilty, but to allow the light of God’s grace to shine on our sins so that we can repent of them and turn back to the Lord.

            Even twelve-step programs recognize the importance of this brutal honesty with ourselves. The fourth step of Alcoholics Anonymous is to “Make a searching and fearless moral inventory of oneself”. In other words, get to know your weaknesses and sins so that we can avoid them in the future. Athletes, too, know this principle – if you’re a football player and you’re pretty fast but you can’t catch well, you’ll want to work on that if you want to be elite.

            In the same way, if you want to live an excellent life – to truly be holy, and not just mediocre – we want to “know ourselves” well. For example, if I notice that when I’m hungry or tired I tend to be angry with people, then I need to be diligent about trying to not be hungry or tired – or when I am, I have to be extra careful about how I react to people. If I know that being around certain people will cause me to curse or tell dirty jokes, then I need to be vigilant when I am around them to make sure my language is clean. Often times when I’m doing my morning prayer, I mentally run through my upcoming day, to see where the temptations and pitfalls may be, and I ask God to give me extra grace to deal with them. Awareness of our weaknesses is half the battle!

            Once we know our weaknesses, we surrender them to God – we ask God to go there, to bring His light, His healing, His love. And like the tax collector, we too shall go home justified.

Twenty-Eighth Sunday in Ordinary Time - October 9, 2016

Homily for Ordinary Time 28

October 9, 2016

Sacramentals – Seeing Is Believing

 

            Let’s go back to the first reading today. The prophet Elisha does an amazing miracle, healing Naaman, the Syrian, of his leprosy by bathing in the Jordan River seven times. Naaman, being a rich official of the Syrian king, offers fine gifts, but the prophet refuses. So Naaman asks for a very strange thing – he wants to take back two mule-loads of earth back to Syria.

            Why would he want hundreds of pounds of dirt? It’s very simple – God did something amazing in his life, and he wanted some way to remember God’s incredible works.

            Think about it – don’t we often take souvenirs from awesome experiences? If I go to a baseball game, I always hope to bring home a foul ball, which helps me remember the great game. If we go to the Eiffel Tower, we bring back photographs, postcards, maybe a little statuette of the landmark. Why do we do this? Because we want to remember the great places we’ve been, the amazing experiences that we’ve had.

             So Naaman wanted to remember all of God’s works – hence, he brings home some of the Holy Land.

            We, too, need things to help us remember the great works of God. Christ gave us seven specific ways in which we remember the great works of God – we call them sacraments. But many of the Sacraments are limited in time and space – we only get baptized once, and we have to come to church to encounter the Eucharist. We need more frequent reminders of the Lord’s mighty deeds!

            Thus, the Church gives us sacramentals. Sacramentals are things that remind us of our Faith. They include things like crucifixes, holy statues, the Rosary, holy water. These sacramentals can be used by all of us, anytime, to remember God’s mighty deeds.

            Many non-Catholics think that these sacramentals are superstition. And, certainly, they are not meant to replace faith and a righteous life. But we recognize the old truism: “Out of sight, out of mind.” If we aren’t constantly reminded about God’s great works, we will forget about Him!

            For example, the crucifix reminds me of Christ’s death on the Cross, and how His death purchased my salvation. Having holy water in my home reminds me of baptism, and how His Spirit now dwells within me. Seeing a statue of Our Lady reminds me that she is always ready to intercede for us. Wearing a scapular reminds me of God’s constant presence as my Creator.

            We all need things to remind us of “God’s wondrous deeds,” as our Psalm puts it. St. Jerome, for example, used to keep a skull on his desk at all times to remind him of the shortness of life (whose skull was it? I wonder!). St. Francis of Assisi was praying before a crucifix when he heard God’s call to “rebuild His Church.” St. Padre Pio would tell his friends, “Bring me my weapon!” when referring to his Rosary, as the Rosary is a powerful weapon against evil.

            We, too, ought to fill our homes and our lives with blessed Sacramentals. Every room in the house should have a crucifix and holy pictures in it. Consider this: let’s say you have a bad day. You come home from work or school and you crash on your couch. If you have an ocean landscape on your wall, you may start to dream about your next vacation, which is fine…but it doesn’t help you in the long run. But if you have a crucifix on your wall, you will be reminded that Christ loves you and is with you in your suffering, and you are able to offer your suffering up to Him as a sacrifice and thereby grow in holiness. All because of a sacramental!

            My friends, fill your lives with sacramentals – reminders of God’s mighty deeds!

Homily for Ordinary Time 26 - Sept. 25, 2016

Homily for Ordinary Time 26

September 25, 2016

Dead Conscience

 

            St. Dominic Savio, the schoolboy saint, one time came upon his friends all huddled in a corner of the schoolyard looking intently at a magazine. He came over to see what was up, and was horrified to see that the magazine contained impure images. Without a second thought, he grabbed it out of its owner’s hands and ripped it to shreds right there on the playground.

            The boys protested, saying, “Hey, that’s our book!”

            But St. Dominic replied, “Is that what God gave you eyes for? To look at bad pictures?”

            One of the boys said, “Oh, it was just for fun. What’s so wrong about looking at it?”

            To which the saint shot back, “If you don’t see anything wrong, that’s even worse! It means you’re used to looking at shameful things!”

            God gave us our consciences in order to lead us to right and wrong. But it’s very possible to ignore our consciences, or deaden them so that evil things no longer bother us.

            This is what happened in today’s Gospel. I’m sure that at first, the rich man felt a pang of guilt for completely ignoring Lazarus at his doorstep. He might have been embarrassed by his riches, maybe feeling ashamed for being so selfish. But after a while, as he continued to ignore his conscience, the guilt dissipated. It didn’t even register on his conscience that this human being, this child of God, was starving outside his door, having his wounds licked by dogs. The rich man had killed his conscience!

            Psychologists today often say that guilt is a neurosis; they say that to feel guilty is an unhealthy reaction. Although it is possible to have unhealthy guilt, most guilt that we feel is quite healthy indeed! Guilt is our conscience telling us that we need to change our lives and repent of our sin.

            CS Lewis once said, “If you live differently than you believe, then you will soon begin to believe the way you live.” For example, let’s say that a person knows that telling a lie is wrong, but does it anyway and feels guilty about it. He will soon be faced with a choice: either stop lying, or stop believing that lying is wrong. If it’s the latter case, then he changed his beliefs to fit his lifestyle.

            I see this all the time as a priest. People don’t go to Mass and feel guilty – so they have to rationalize it and say, “Well, I don’t believe it’s a mortal sin to miss Mass.” People commit impure actions and feel bad about it. They can either repent or rationalize it away, saying, “Oh, it’s no big deal, everybody does it.” If they rationalize it away, then they have killed their conscience!

            So, what are we to do to make sure our conscience is alive, leading us to God? First, we must form our consciences. We must study the teaching of Christ and the Church to know what is right and wrong. It’s not the role of our consciences to decide right and wrong for ourselves – rather, our consciences apply the teachings of Christ and the Church to specific situations in our life. An example might make this clear: Christ clearly teaches through His Church that gossip is wrong. Our conscience doesn’t determine that. But our conscience determines whether this particular incident where we had to speak about our friend to another friend was actually gossip, or whether it was a necessary conversation we needed to have to ask their advice. That’s the role of conscience – to apply moral teachings to particular situations.

            Secondly, we must examine our consciences daily. Usually done before bedtime, that means going over our day to see where we fell short of loving God and our neighbor. If we examine our conscience daily, we will sharpen our conscience and discover small faults that we never knew we had. If we take care of the small faults, they won’t grow into big ones! Our conscience is like a muscle – if we use it daily, it will grow stronger. But if we neglect it for a length of time, it will grow dull…and perhaps wither and die!

            Thirdly, we ought to be wise about what influences us. When I was a teen I fell in with a group of friends who were great people, except they cursed…A LOT. If I didn’t know better, I’d say they were all destined for the military with their foul language! The first few times I was around them, I found their language shocking…but little by little, I became accustomed to it, and soon I found myself indulging in their bad words. That wasn’t good! Our consciences can be dulled simply by what’s around us. If we play violent video games, we will quickly stop being horrified by violence; if we look at sexually explicit material, we will soon find it mundane. And that is a terrible thing, because it means we’ve become so accustomed to sin that it doesn’t shock us anymore! So, to keep our consciences alive and well, we ought to control what we watch, listen to, and who influences us.

            As evidenced by the Gospel, ignoring our consciences comes with a great risk…the risk of eternal damnation. For this reason, we ought to listen carefully to our conscience, as it is the voice of God in our soul, leading us along the path of holiness.

Homily for Ordinary Time 25 - September 18, 2016

Ordinary Time 25

September 18, 2016

Only Saints Can Save Us

 

            Corrupt government. Entertainment that glorifies violence. Fear of terrorism. High taxes, extreme debt. Every sort of sexual perversion encouraged. Breakup of the family. Immigrants bringing in their bad habits and vices. Uncontrolled greed. A nation divided.

            Of course I’m talking about the Roman Empire in the late 300s. All of these problems – and more – caused the breakup of the greatest empire the world had ever seen. They had been corrupted from within, and attacked from without. Finally, the Roman Empire fell, attacked by barbarian hordes and unruly citizens.

            But from the rubble of the greatest nation on earth arose an unlikely survivor – Catholicism, which began to flourish and spread. Under the pagan Roman Empire, Christianity was persecuted, sometimes violently – in fact, over 10,000 Christians were killed in the Coliseum alone. But as Tertullian said, “The blood of martyrs is the seed of Christians” – and through the sacrifice of these heroic men and women who gave their lives for Jesus Christ, Catholicism continued to grow stronger.

            It was truly Catholicism that saved civilization. Order, learning, literacy, art, music, science, and even civilization itself was in danger of being destroyed once the Roman Empire fell. But the Church – in particular, the monasteries – began to preserve and enhance it. Monks and nuns throughout the fifth, sixth, seventh centuries wrote books, started schools, composed music, and preserved civilization from becoming completely defunct.

            It was martyr-saints who grew Christianity. It was monastic saints who, through Christianity, saved civilization. And in today’s day and age, only saints again will save the world.

            In many ways our world is similar to that of the declining Roman Empire. All of the problems I mentioned at the beginning are problems that the declining American empire also faces. So let us apply what St. Paul said in our second reading to our current situation.

            First, St. Paul urges prayers for those in authority. We’re very good at complaining about politics and our government, but have we actually prayed for them? Our president and Supreme Court justices and congressmen and women are human beings, souls, persons who have been created in God’s image and who can be redeemed by Jesus’ Blood. And I guarantee that if our nation’s leaders become better disciples, the entire nation would benefit. So, while we complain about our leaders, do we pray for them? St. Paul tells us to!

            I would wager that our leaders do not only include government but also leaders in media. TV personalities, pop singers, movie stars, journalists – all of these people shape our culture and our civilization. But when’s the last time we prayed for them? St. Paul goes on to say that God desires ALL men to come to salvation – He wants you and me and Justin Bieber and Donald Trump and that man in prison who committed an unspeakable crime and that annoying neighbor who plays their music too loud – He wants all of us to become saints.

            That means we have to do two things. First, we have to become saints ourselves. St. Paul tells us that his desire is for us to live a life of “devotion and dignity”, where we live a life of prayer and sacrifice and love. Mother Teresa was once asked by a reporter, “What do you think needs to change in the world?” She answered, “You and I.” As Archbishop Charles Chaput of Philadelphia once wrote, “The only people who ever really change the world are saints.” St. Francis said something similar: “Sanctify yourself, and you will sanctify society.” If we allow God’s grace to transform us and make us holy, that will change the world!

            My brother Patrick is studying for the priesthood, and recently he began his studies in Rome. He has to stay in Rome for the next two years without coming home at all, and he was telling me how tough this was. His heart is burning to make a difference, to preach the Gospel, to lead souls to Christ – and here he is, hidden from the world, only studying and praying. But I told him – work on becoming a saint, make that your goal and let every choice of every day be directed towards that goal, and you WILL be changing the world. Even if you live alone with very little interaction, even if you think your life is too small to make much of a difference, I guarantee that your love for Jesus, your small and hidden sacrifices, your prayers make a tremendous difference that we will only know in eternity.

            In addition to becoming saints ourselves, we must pray and fast for the salvation of others. God desires all men to be saved, but that does not mean that all will accept His invitation. We believe that as believers in Jesus, we are part of His Mystical Body, which means that we cooperate with Him in saving souls and bringing His grace to others. We do this by our witness and words, but even more so by our prayers and sacrifices. So pray and fast – for people in authority, for famous people, for sinners, for friends and benefactors, for those who’ve left the Church, for the souls in Purgatory. God has so designed it that, at times, He waits for us to request grace for others, to allow us the privilege of participating in His saving work!

            With everything that’s going on in our nation and our world…only Jesus can save us. But Jesus wants to save America by transforming you and me into Him, through grace…He wants to make us saints. The world was saved after the fall of the Roman Empire by saints. And people living lives of holiness is the only thing that can save us now.

Homily for Ordinary Time 24 - September 11, 2016

Ordinary Time 24

September 11, 2016

Mercy’s Price

 

            Archery is a great sport – I used to do quite a bit of it in Boy Scouts. There’s nothing more satisfying than pulling back a bow and watching your arrow launch toward the target. But it’s very challenging – it’s hard to aim it just right, and a lot of times your arrow will fall short or overshoot the target. Taking your eyes off the bulls eye or losing focus will cause the arrow to go in unintended direction.

            The Greek word for sin is “hamartia” – which literally means, “missing the mark”. It’s an archery term for shooting at something but falling short. And sin is falling short – sin is settling for less than holiness. Most often, we sin when we take our eyes off of the target – the goal is to become a saint, to be with God for eternity in Heaven. We lose focus in life and start to pursue lesser goods – like money or comfort or pleasure or the esteem of our friends – instead of pursuing the highest good, love of God and neighbor.

            Consider the Israelites in the first reading. The Israelites had just seen God do absolutely remarkable things – He freed them from slavery in Egypt through these miraculous ten plagues, led them through the Red Sea, fought for them, made a holy Covenant with them. But the Israelites had forgotten the good works of the Lord, and began to worship a golden calf! As one Scripture scholar put it so well, “It was easy to bring Israel out of Egypt; it was much harder to bring Egypt out of Israel!” – in other words, physically removing Israel from Egypt was easy, but the bad habits that Israel had formed in Egypt would take much longer to cure. Those bad habits were habits of sin – particularly the sin of idolatry.

            And isn’t every sin a form of idolatry? When we choose to tell a lie, we’re choosing ourselves and our comfort over God’s laws. If we choose impurity, we make pleasure a god. Many people worship many things other than God: sports, sleeping in, work, money, sexual license, technology…we often choose these false gods instead of the true God. Thus, all sin is idolatry.

            All of us have sinned. No matter how good our life has been, as St. Paul puts it in Romans, “All have sinned and have fallen short of the glory of God.” None of us have hit the target exactly – and we can never do so on our own strength. That’s why we need the mercy of God.

            We hear in the Gospels these beautiful parables about God’s mercy. And indeed, His mercy is endless. But God’s mercy comes at a price. We believe that God is also perfectly just – therefore, all of our sins need to be atoned for. Mercy was purchased with the price of Jesus Christ’s blood!

Do we realize the tremendous price He paid for our sins? Do we realize the cost of His forgiveness? I remember thinking as I was watching Mel Gibson’s “Passion of the Christ” – “Gosh, after watching this movie, I never want to sin again!”

I’ve often heard old spiritual writers – and some of you may remember nuns from Catholic school telling you – that our sins “offend” God. I don’t particularly like that language, but I agree with the idea behind it – the idea that our sins DO affect God. They affect Him because He is a good Father and He grieves to see us turn from Him. They affect Him because He paid such a high price for our salvation, and our sins demonstrate ingratitude for the death of His Son.

Back in 1939, there was a group of young boys in France who were being forced to go to Confession and they really didn’t want to go. They decided they’d have a little fun – they convinced one of their friends, a Jewish boy, to go in and make up bizarre sins. The boy went in and started to tell the most outlandish, ridiculous made-up sins you would ever hear, trying hard not to laugh the whole time. But the priest was a wise and holy man, and he said, “For your penance, I want you to go before the Crucifix and say three times to Jesus, ‘You did all this for me, and I don’t give a damn.’” The boy thought this was pretty easy, so he left the confessional and stood boldly before the Crucifix. The first time he said it was courage, “Jesus, You did all this for me, and I don’t give a damn!” But then reality set in, he said a little more quietly, “Jesus, You did all this for me, and I don’t give a damn?” On his last time, he could only get out, “Jesus, You did all this for me!” before he broke down in tears. He went back and asked for baptism – and this boy grew up to be a priest and the Cardinal of Paris, France until his death in 2007 (Cardinal Aaron Jean-Marie Lustiger).

Consider, next time you are tempted to sin – THIS (the Cross) is the price of mercy.