31st Sunday in Ordinary Time [C] - October 31, 2010

The 31^st Sunday in Ordinary Time [C]

Wisdom 11:22—12:2  ―  2 Thess 1:11—2:2  ―  Luke 19:1-10

October 31, 2010

The four Gospel accounts do not tell us >everything< that happened to Jesus during His earthly life.  The evangelists—as writers—chose particular events, and details about those events.  When they chose a particular event to describe, they also chose specific details because these details help us relate Jesus’ life to ours.  Why, then, does Luke bother to mention that it’s >Jericho< “that Jesus came to… and intended to pass through”?  If the detail is not important, why mention it?

Luke knew that those hearing his gospel account understood the Old Testament.              In the Old Testament, many things—people, places and things—foreshadow something in the New Testament.  This is not accidental, but inspired by the divine Author of Scripture.

Think for a moment about a city:  symbolically, it can represent another city, or even something other than a city.  This is often true in stories.  Take, for example, A Tale of Two Cities.  Dickens’ story is not actually a tale of two >cities<.  Rather, it’s a tale of two >men<.  The two cities represent two men, identical in  appearance, who come face to face with death, and make different choices.  The reader, of course, learns from the experiences of these two men, and come away from the story a better person.

Jericho in the Old Testament had its walls destroyed by Israel, so they could conquer it.  Israel did this to many cities.  But that’s not how Jesus works.  Jericho, in Sunday’s Gospel, represents a person.  Or more exactly, Jericho represents the human soul.  In the Gospel, Jesus enters into a city, to bring it salvation.  We can see here how Jesus can bring salvation to a soul—including yours—through this story.

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Zacchaeus is a rich collector of taxes.  Each of us, like him, is attached to worldly things.  Zacchaeus (meaning you) wants to see who Jesus is, but Zacchaeus has two strikes against him.

The first strike against Zacchaeus is the crowd, because everyone wants to see Jesus.  It’s easy to get lost, not to be loved, in the crowd.  One might ask himself, “How can Jesus love EVERYone?”  The second strike against Zacchaeus is his small size, which may represent the size of our soul.  One might feel unworthy of God’s love, and ask himself, “How could Jesus love ME?”

So Zacchaeus climbs up into a sycamore tree to see Jesus.  This is all Zacchaeus wants:  to see Jesus.  But that’s not enough for Jesus.

Here’s the turning point in this gospel passage:  When Jesus reached the place (where Zacchaeus had climbed the tree), Jesus looked up and said to him, “Zacchaeus, come down quickly; for today I must stay at your house.”  Jesus takes the initiative to reach out to this individual.  And just as he reached out to this little sinner, he is trying to reach into your life.

This passage illustrates the point/purpose/end of the spiritual life:  that God would dwell within us, and from within, transform us.  This is point of listening to God calling us in the Liturgy of the Word: to come down from where we’ve placed ourselves, and allow Jesus to enter our home, to enter our soul, to transform us from within.

30th Sunday in Ordinary Time - October 24, 2010

The 30^th Sunday in Ordinary Time [C]

Sirach 35:12-14,16-18  ―  2 Timothy 4:6-8,16-18  ― Luke 18:9-14

October 24, 2010

“O God, be merciful to me, a sinner.”

We hear again this Sunday a parable on how to pray.  In light of our coming celebration of All Saints, we’re mindful that God calls ALL people to radical holiness.  Last Sunday Jesus spoke about the need to persevere in prayer.  This week, however, he shows us that perseverance will do no good if we’re not praying with >spiritual< humility.

Humility is also a very >natural< virtue that you can see in a tiny infant, who so completely depends upon his parents.  Yet you find that as soon as the child is old enough to do something—anything—by himself, he wants to do it without help.  Receiving help becomes an insult.

Hopefully we are not insulted by the many graces God offers us.  In our daily spiritual lives, as we seek to grow, we never stop being children of our heavenly Father.  Humility is the foundation upon which we pray in four different ways.  Each of these four forms of prayer expresses the covenant—or PACT—with Him that we entered through Baptism.  It is easy to remember these forms of prayer if we keep that PACT—and the letters that spell it— P-A-C-T – in mind.  The example of a child before his parent is a good image through which to reflect on these four.

First:  during the first few years of his life, a child expresses his relationship with his parent largely by crying for what he needs.  In our relationship with God, this same reality is present:  we continually make prayers of petition.  “P” for petition is the first letter of the word “PACT”.  If a person’s relationship with God is based upon nothing >but< petition, then the relationship will never mature.  God calls each of us to see Him as more than Someone to meet our needs.

Second:  one of the first things a parent teaches a child to do is to say “thank you.”  Because of a basic self-centeredness in humans, we have to be taught to be thankful: whether towards a grandparent for a Christmas gift, a friend for giving a party, or a brother or sister for doing one’s chores.  As people mature,  they realize just how much their lives are built upon gifts given them by others, and how differently their lives would be without those gifts.  As Christians, we mature further when we realize that in fact, >everything< in our lives is ultimately based upon God being so generous.  Literally, we are nothing without God.  The only realistic response is thanksgiving, the “T” in the word “PACT”.

Third:  it takes real humility for a child to thank his parents when he realizes how much they have done for him.  Humility is even more necessary, though, when a child realizes that he has offended a parent by his thoughts or words, in what he has done, and in what he has failed to do.  It takes great humility to ask for forgiveness.  In the same way, it is difficult for a Christian to admit offenses committed against God the Father, and to ask His forgiveness.  It is only possible to ask for true forgiveness when we have contrition in our hearts.  Contrition is the “C” in the word “PACT”.  When our prayer takes the form of contrition, we are not only admitting our dependence on God.  We are also admitting that while God’s love for us is unconditional, our love for Him is not as mature as it should be.  The more in love with God a person is, the more he or she is willing to choose God’s will over any temptation that may come along.  And yet, when we do sin, and admit our failing to God, and seek to be reconciled with Him, God more than forgives us.  He abundantly pours His grace into our hearts.

Fourth:  we recognize that in a relationship between child and parent, admiration or >human< adoration is something that only comes over a long period of time, and is really based upon reflecting on the petitions which the parent has fulfilled, and on the parents’ gifts for which thanks have been given, and on the contrition to which the parent has responded with forgiveness.  And yet, true adoration is not based upon anything that the parent does for the child, but is simply loving the parent for who that parent is as a person.  God, of course, deserves adoration from everyone in a way that should be given to no one else.  Adoring God in prayer means simply praising Him for who He is:  GOD, the all-perfect, all-loving, all-merciful One who is divine Goodness.

29th Sunday in Ordinary Time [C] - October 17, 2010

 The 29^th Sunday in Ordinary Time [C]

Exodus 17:8-13  ¾  2 Timothy 3:14—4:2  ¾  Luke 18:1-8

October 17, 2010

                                          

CLICK BELOW FOR SUNDAY’S SCRIPTURES:

http://www.usccb.org/nab/101710.shtml

Through our second reading, Saint Paul describes how God’s Word speaks to us through the Scriptures:  that is, through the words of the Bible.  But the Word of God is more than the Bible.  We listen to the Word of God IN the Bible in order to receive an even greater gift.  Opening our selves to this greater gift is one of the most basic stages of growth in the Christian spiritual life.

It is not a coincidence that Holy Mass follows the pattern that it does.  The two main parts of the Mass—called the Liturgy of the Word and the Liturgy of the Eucharist—are NOT interchangeable.  The Mass would not make sense if we celebrated the Liturgy of the Eucharist first, and then the Liturgy of the Word.  The reason why this is so, is that the Word is proclaimed first as a preparation, in order to lead us as pilgrims and disciples towards something greater. 

We can see this if we overlay the outline of the Mass upon the outline of salvation history.  Consider what we might call the “first half” of salvation history:  the time of the Old Testament.  During this long period of time, ‘God spoke’ his Word ‘in partial and various ways to our ancestors through the prophets.’  But in the “second half” of salvation history ¾ the time of Christ and His Body, the Church ¾ ‘God spoke to us’, and speaks to us today, ‘through His Son’, the Word made flesh.  And the most important words spoken by God the Word made Flesh were:  ‘Take this, all of you, and eat it.  This is my Body, which will be given up for you.’

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Catholics are at times accused of being ignorant of the Scriptures, and unfortunately there are times when this criticism is justified.  As Christians we must dispel such ignorance, because the words of Saint Jerome are just as true today as when he wrote them:  “Ignorance of Scripture is ignorance of Christ.”

However, our devotion to Scripture is misguided if it does not lead us into a deeper devotion to the Holy Eucharist.  If we remember the words of Saint Jerome, we should remember all the more the words of Our Savior:  ‘Take this, all of you, and eat it.  This is my Body, which will be given up for you.’

If our devotion to Scripture does not LEAD us to a deeper devotion to the Eucharist, we miss the entire POINT of God becoming human, of the divine Word becoming flesh and blood.  After all,  what did God the Son say on this earth that God the Father could not have said from the heavens?  Couldn’t God the Father have spoken the Beatitudes from the heavens, rather than Jesus speaking them during the Sermon on the Mount?  Couldn’t God the Father have taught His People how to pray to Him from the clouds, rather than Jesus teaching us the ‘Our Father’?  What words HAD to be spoken by one who is both fully divine and fully human?  ‘Take this, all of you, and eat it.  This is my Body, which will be given up for you.’

The standard of our lives on earth ¾ as pilgrims and as disciples ¾ must be Christ’s self-sacrifice on the Cross.  When we share the Scriptures, we must keep in mind that God Himself was not content only to have His Divine Word preached.  The Father sent His Word to become flesh and dwell among us, to die for us, and to be received by us into our souls, for unless we eat Christ’s flesh and drink His Blood, we will never have eternal life within us.

28th Sunday in Ordinary Time - October 10, 2010

Twenty-Eighth Sunday in Ordinary Time  [C]

II Kings 5:14-17  ¾  2 Timothy 2:8-13  ¾  Luke 17:11-19

October 10, 2010

“I will no longer offer holocaust or sacrifice to any other god except to the Lord.”

We have all been to various Masses during our lives:  besides the Sunday Mass we participate in each week, there are other holy days that we celebrate with greater solemnity.  There are also different occasions in people’s lives that we celebrate at Mass.  Most of us have attended a wedding Mass, where a man and woman give their lives to each other through their covenant with God.  Many of us have attended a Confirmation Mass, where young men and women receive the fullness of the Holy Spirit’s gifts.  You may have a cousin or brother who is a priests, and perhaps you attended his Ordination Mass.

No matter what the occasion, almost everything important in our lives takes place within a Mass.  This is because at its heart, the Mass is a sacrifice—the Sacrifice of Jesus’ Body and Blood—and everything important in Catholic life is about sacrifice.  Sacrifice is what marriage is about; sacrifice is what the priesthood is about; sacrifice is what accepting the gifts of the Holy Spirit are about.  We accept the gifts God gives us only in order to give those gifts to others, not to pursue our own interests, so as to be able to say, in the words of our First Reading, “I will no longer offer holocaust or sacrifice to any other god except to the Lord.”

Gratitude is the root of all true love.  Until we recognize how much in our lives is “given”, how much in our lives is a gift, how much in our lives is sheer grace, we are (because of original sin) ungrateful for what we have in life, and so we lack the charity that should mark our lives.  One of the deepest ‘moves’ in our spiritual life—and certainly one that eventually is necessary for spiritual growth—is gratitude for the sacrifices we are called to make.

As Christians, we’re called to recognize that God the Father not only gave us His own Son, but also that He gave his Son to us as one of us.  Christ is that great gift Who is the perfect image of the Father, and the perfect image of what it means to be human.  Because Jesus is “one of us”, He teaches us by His example, as well as by His grace.  When we approach the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass with humility, we can better understand and believe how Jesus in His humanity gave thanks for offering His life for us at the Last Supper and on Calvary.

CLICK ON THE LINK BELOW FOR SUNDAY’S READINGS:

http://www.usccb.org/nab/101010.shtml

27th Sunday in Ordinary Time [C]

The 27th Sunday in Ordinary Time  [C]

Habakkuk 1:2-3;2:2-4  ¾  2 Timothy 1:6-8, 13-14  ¾  Luke 17:5-10

October 3, 2010

Sometimes when a priest receives an assignment from his bishop, he knows that it will mean certain hardships, just as surely as blessings.  The second assignment that I received from my bishop began in 1999.  I was sent to Rome for two years to study theology.  That may sound like an assignment with many more blessings than hardships, but I learned during those two years how sometimes, something that we think is a hardship ends up being the very thing that reveals the blessings in our lives.

Living in a foreign country, with a culture that often didn’t make sense, and a language spoken by the natives as quickly as you could imagine, definitely makes life difficult.  But all of these experiences simply deepened inside of me my love for my native country.  The first Thanksgiving that I ever spent outside the United States made me think about what I usually took for granted about our land.  Our “casa” or house in Rome, with about eighty American priests living there, was the largest residence of Americans in the city of Rome, a city of three million people.  Every Thanksgiving the Casa became a gathering place, and Americans from all over the city would join us for our Thanksgiving dinner, which we would end by singing “God Bless America” very loudly and very proudly.

Around the second Thanksgiving that I spent in Rome, those of us living in the Casa noticed something on the streets outside.  Every once in awhile, we would notice armed military or police walking up or down the streets around our buildings, and as the months passed by, this became a more and more frequent sight.

Finally, that next spring, everyone in our residence was called together for a house meeting.  We were told by the superiors of the house that the U.S. Embassy had been working with the Italian government to keep an eye on all buildings in Rome with significant populations of Americans, because of threats of terrorism that had recently been made.  After this announcement, the presence of armed forces became even more frequent.

This was the spring of 2001.  I finished my studies in June of that year and returned to American soil with a deeper appreciation for our country.  Three months later, on September 11^th, I thought back to what we’d been told that spring about threats against our country, and the people of our country.

I imagine that I was like most American in the aftermath of September 11, wondering what to do.  We want to be safe, but we want something more as well.  As someone who had just returned from living in a foreign country, with a deeper appreciation for our country, I wanted to do something FOR this country, on its behalf, to defend it, and to let others know of our pride for our country.  I debated what I could do.

Hopefully this is a debate that every American, and every American family, has engaged in.  In the same way, I hope that every Christian, and every Christian family, debates what they can do to promote greater respect for the dignity of all human life, from conception until natural death.  It’s important to remember that small things do make a difference, such as flying an American flag, or putting a poster in a window or doorway to express respect for human life.  We can thank others for their respectful support of pro-life events.

What it comes down to is this:  don’t define your life, and your faith, by what you DON’T do.  Last week I used the image of a house and its foundation.  When God judges your soul after you die, he’s going to ask, “What did you DO for the least of my brethren?”  So it’s a good idea now, during your life on this earth, to ask yourself:  “Do I see Jesus Christ in the hungry, the thirsty, and the imprisoned?  Do I see Jesus Christ in those who mourn, those who doubt, and those whose very life and existence is denied by those who say that it should be legal for one human being to kill another?”  If you do see Him in these persons, what sacrifice will you make to serve Him?

Do not define your life by what you don’t do.  Your life is shaped by the sacrifices that you DO make for others.  What does it mean to be “pro-life”?  What makes a person “pro-life”?  Can I say that I’m pro-life simply because I’ve never had an abortion, or never encouraged someone else to do so?  Does that fact make me pro-life?

Saying so is like saying that I’m a patriotic American because I’ve never flown an airplane into a skyscraper.  But a patriot isn’t someone who doesn’t harm his country.  A patriot is someone who does make sacrifices out of love for his country.  The men and women of our military who are overseas, in hostile territory:  those persons are patriots.  The woman and men in the reserves who can be called into action at a moment’s notice:  they are patriots.  They set the standard for the rest of us to live up to.  Maybe we can only fly a flag outside our homes or businesses, or send care packages, or vote to ensure that our nation is strong, but those things will make a difference.

We have no less an obligation to defend the right to life of every human being.  What sacrifice will you make to defend the right of the unborn to live?  How will you do what Saint Paul encourages Timothy in the second reading to do, to bear your share of hardship for the gospel with the strength that comes from God?  Do not ask God for more faith, but put the faith that you have into practice, and make a sacrifice for the unborn.