Christ's Path Leads to the Cross... and Joy!

+ J. M. J. +

Homily Outline for the 24th Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year B

Jesus places a significant question before us: “Who do people say that I am?” Notice the focus on Jesus’ identity: He doesn’t ask, “What do I do?” or “What do I teach?” but rather “Who am I?” The other questions are significant, but actions and words flow out of our existence and being. We are before we do or act or speak. Any number of theories are floating around about Jesus: Some say John the Baptist, others Elijah, still others one of the prophets. In our own time, this is also true: many theories float around about who Jesus is: a good teacher, a philosopher, a misguided peasant, a revolutionary, a peacenik, or one among a whole clan of religious figures like Mohammed or Buddha. Many people who pay lip service to Christ and think of Him fondly embrace one of these ideas: Jesus, one religious leader or founder among others, even if He is the leader I choose to follow.

This is not enough, and it wasn’t enough for Jesus, and He pressed His followers to go further: “Who do you say that I am?” Peter, impetuous faithful faltering Peter said “You are the Christ.” Christ is Greek for Messiah, which is Hebrew for the Anointed One: the one we have been waiting for, the new David, the new King, the Savior. All this is caught up in that little word, Christ.

Notice carefully what happens next: Jesus goes on to teach that the Son of Man will suffer, die, and rise again. Peter rebukes Him! Imagine this, the student rebuking the teacher! The Jews did not expect a suffering Messiah, nor is it what they wanted. They wanted victory, power, honor, wealth, comfort, all of this coming with the Romans kicked out and their kingdom not only reestablished, but preferably bigger than ever before!

Jesus uses the STRONGEST possible words in rejecting this, “Get behind me, Satan. You are thinking not as God does, but as human beings do.” We readily choose to avoid pain and suffering and adversity, but God goes deeper, and He sent His Son, Jesus Christ, not to avoid suffering, but to walk right into the midst of it, thus conquering it from within and forever.

Jesus goes on to make it VERY clear that if we are to follow Him, this too will be our path, into the midst of suffering, taking up our cross, whatever it may be, giving up our lives into the Father’s hands, and in losing our lives with Christ, in dying with Him, rising to new life. Each of us faces suffering right now: physical sickness or pain, fear or anxiety, a crisis of faith, a broken relationship, trouble at work, or the sufferings of a spouse or a parent or a child. This is precisely what Jesus is talking about: will we take up these crosses in all their bitterness, and follow Him to Calvary? Quite against all our expectations and our longing for comfort and ease, this is the path that leads to joy and peace and eternal life. Our faith must express itself in concrete actions, in concrete everyday decisions, or it is merely lip service. To use James’ very pithy expression, “Faith of itself, if it does not have works, is dead.”

Today is Catechetical Sunday, and after communion we will bless our catechists, our parents who are the first and most important catechists, and godparents who promised at the baptism of their godchildren to be witnesses and teachers of the faith. Catechesis is a countercultural act, and a path likely to lead to disdain and rejection. To catechize is to teach and live the Gospel in all its truth. In our contemporary situation, to publicly claim that something is true is very likely to lead to accusations of hatred, bigotry, and intolerance. Even more, to claim that Jesus is Lord and Christ, the most basic expression of our faith, may very quickly lead us into difficulty, especially if we seek to firmly follow Jesus’ moral teachings. Isaiah describes the consequences of speaking the truth with our lives, “I gave my back to those who beat me, my cheeks to those who plucked my beard; my face I did not shield from buffets and spitting.” We should not imagine that our own following of the Lord will necessarily lead to honor and respect and kindness from a world that is increasingly and aggressively hostile and intolerant towards people of faith , especially if they have the temerity to claim that what they believe is true!

Our catechists, parents, and godparents have a special joy, a special privilege, of handing on the truth of the Gospel, but also a special burden and challenge. I am filled with confidence that if we will follow the Lord with zeal and humility and faithfulness, this will lead us to eternal life and joy. I am similarly confident that it will involve us in every sort of difficulty and struggle! Jesus was frank and clear about this, we see that difficulty and struggle co-existing with peace and joy in His life and the lives of all the saints. Very likely we have observed it in the lives of family members and friends who have been witnesses of faith to us. Each day I encounter men, women, and children facing every sort of difficulty, and I am often humbled by their faith and perseverance in the midst of it.

I would like to conclude with a story of hope, a story of catechesis apparently failed and the Lord’s patient mercy. It is, briefly, the story of one of our current seminarians, Brandon Oman, a witness I have heard him share publicly a number of times.

Brandon readily relates that he had no love for CCD or confirmation classes, and went to great lengths to be disruptive. Once he was confirmed, he pretty much stopped going to church despite his parent’s entreaties. After high school he worked as a logger in the woods, and eventually was driving log trucks most of the time and making decent money. He was also playing in a band and living the party life. For several years, this was his life, but it left him emptier and emptier. One day, as he was driving a loaded log truck, he was feeling empty and hopeless. He knew he believed that God existed, and he believed that Hell existed, because he was in the midst of it. He remembered his confirmation teacher telling him, “If you ever call upon the name of Jesus, He will always come to your aid.” So, right there, as he was driving along, he called upon the Lord. In the months and years ahead, he started going back to church, to everyone’s surprise, and he began to pray the rosary. A few years later, Bishop Sample was ordained a bishop, and although Brandon had to work, he had his mom tape the live broadcast of the ordination Mass. As he watched it later that evening, he was struck to the heart by our bishop’s words. Bishop Sample, partway through his homily, went off his prepared text, moved by the Spirit, and looked out into the congregation. I was there myself and I remember it. He said, “If there are any young men listening to me today, and if the Lord has placed it on your heart to become a priest, take courage!” As Brandon heard those words hours later, he was pierced to the heart, and shortly after that began the journey to the priesthood. He is now in 2nd Theology and, God-willing, will be ordained a priest in about two and a half years!

I was relating this to a friend from the same area some years ago, and it turns out he was the confirmation teacher, and he shared with me his own joy at seeing the Lord at work in Brandon’s life, even though it had not seemed at all promising during those confirmation classes!

The Lord is at work in our midst, at every day, and at every moment, not least through our catechists and parents and godparents! As we come to this altar now to receive the Christ, the Messiah, the Anointed One, our Lord and King, we ask the Lord to sustain us and empower us to live our faith each day, that our faith may pass beyond lip service and vague affiliation into concrete belief and action.

+ A. M. D. G. +

Be strong, fear not! Here is your God!

+ J. M. J. +

Homily Outline for the 23rd Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year B

Be strong, fear not! Here is your God, he comes with vindication; with divine recompense he comes to save you.

God comes Himself to save us! No one who heard Isaiah’s words could have imagined anything but a military victory: the Kingdom of Israel restored, prosperous, powerful, and honored. And, yet, we see hidden here in plain view the great mystery of the Incarnation, God coming to dwell among us in the Flesh, a man like us in all things but sin.

What would God do when He came?

Then will the eyes of the blind be opened, the ears of the deaf be cleared; then will the lame leap like a stag, then the tongue of the mute will sing.

He will bring sight, we will see beauty; He will bring sound, we will hear truth; He will bring strength and wholeness, we will leap and live; He will fill us with His grace and we will sing.

God kept this promise. Jesus went among the people and taught and healed and cast out demons. We hear today of His earthy healing of a deaf man with a speech impediment: a man who could neither hear the speech of others, nor speak well himself. His communication with others was blocked and Jesus said, “Be opened,” and he spoke plainly. Those who observed were exceedingly astonished, and they said, “He has done all things well.” God’s promise through Isaiah is fulfilled.

Great! Wonderful! Beautiful! But, what does this have to do with us today? That was 2000 years ago—now we have medicine, and doctors, and hospitals, now we have hearing aids and speech therapists and technology. Why would our hearts be frightened? Why do we need God to come with vindication and divine recompense? Brothers and sisters in Christ, we need the hope that God offers us more now than ever. Yesterday, as every day of the year, over three thousand children were surgically aborted in our country, leaving their mothers and fathers wounded and in need of healing. Roughly 100 people committed suicide, and that rate has been going up for over 10 years. The number of marriages has been steadily dropping, and marriage itself is now very much under attack. Our national birthrate is below replacement in our country, which means that without immigration, our population will shrink each year. Mass attendance in the US has been dropping in many places, and the average age of our congregations increases. Each one of us faces these and other struggles in our own lives, in our own homes, among our families and friends. In the media, we hear that the steady march of modern progress continues, and while it’s true that our cell phones are more powerful than ever before, nevertheless, I think if we look around us, and if we look within, we will quickly realize that we need hope, and Divine Help, very much indeed.

I was discussing some of these issues with a group of our Knights at Keenagers as we pulled off the old wallpaper. Somebody remarked on the grimness of these statistics, pointing out that the Lord seems to be hidden in the midst of all of this. It is true that the challenges we face are very great. It certainly appears that the tide has turned against life, against family, and against faith in our so-called modern world. Many would rather ignore or justify these grim statistics rather than seriously assessing the shadowlands we have walked into as a culture and society. But, there is little honesty or courage in looking away from these hard facts, and certainly no adequate response to be found by ignoring them. I don’t enjoy bringing them to your attention, but I could not be faithful to the Lord if I were silent. The Culture of Death does seem in many places to have the upper hand over the Culture of Life.

That would never have been more true than on Good Friday, such a paradoxical name for that dark day when Jesus Christ went to the Cross as most of His disciples turned their backs. We know, however, that there is more to the story. And that is just as true now as then—there is more to the story. God’s love for us is undiminished. Even as our ears have often been blocked, and our tongues tied, God has not stopped offering us healing and strength. Vocations to the priesthood and the consecrated life are on the rise in many quarters, and some families are choosing God and faith and life even though it’s an uphill battle. Even more importantly—YOU are here today, YOU are here seeking God, seeking His grace, seeking His will. The only adequate response to God is YES! If that “Yes” becomes full, it leads to sanctity, and saints change the world, on life at a time. Each of us received that call at our baptisms: will we answer it now, and then again tomorrow, and the next day? God will open our ears to His truth, and we will be empowered to speak the truth of His love with our lives. Our world is very broken, and we are broken, too, and in this brokenness the Lord says:

“Be strong, fear not! Here is your God, he comes with vindication; with divine recompense he comes to save you.”

He comes now to this altar to save us, and through us, the whole world.

+ A. M. D. G. +

Are you a Doer of the Word? Seek the Beauty of the Law!

+ J. M. J. +

Homily Outline for the 22nd Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year B

La vita e bella! Life is beautiful! Perhaps you saw the magnificent 1997 film Life is Beautiful… if you haven’t seen it, run, don’t walk, and rent it or buy it. It’s one of the most beautiful films I’ve ever seen, and it tells a tale of great joy and gratitude in the midst of the very dark circumstances of World War II and the Nazi extermination of the Jews. Life is beautiful even in our broken and fallen world. From a young age I’ve often experienced an intense awareness of gratitude for God’s blessings in my life. James alludes to this in his letter, our second reading:

Dearest brothers and sisters: All good giving and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no alteration or shadow caused by change. He willed to give us birth by the word of truth that we may be a kind of firstfruits of his creatures.

God is perfect and perfectly faithful in His love for us, and all that is good comes to us from him. The greatest of his gifts is His Word of Truth. God created us by His Word: when God speaks, we are. Having loved us into existence, He didn’t abandon us when we turned away, but continued to love us and call us to Himself. One of God’s greatest and most perfect gifts to us is His Law.

Wait… what did I just say? One of God’s most beautiful gifts to us is His Law? Does that sound right to you? That’s what Moses told people in our first reading,

This great nation is truly a wise and intelligent people. For what great nation is there that has gods so close to it as the LORD, our God, is to us whenever we call upon him? Or what great nation has statutes and decrees that are as just as this whole law which I am setting before you today?

Although counter-intuitive, this is exactly right… God IS TRUTH, and He IS LOVE, and so His Word to us is perfectly true and perfectly loving at the same time, and thus His Law to us is an expression of the truth of things, of reality, and also an act of love. The One who made us knows what works for us and what does not. When we reject that law, when we live our lives against God’s plan for us as our Creator and Redeemer… well, we get the world we all live in today where sin and vice are glorified and rewarded and virtue is mocked.

In my own life Boy Scouting was a source of great grace to me, and one of the places, after my own home, where I learned about virtue and service and living well. I also began to notice that I was most full of joy and peace precisely when I was serving and helping others, whether that was running recycling drives, raking the lawns of the elderly, or helping the younger Scouts learn to start a fire or tie a square knot. Later in high school, one of the very first serious books about the faith I read was Back to Virtue by Peter Kreeft. Peter Kreeft is a convert to the Catholic faith, and a brilliant speaker and writer… anything by him is worth reading, and very likely entertaining to boot! God was working through that little book, because for the first time I realized how thoroughly mixed up our world was, and how we’d lost track of God’s law, and how this path we’ve been on for some decades leads to self-destruction. I don’t know if I was 17 or 18, but I PRAISE GOD for giving me this clear glimpse of an authentically beautiful life of virtue, even as I struggled to live it.

God’s law is one of His greatest, most beautiful, and most difficult gifts to us. In our Gospel, Jesus challenges the Pharisees and scribes because they had embraced one of the two most common errors regarding God’s law: they had turned it into an empty and outward observance. They observed secondary consequences of the law, careful ceremonial washing of hands and dishes, but ignored the substance and heart of the law. Jesus quotes from Isaiah—this was not a new problem:

This people honors me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me; in vain do they worship me, teaching as doctrines human precepts. You disregard God's commandment but cling to human tradition.

So, the Pharisees went through the motions, and their hearts were often stone cold. This is still a very real possibility if we let Mass attendance, or regular confession, or “being good people” become an empty outward sign unconnected to the fire of love or conversion.

However, I think it is strikingly clear that in our own time, even among those of us who practice the faith, a far more common error is the outright abandonment of any standard of right and wrong, the great lie of relativism and individualism. One crude definition could be this: To live by the principle that nothing’s wrong if I want to do it. This is not only a big fat lie, but the surest path to sorrow and emptiness.

God loves us and gives us the beautiful gift of His Law, a Law perfected and fulfilled in Jesus Christ. St. James lays out the path for us clearly enough:

Be doers of the word and not hearers only, deluding yourselves. Religion that is pure and undefiled before God and the Father is this: to care for orphans and widows in their affliction and to keep oneself unstained by the world.

May we reach out to those in need with generous hearts, may we reject the lies and sins that the world offers to us in such appealing disguises. May we receive the Lord today, and being filled with His grace, become doers of the Word, living beautiful lives.

+ A. M. D. G. +

As for me and my household.... well, what will you do?

+ J. M. J. +

 Homily Outline for the 21st Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year B

            Today we come to the climax of Jesus’ teaching on the great mystery of the Eucharist. People grumbled at this hard teaching, and He responded by re-emphasizing His point: we are to gnaw His flesh and gulp His blood, they are true food, and without them we have no life within us.  EVEN Jesus’ own disciples struggled with this teaching, “This saying is hard, who can accept it?”  If Jesus was going to step back and render symbolic His statements, here was His chance. Many times He had pulled the disciples aside to explain the significance of a parable, but not today: “Does this shock you?” He said, and turning to the Twelve, his closest collaborators, these men He has called by name and formed with love and patience, turning to them He said, “Do you also want to leave?”

            Let that sink in for a moment: Jesus is not only ready to see the crowds turn away; He is not only willing to see the disciples turn away.  Jesus is willing to have the Twelve turn aside if they will not accept this strange and unsettling teaching: unless we eat His Body and drink His Blood, we have no life within us.  Jesus is Himself the Truth, and He can only speak the Truth, and so He must teach those He loves the Truth, even when it is difficult, even when it is surprising, even when it is likely to be rejected.

            Jesus teaches us with such courage and fortitude, with such love, because He is preparing us to enter into the New Covenant in His Blood. A Covenant is not merely a contract, an exchange of services; rather it is a permanent co-mingling of lives, a bond even unto death.  A Covenant draws us into commitments that are beyond our unaided power, to a love that is stronger than death.  God sealed a covenant with Abraham, and with Moses on Mount Sinai. God called the People of Israel to Himself and told them that He would be their God, and they would be His people.  When Joshua gathered the tribes at Shechem after they had entered into the Land, he once more placed a decision before them: God has chosen them, would they choose the Lord?  Joshua had made his choice, “As for me and my household, we will serve the Lord.” 

God called them to be a Light to ALL nations, and in the fullness of time, God came Himself into their midst.  In Jesus Christ a New Covenant was sealed between God and His people in the Blood of the Cross.  Jesus offered no animal, no grain offering, no tithe—He offered Himself, Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity on the Cross for us, thus bridging forever the chasm opened up by our sins.  By His stripes, by His passion, we have been healed.  God has united Himself to us definitively, once for all, and what God has united, no man can divide.

This is the awe-inspiring context for St. Paul’s words to the Ephesians. Some claim this passage has been abused as an excuse for men to mistreat their wives, while in our own time many have used it as an excuse to ignore the Church’s teaching on marriage.  Neither abuse of this passage has anything to do with what St. Paul is teaching, and his first words make that clear: “Be subordinate to one another out of reverence for Christ.”  In the Greek and Roman worlds, a woman was the property of her husband, and could be readily dismissed at his prerogative.  St. Paul rejects this inhuman cultural situation and tells husbands and wives that they are to surrender themselves to each other out of reverence for the Lord who surrendered Himself to us.  If anything, it is men who are called to task, “Husbands, love your wives even as Christ loved the church and handed himself over for her to sanctify her.”  

How did Christ love the Church?  On the Cross, He offered Himself unto the last breath, unto the last drop of sweat on His lacerated brow, unto the blood and water that poured forth from His pierced side. Jesus offered Himself unto the carrying of the Cross, unto His dying on the Cross, unto the cold and silent tomb, and even unto Gehenna itself, where He shattered asunder the gates of Hell.  My brothers in Christ, whether you are a husband, or a boyfriend, or a single man, or a boy, this is what our faith calls us to, and Jesus walked before us on this path.  Sisters in Christ, how would you respond to a man who laid down his life completely, unto the last breath for you?  Could a man who emptied himself completely for his wife ever lord it over her?  Could he ever mistreat his wife and claim to be following Christ?  He could not.

This, then, is the covenant God has made with us. He has wedded Himself for all eternity to His Bride, the Church, and sealed this covenant by His own blood on the Cross.  He submitted Himself to all things, to all suffering on our behalf, and at every Mass this sacrifice and banquet feast is re-presented.  We are drawn into the sacrifice of Calvary, and we are drawn into the Wedding Feast of the Lamb.  Marriage is the metaphor, and for most of us, it is the path God has called us to.  Marriage is in great trouble in our land, perhaps your own marriage is in trouble, but the path to healing and truth passes through this altar from which we receive the Lamb of God, He who takes away the sins of the World.  This Lamb’s teaching is mysterious, at times it is hard, at times it is not apparent how it fits into our deeply wounded world.  And, yet, we are called to make a decision: the same decision Joshua put before the Chosen People… the same choice Jesus put before the crowds, before His disciples, and finally before the Twelve.  Will we leave Him?  Will we follow idols, or will we follow the One True God?

As he did so often, out of his own weakness, St. Peter models for us the way forward, “Master, to whom shall we go?  You have the words of eternal life.  We have come to believe and are convinced that you are the Holy One of God.”  Peter does not say, “Lord, it all makes sense to me, so I’ll follow you.” He could not have understood in any full way how they were going to eat the Lord’s Body and drink His Blood, but he made the choice, he cast his lot with the Lord, he made the same choice that Joshua did.  May we make that choice today, either for the first time, or once again. May Joshua’s words be our own, “As for me and my household, we will serve the Lord.” 

+ A. M. D. G. +

How can we eat this man's flesh?

+ J. M. J. +

Homily Outline for the 20th Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year B

The bounteous repast that the Church spreads before us on this parish picnic weekend is rich indeed! We begin with Lady Wisdom, God’s wisdom here anthropomorphized and imagined as a wealthy and powerful queen. She has set up her home, prepared the feast, set the table, and then she sends out her maidservants and puts out a wide invitation:

"Let whoever is simple turn in here; To the one who lacks understanding, she says, Come, eat of my food, and drink of the wine I have mixed! Forsake foolishness that you may live; advance in the way of understanding."

The invitation is clear… if we will turn towards God’s wisdom, knowing our own simplicity and lack of wisdom, we will be filled, we will be lead deeper into the mystery of God. The door, my friends, is open to us.

St. Paul also calls us to wisdom, inviting us to live, “not as foolish persons but as wise, making the most of the opportunity…” We become wise and live wisely precisely to the extent that we seek the will of the Lord, turn away from sin and vice, and open the door to the Spirit. This wisdom culminates in a joyful outpouring of praise to the Lord, and most importantly, thanksgiving. We should be “giving thanks always and for everything in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ to God the Father.”

Here the plot thickens—the Apostle has told us to give thanks always. The phrase he uses in Greek is euxaristountes pantote, that is “giving thanks always…” Do you hear the connection? Euxaristountes? This is the very same root as for the word “Eucharist.” This is the Greek word for gratitude. If we are to cultivate grateful hearts and lives and so be wise, this means we must cultivate Eucharistic hearts!

Wisdom is not a popular category… it has been supplanted in our daily lives by knowledge, and even more by raw data. On the internet we have practically infinite information and data at our fingertips. But, then, we don’t know for sure if ANY of it is true, accurate, dependable or trustworthy. I think we can see that in our world information and data have exploded, but wisdom is just as rare as ever. How do we acquire wisdom? It comes from God, we can receive it as a gift if we realize that we are little and that we are not self-sufficient, and that we need a Savior. Jesus spoke the truest and deepest wisdom to those crowds, but it was difficult for them to accept. He said:

"I am the living bread that came down from heaven; whoever eats this bread will live forever; and the bread that I will give is my flesh for the life of the world."

How can we eat this man’s flesh? The crowds had the very same question… and it’s a good question, a reasonable question. How indeed? Jesus doesn’t step back, or indicate that He’s speaking a parable, or using hyperbole, as He often did at other times. He continues:

"Amen, amen, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you do not have life within you. Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him on the last day. For my flesh is true food, and my blood is true drink.”

Once again, there’s a deeper connection here in the original Greek. Jesus makes a solemn declaration, “Amen, Amen. You must eat my flesh and drink my blood or you are without life.” Then Jesus ups the ante even further… He switches verbs, and instead of the common ordinary Greek words for eat and drink that He has used up to this point, He chose graphic words that mean literally to gnaw and gulp… words that explicitly emphasize real eating. He drives home the point, “For my flesh is true food and my blood is true drink.”

How are we to understand this??? We’re supposed to eat the Lord’s body and drink His blood? We’re supposed to gnaw his flesh and swallow His blood? PLEASE, don’t just say to yourself, “oh, yes, we say that all the time at church.” These are astonishing and even offensive words… if the people listening to Jesus that day struggled with this, it was at least in part because they were really listening to the Lord. We are incomplete, broken, starving, desperately in need of God’s help in ways large and small, in ways visible and hidden. God from all eternity has seen our poverty, and in the fullness of time He responded after centuries of preparation. That response to our poverty and starvation is Jesus Christ, and Jesus Christ who is Himself Truth Incarnate said, “Amen, amen, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you do not have life within you.”

This is not data that our data-saturated world is readily able to accept… neither is it data that we should gloss over too easily just because the words are familiar. When church-going Catholics in our country are asked in surveys, “Do we really consume the Lord’s body and blood at Mass,” a solid minority say, “No.” Yet, Jesus said, “My flesh is truly food and my blood is truly drink.” God in His wisdom has set the table, prepared the meal, and opened the doors…. But we have to forsake foolishness if we are to live, we have to forsake simple routine if we are to receive eternal life. Brothers and sisters, do not approach this altar half-awake, out of habit. Do not approach this altar unless you desire God’s wisdom which breaks our categories and our hearts and our lives so that we can be remade in His image. Please, today, perhaps even for the first time, approach this altar with reverence, with awe, aware that we receive here a mystery beyond our full comprehension. At this altar we receive the Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity of Jesus Christ, our Lord and King and He says to us, “This is the bread that came down from heaven. Unlike your ancestors who ate and still died, whoever eats this bread will live forever.”

+ A. M. D. G. +

Will the journey be too long for you?

+ J. M. J. +

Homily Outline for the 19th Sunday of Ordinary Time, Year B


“Get up and eat, else the journey will be too long for you!” These are the angel’s words to Elijah the prophet—he has been fleeing from the King Ahab and Queen Jezebel who are trying to kill him, and he has all but given up. The angel of the Lord brings him food and drink, but he is so weary and close to despair that the angel has to urge him on to eat enough. Without adequate food, we become weak. If we face a big physical struggle, all the more must we eat well. My uncle Tim ran the Paavo Nurmi Marathon in under 4 hours this morning, and last night I made sure to feed him a plate of pasta! On the Baraga March this past week, we biked over 100 miles, and we had to make sure to eat and drink so we would have fuel for the journey. Simple enough, this principle, something we are all familiar with… but as we spoke of last week, are we prepared to go deeper? Can we apply this knowledge of our physical bodies to our spiritual life by analogy?

As human beings we are uniquely body and soul. Of all God’s creatures, only we have both a material and spiritual component. The angels are pure spirit, and even the highest animals fall short of free will and the ability to choose and love that God has given us. Unless we integrate these two aspects of our united being, we will easily go astray. Both our bodies and our souls lie at the heart of the human condition. God, in His perfect wisdom, has always responded to us on both levels. We will understand and penetrate deeper into the mystery of the Eucharist only if we bring together what we know and experience in our bodies AND our souls, just as we do at every Mass, with the Word, and music, and architecture and art, and vesture, and posture, and, at the very crux of things, food.

Last Sunday we heard of Jesus challenging the people who had come to Him hungry for more to go deeper. What sign might He do to prove to them He is a prophet? Moses called down bread from heaven! Jesus responded, “"I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me will never hunger, and whoever believes in me will never thirst."

Notice how the people respond: they grumble—don’t we know this guy, his parents—how can He say such a thing?!! Jesus is familiar to them, they think they know where he’s from, and so they balk. They want something spectacular, surprising, obvious… and Jesus offers them mystery and sacrament. “Everyone who listens to my Father and learns from him comes to me…I am the bread of life… I am the living bread that came down from heaven, whoever eats this bread will live forever; and the bread that I will give is my flesh for the life of the world.”

Every third year our Mother the Church lays out this whole long sixth chapter of John, and I think we see within the reading itself the wisdom of this repetition. Each one of us in different ways is up against some pretty tough struggles: maybe it’s something big that came out of the blue, like cancer, or a divorce… maybe it’s a hidden battle against a temptation that no one else knows about, but whatever it is, God is calling. St. Paul says, “All bitterness, fury, anger, shouting, and reviling must be removed from you, along with all malice. And be kind to one another, compassionate, forgiving one another as God has forgiven you in Christ.” Whether it’s rejecting what is evil, or more fully embracing what is good, this is not easy, and it’s not automatic. It’s not a choice we can make once, but a series of choices every single day. Where do we get the power? Where are we to find the stamina? What fuels this journey?

Jesus said, “I am the bread of life.” When the people of Israel were in the desert, God sent them bread through Moses. When Elijah was fleeing for his life in the desert, God sent him bread through an angel. As we face the desert struggles in our lives, each day, God has not forgotten us. Jesus sees our hearts, our need, our hunger—but in Jesus, God didn’t send just a prophet, an angel, a messenger—God came Himself, and Jesus who is both God and man gives us Himself. “When the afflicted man called out, the Lord heard, and from all his distress he saved him.” Perhaps this is not immediately satisfying—we’d like to see something obvious, something impressive, something overt. But, God knows what we need, and He gives us Himself, He who is the only final and full satisfaction for our whole being, body and soul.

Let me close by inviting you to very seriously ask yourself a question: Have I kept the Lord ’s Day holy? Have I gone to Mass unless it was physically impossible? If you’ve allowed other things to creep into God’s place, if Mass has become occasional or a matter of convenience—you’ve been running on empty. You’ve been attempting to navigate the marathon of life without a spaghetti dinner. You’ve been facing struggles big and small, both visible and hidden, on your own. God doesn’t ask this of you, to fly solo. God doesn’t ask this of you, to step into the ring on an empty stomach. God comes to every altar, to every Mass, waits for you in every tabernacle throughout the world, and He even urges you on through me, through the Church. Don’t stay away, don’t let obstacles keep you from the Bread of Life. “Get up and eat, else the journey will be too long for you!”

+ A. M. D. G. +

What lies in the depths of your heart?

+ J. M. J. +

Homily Outline for the 18th Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year B (5 August 2012)

What lies in the depths of our hearts? Give me your full attention, pause for a second, close your eyes, and look within your heart. What desires move there? ...What longings, hopes, and dreams? ... There are layers in our hearts and lives, as if all of our being and experience were a deep pool or ocean.  Passing breezes and surface currents ripple the surface, or even cause massive waves… but the surface doesn’t tell the whole story. If we plunge past the surface of the ocean, we find layers and depths and currents that are largely hidden. If we venture past the superficial passing fancies and desires that each day brings, we will find layers and depths and currents there: some of that is painful, some is embarrassing, some is confusing, and at the core, there is the possibility of finding something very beautiful and enduring,

Do you desire a donut, or a cold glass of water? Do you long for nap? Take a step deeper… are you hungry for a friend, thirsty for a conversation, or longing to simply sit still out in the woods? At the core… are you hungry for love, or forgiveness, or truth? Are you sad, or feeling flat and lifeless, or full of enthusiasm?

As children, we must learn not to act on every impulse—we can’t take every cookie we see, hit every person that makes us mad, or go to the bathroom the moment the urge strikes us. This is the beginning of virtue—to make decisions about how and when and if we will act on our desires. However, much more is required! Maturity, and holiness, cannot be merely the ignoring or suppressing of our desires. We must learn to discern, purify, and move from the surface to the depths, to those deeper currents, to the deepest truest innermost current which is God’s own life and love, the Holy Spirit.

This dynamic is played out over the whole course of salvation history, and in each person’s life, and it is vividly present in our readings today. Moses led the people out of slavery in Egypt by wonders and signs into the desert, and very quickly they began to grouse and complain about the lack of food, so God sent quail and manna in the desert. God did not ignore the most basic desires:

He commanded the skies above and opened the doors of heaven; he rained manna upon them for food and gave them heavenly bread. Man ate the bread of angels, food he sent them in abundance. And he brought them to his holy land, to the mountains his right hand had won.

Centuries later, Jesus encountered the same dynamic, we heard about it last Sunday.  He saw the crowd hungry before Him, and he multiplied the loaves and fed their bodies. Now, they have followed him to Capernaum, looking for more. It is good that they seek Him, but Jesus sees into their hearts, that they are still just looking for more bread.

Why are we here at this Mass? Part of it is may be habit, part obligation… maybe we’re here out of obedience to our parents or to please them or to please a spouse. Part of why I’m here is that it’s my job! None of that is bad, but it’s not enough…the Lord wants your whole heart, mind, and soul, and He wants mine, too. Jesus Christ challenges us: do we want food that endures? Do we want more than going through the motions or fulfilling a duty or making someone else happy? Do you want to go deeper than seeing who this new priest is? How do we get there? How do we go deeper? The people asked, “What can we do to accomplish the works of God?” Jesus said, “Believe in the one he sent.” It is by faith in Jesus Christ, that faith itself a gift, that we go deeper and draw nearer to the Living God.

To make an act of faith, to step beyond what we fully understand, that takes courage, a leap beyond our comfort zone… and the people of Jesus’ time wanted a sign, like Moses had given. They’re still stuck hoping to see another miracle and get some more bread for free. But a miracle, miraculous bread comes from God—it is God we seek. The deepest current, the truest depths of our hearts seek God and Him alone. Nothing else will satisfy us. We see this painted across the screens of the media so clearly - men and women rich, famous, and powerful far beyond our circumstances, and scrabbling in the mud with their fingernails trying to get just a little bit more. Clearly the things of this world do not themselves bring peace. Jesus knows this, He knows that it is to answer our hunger and thirst that He has come, that it is to answer our deepest desire that He will die… and so He tells us the truth so far beyond our expectations, “I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me will never hunger, and whoever believes in me will never thirst.”

Brothers and sisters is Christ… for the next three weeks we will unpack what Jesus meant when He said, “I am the bread of life.” The sixth chapter of John is a long one, but it’s long because it’s important, and here Jesus draws us into a very deep mystery, the Eucharist, the source and summit of our faith. I love this chapter, this mystery, the Eucharist, and I hope you do too! It is a great mystery, always beyond our full grasp. But we can turn to this mystery once again, and enter into its light and beauty. To do this, however, we must come attentive to the deep desires of our hearts. God responds to what is deepest and truest in us, but if we don’t know what’s there, if we haven’t had the time, or the inclination, or the courage to look within, if we’re not willing to go deeper, we get stuck on the surface. Do you want to go deeper? God will help. St. Paul challenged the Ephesians to go deeper, so let me close with His words directed now to each one of us:

Brothers and sisters: I declare and testify in the Lord that you must no longer live as the Gentiles do, in the futility of their minds; that is not how you learned Christ, assuming that you have heard of him and were taught in him, as truth is in Jesus, that you should put away the old self of your former way of life, corrupted through deceitful desires, and be renewed in the spirit of your minds, and put on the new self, created in God's way in righteousness and holiness of truth.

This is God’s invitation to us, to be open to becoming new men and women in Christ, and this happens above all through the Eucharist. In the Eucharist we encounter God, the only source of lasting peace, and we are empowered to know the depths of our own hearts and souls. May we open our hearts to this beautiful mystery now, and in the weeks that lie ahead.

+ A. M. D. G. +

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