Christ’s Divine Mercy—Second Sunday of Easter 2018 (Cycle B)

Acts 4:32–35; 1 John 5:1–6; John 20:19–31

Divine Mercy is the theme this Sunday, and the readings explain how this mercy is manifested in the early Church. As Acts notes, the members of the Church shared what they had with each other, even to the point of selling their property and bringing it to the Church to disperse. Our American culture of individualism occasionally blinds us to the obvious: when people in free association with each other decide to share what they have for the common good, that’s simply good Christian charity on display. That is what motivated charity through the early Church and the middle ages. But in Acts and in general, Christian charity is voluntary. Otherwise, it’s not really charity and not an act of love. And it’s not an Act of charity if we perform it to gain something for ourselves. Later in Acts, a couple of land owners decided to pretend they were giving everything they owned while holding something back. So Acts teaches us that all charity should be voluntary and that we should not attempt to glean favor by giving it. Give your alms in silence, and you will have your reward in Heaven.

I’ve spoken many times on our need to show mercy, particularly in how we address the problems of need we encounter locally. We have an obligation to address such needs locally and not simply rely on government assistance. As John addresses it, “In this way we know that we love the children of God when we love God and keep His commandments. For the love of God is this, that we keep His commandments.” And God commands us to love our neighbor and to care for his needs. So we don’t get to relegate that to the government. If we don’t help the poor ourselves, it’s on us.

The first letter of John approaches the question of mercy from a very different angle than Acts. John’s words fit so well with Christ’s own. They both speak with riddles and paradoxes: we have to become poor to be blessed; we have to die to really live. It sounds absurd, but we don’t really come to know life and the truth until we set our lives aside and live for others—in other words, until we die to ourselves and live for others. “Blessed are the merciful, for they will be shown mercy.” We show mercy, and in turn, God shows us His mercy.

First John highlights and espouses what one commentary on scripture calls the three inseparable dispositions: to love the children of God, to love God, and to keep his commandments. In these dispositions, we capture what the early Christian community was about. We have to love God by loving His children and obey His commandment to care for one another. In the chapter just before this one, John writes, “If any one says, ‘I love God,’ and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen, cannot love God whom he has not seen.” So we must show mercy and care for one another if we truly love God.

Our gospel account relates two events: the first is the appearance of Jesus to 10 of the apostles, and the second is His reappearance to the apostles including Thomas. I want to focus on the first event as it relates to the theme of Divine Mercy. Jesus gives the disciples two missions here. First, He sends them and commissions them to preach the good news. This is the Great Commission. And what are they to preach? That Christ came, died, and rose again for the remission of sin—so that the way to salvation would be open to everyone. At the end of Matthew, Jesus sends them in like fashion, telling them to baptize in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.

Second, though, Jesus breathes on the disciples and says, Receive the Holy Spirit. Whose sins you forgive are forgiven them, and whose sins you retain are retained.” Compare this to Matthew 16:18–19, when Jesus says to Simon,

And I tell you, you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the powers of death shall not prevail against it. I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.

Now, whenever someone gets a new name in scripture, they also get a new mission. The woman becomes Eve; Abram becomes Abraham; Jacob becomes Israel. With each new name comes a new role. We should expect the same of Peter here. The keys of binding and loosing are the authority to excommunicate or to allow admittance to the Church. Jesus extends this authority to the rest of the Twelve Apostles in Matthew 18:18. But it can’t get any clearer than here in John that Jesus grants the Apostles the power to remit sin: whose sins you forgive are forgiven, whose sins you retain are retained. These passages in scripture are the foundation for the Sacrament of Penance, what we also call the Sacrament of Confession or Reconciliation. This is one of the great sacraments of healing in our faith.

Christ is sent and becomes incarnate out of God’s great mercy for our redemption, and Christ commissions the Apostles to continue His mission of mercy, and one way that the Church demonstrates that mercy is through the Sacrament of Confession.

Some of us aren’t really wild about receiving this sacrament. Our Protestant brethren often don’t understand the need and question its necessity. Sadly some Catholics say the same thing: “Why do I need to confess my sins to a priest?” That’s like asking why you need to take medicine when you’re ill. It’s so you can be well again. The sacrament was founded by Christ not to cause us shame or to punish us.. but to heal us. And it is a perfect example of how God continues to extend His mercy to us through the Church.

Christ’s abundant mercy is right here in His sacraments: in this Eucharist which we will celebrate in a few minutes, in the words of scripture that we read, and in the Sacrament of Confession. What grieves Him more than anything is that so few people seek His mercy, and so few of us recognize our need for it. But His mercy is right here for the taking.

Advertisements

Grace, Light, Love, and Truth—Fourth Sunday of Lent (Cycle A–B)

1 Sam. 16:1b, 6–7, 10–13a; Eph. 5:8–14; John 9:1–41; 2 Chron. 36:14–16, 19–23; Eph. 2:4–10; John 3:14–21

I have two themes I want to discuss in regards to today’s readings: grace and light, and their relationship to two attributes of God, love and truth. We have our second scrutiny today for those who are on their journey into the Church, which means that I am straddling two different sets of readings. By God’s mercy in this very busy week, He’s given me enough commonality between our Cycle A and Cycle B readings that I can preach on both without doing any violence to the text.

First, the gift—grace. I’m actually being redundant when I say that. Grace comes from the Latin word gratia, which means gift. In Ephesians 2, Paul says, “For by grace you have been saved through faith. It is not from you ; it is the gift of God. It is not from works….” Paul’s reference to works here points to the works of the law of the old Covenant. But he’s underscoring something here that we do well to remember. While our actions—our works—matter in terms of our sanctification, all of it still comes about through the working of grace. This doctrinal truth was reinforced recently in a document released by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith titled Placuit Deo. In it, the Church affirms that we are not able to work our way to salvation and that all salvation comes to us through Jesus Christ. Likewise, our salvation doesn’t come about because of our own spiritual enlightenment apart from any external influence, but because we have been enlightened by Christ’s redeeming act.

It’s all a gift. The gospel reading from John 3 is the most recognizable statement of this reality. “For God so loved the world that He gave His only son, so that everyone who believes in Him might not perish but might have eternal life.” That is the good news in a nutshell. God gave to us the gift of His Son, and through His Son, we have redemption from our sins.

Grace enables us to do God’s will. Outside of grace, we act largely for our own benefit. That doesn’t mean that people who aren’t Christian can’t act benevolently. It does mean that in some way, they may cooperate with God’s grace even without recognizing it. That’s the seed of faith at work. But all good is the result of a God who is the greatest good. We can only impart what we possess, and if we have any good, it is because of the source of good, the greatest of all goods, our God, who endows us with His goodness.

Recall that Jesus says in the Sermon on the Mount from Matthew 7:11, “If you then, who are wicked, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give good things to those who ask him.” Why else do we give gifts if not out of love? Otherwise, the giving of a so-called gift requires reciprocation—something in return. And that is not a gift at all. God gives us all that we need not out of any need He has, but simply because He loves us and knows what we need.

Grace has effects, and one of them is enlightenment. There’s a popular Catholic writer and apologist who likes to put it this way: sin makes you stupid.

Sin makes you stupid.

When I look back on the sinful moments of my life, I can hear that, sagely nod my head, stroke my very gray beard, and say… “Yep.”

Sin makes us stupid. It’s so obvious that we shouldn’t have to say it. When we are in the midst of our sin, we can’t see how it clouds our judgment, how it blinds us, how it darkens our moral vision. Once we snuff the light of grace, our path is darkened, and we have to grope to find our way back. And of course, when we grope in the darkness, we’re going to bark our shins, stub our toes, and smack our foreheads on that overhang we always have to duck.

Without grace, we do not experience the love of God—the love of Him offering His Son for our salvation—but we also do not experience the truth of God. We cannot see. We are trapped in the darkness of our sin. God’s light can permeate all darkness except one—the darkness in which we wrap ourselves by our own act of will, the darkness that we choose on our own.

Recall when Jesus meets with Nicodemus in the night. He says, “Unless one is born of water and the spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God.” He notes this irony: “Are you a teacher of Israel, and yet you do not understand this? Truly, truly, I say to you, we speak of what we know, and bear witness to what we have seen; but you do not receive our testimony.”

They do not understand, which is to say that they do not see. Now, Nicodemus was one of the ones who eventually came to understand. He came to Jesus in the night, but later, he and Joseph of Arimathea took away Jesus’s body and buried it, according to Sacred Tradition. He saw something after Jesus’ death that the Twelve, those Jesus had picked by hand, did not see.

Why is that? Because the light had not yet come to them, and by the word light, we mean that other aspect of God I mentioned earlier, the Truth. God is Love, and God is Truth. We think of these attributes of God as distinct things. But God is utterly simple. He isn’t divided. His love is His mercy is His justice is His truth. While we make distinctions in God, they only exist in our limited ways of understanding Him because we need distinctions to comprehend the simplest truth about God.

Recall 1 Samuel, when the prophet Samuel goes to Jesse of Bethlehem to anoint one of his sons as the next king of Israel. Samuel sees the first of Jesse’s sons and is certain that this is the one, but God tells him, “Not as man sees does God see.” Without the light of Christ, we can only judge by human means. With Christ’s light, we see more and more as God sees. St. Paul in Ephesians contrasts this before and after state for those who come to Christ: “You were once darkness, but now you are light in the Lord.” And finally, in the story about the man blind from birth, the disciples assume that the man’s blindness is on account of his parents’ sin. Jesus responds to them, “While I am in the world, I am the light of the world.” By His actions, He brings light into the world, and through our baptism, we are made partakers in that light. So we become the light in the world.

God’s gift of grace through love to us allows us to be the light and truth to others. We are Christ’s hands and feet, but we also convey His grace in our actions, in our loving response to others, in our testimony to the truth.

We receive this Eucharist here to strengthen us so that we can go out and be Christ to the world: hands, feet, love, and truth. Don’t let this grace sit idle in your heart. Take it to your neighbors, to your coworkers, to the people you can’t stand, and the people who can’t stand you. Don’t cover the light of truth with a bushel basket. Don’t hoard the grace that has been given freely to you. Pass on your grace as a gift to others. Let your light illumine others. In the words of Flannery O’Connor, “the life you save may be your own.”

Healing the Leper in Us—Sixth week in Ordinary Time (Cycle B)

Leviticus 13:1–2, 44–46; 1 Corinthians 10:31—11:1; Mark 1:40–45

As many of you know, I returned to the Catholic faith when I was in my late 30s. For those of you who have practiced your faith steadily for your entire life, you will never know what it is like to make a twenty-year confession. I could say that you are blessed never to have to do so, and that would be true. But likewise, it’s a blessing after such a long time away from the sacraments and after having wended my way through all of the poor decisions of a young-adult life outside the Church to unburden myself and to hear those most beautiful words of absolution:

God the Father of mercies, through the death and resurrection of your son, you have reconciled the world to yourself and sent the Holy Spirit among us for the forgiveness of sins. Through the ministry of the church, may God grant you pardon and peace. And I absolve you of your sins, in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Those words were beautiful the first time I heard them after 20 years, and they are still beautiful now every time I go to reconciliation, which I try to do every three or four weeks.

But it’s really easy to get bogged down in shame and avoid acknowledging our need for forgiveness and healing. We get a hint of this in the reading from Leviticus. Note that the person with lesion is “brought to the priest”—that is, he doesn’t present himself, but those who notice his lesion bring him to the priest. The suggestion, of course, is that the person who might have leprosy does not come willingly but is forced to come because others see his possible uncleanliness.

And that makes sense. Back then, being branded as a leper meant that you were an outcast—unclean. You had a duty to warn people away from yourself, until you somehow were healed from your leprosy. But how could that happen if you are outcast? Who would heal you? You have to be healed before you can even approach the priest to examine you and perform the ritual sacrifices for you to be brought back into the community.

When St. Paul talks about the burden of the law, and when Jesus talks about the burdens that the scribes and Pharisees put on the shoulders of the faithful, this is what He means. They lay out the consequences and the costs but give no means for actually resolving the situation. If you become unclean, you have to hope that somehow you will become clean again, with no way of being able to make yourself clean. To paraphrase Psalm 49, we cannot pay our own ransom or the ransom of anyone else. So how hopeless is the plight of the leper? There is a chasm between him and the community that he can only pray will be breached.

Leprosy, of course, is a figure or type for sin. When I use the terms “figure” and “type,” I’m using the language of biblical scholars, but what those terms mean is that a figure or type is a foreshadow. It’s a pattern that precedes something in scripture that helps the second thing make sense. So if I refer to the crossing of the Red Sea as a kind of baptism, you see the crossing of the Red Sea in Exodus as having some kind of meaningful connection to the Rite of Baptism—a cleansing from sin, a transition from slavery to freedom. The Church counts on your ability to make sense of these analogies or “figures,” and  it salts our sacramental rites with these hints. If you have listened to our sprinkling rite or the baptismal rite, you know that we remember every baptismal symbol from scripture: the separation of all matter from water, the story of Noah, the passage of the ark of Moses in the Nile, the passage of the people of Israel over the Red Sea, the passage of Joshua and the nation of Israel over the Jordan—all of these figures are important for us to grasp our faith. We need scripture to show us how it all works, and our liturgies are the apparatus by which it all comes together.

So leprosy is likewise a type for sin. The Old Testament Hebrews could not rid themselves of leprosy, any more than we can rid ourselves of sin. They had to rely solely on the grace and mercy of God to be healed. And then they had to be affirmed as clean by a priest before returning to the community. The gospel reading likewise demonstrates this. The leper seeks healing from Jesus, saying, “If you wish, you can make me clean.” There is no question and no hesitation from the leper as to Jesus’ ability to heal. He knows it’s simply a matter of Jesus’ willingness to heal him, and of course, Jesus wills it.

I want to interject here something I’ve been sort of stewing on that came to me last night. Notice the reversal that takes place at the end of the gospel reading. The leper, who is an outcast, comes to Jesus and is healed and then enters the city again, while Jesus becomes the outcast. He can no longer enter the city because of the crowds. He switches place essentially with the leper.

So imagine the courage it must’ve taken the leper, an outcast, to approach Jesus in this way? To come closer than 150 feet to anyone meant the possibility of violent reprisals. But he knew that Christ had the power to heal, and that Christ wished to heal. And he knew that he so desperately needed healing that only Jesus could give him, so he took the chance. It must’ve taken courage and humility.

Leprosy, in these readings, represents our uncleanness, or dis-ease due to sin. Perhaps no one else recognizes our sinfulness, no one sees the lesions, sores, and disfigurement than sin causes in us. We might try to rationalize it away—that’s one of the effects of sin—clouding and distorting our moral vision to hinder our ability to see our failings. But if we’re honest with ourselves—if we examine our motivations, our thoughts, our negative impulses—we come to recognize our need for forgiveness. That’s half of the battle.

But then we need to approach Jesus to find the healing we need. Sometimes that does take courage, and it always requires humility. For some of us, particularly those of us who have cultivated the habit, confession is easy. We know that the priest is there to show us God’s mercy not to condemn us. But for others of us, we feel the sting of conscience, the shame of hearing ourselves repeating out loud again the same sins we take into the confessional every few weeks. We think, “What must this priest think of me? How can I look him in the face when I see him around town?”

Now it’s common to hear non-Catholics ask why they would need to confess their sins to a priest. It might be more unusual to hear Catholics say the same thing, but I have heard it. Nonetheless, confession is necessary for mortal sin. When we sin mortally, we break communion with God and with the Body of Christ. Confession is the way that we reconcile with God and the Church. So before we come to this altar of sacrifice to share the Eucharist in communion with the Church, we need to prepare, and that often includes confession of our sins. It’s not only the law of the Church. It’s also noted in scripture. In John 20:22–23, Jesus breathes on the disciples and says, “Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven. If you retain the sins of any, they are retained.” James says in his letter to the Jews in the dispersion, “Confess your sins to one another, and pray for one another, that you may be healed.” So for all mortal sin, confession is a necessity before we can receive the other sacraments.

But remember that the priest is not simply and solely a man in his role as confessor. He acts in persona Christi, in the person of Christ. That is, he forgives sins, not by his own power, but by the authority of Jesus Christ. The priest makes Christ present in his priesthood. We need God’s mercy and healing, and in His wisdom, He has given us this sacrament of reconciliation, so that when we hear those words of absolution, we truly know that God has forgiven us.

Members of the Body of Christ—Second Sunday of Ordinary Time (Cycle B)

1 Samuel 3:3–10, 19; 1 Corinthians 6:13b–15, 17–20; John 1:35–42

I tend to lean on the gospel readings heavily when I write my homilies and less on the readings from the epistles, usually Paul’s writings. I’m going to deviate from my norm today because I want to focus on an element of our faith that I don’t think is well understood and one that can get distorted by the currents of politics and culture.

“Do you not know that your bodies are members of Christ?”

Your bodies are members of Christ. What does that mean? Clearly, it suggests connectedness in some way. Is it the connectedness of a club? Or a fraternal organization? Is it like a voluntary membership to your neighborhood association?

It is like none of that. The Body of Christ is not simply a matter of agreement on certain beliefs, or alignment on political principles, or acceptance of certain ideologies. We are joined by a common baptism and confirmation, and we are joined by our shared communion in the Eucharist. What does this mean, and what should its impact be in our world and on our lives?

Let’s start with the Sacrament of Baptism. In the understanding of many of our Protestant brethren, baptism is merely a symbol of our acceptance of Christ as our savior. That is not the historical understanding of baptism, nor is it a scriptural understanding of baptism.

First, let’s talk about what scripture says about baptism. What it does not say is that baptism is optional, is purely symbolic, or is reserved for adults only. In the gospel of John, Jesus says that you must be reborn by water and the spirit. In Matthew, he tells the Apostles to go to all nations baptizing in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.

In Acts, in response to the Pharisees who ask how they can atone for having crucified Christ, Peter says, “Be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ.” In his first epistle, Peter says, “Baptism now saves you.” It replaces the Jewish practice of circumcision. Paul in Romans notes that we die and rise with Jesus in our baptism. So there is the scriptural foundation for our belief. But what does the Church teach about the effects of our baptism?

First and foremost, the Church teaches that baptism joins us to the Church. It is the means by which people begin communion with the Church. It has other effects as well, most notably cleansing from Original Sin and personal sin. But it is a sacrament of initiation, and what it initiates is membership in the Body of Christ. And not just baptisms in a Catholic church! If you are baptized using the proper matter and form—that is, with water and with the words “I baptize you in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit” and with the intention that the Church has, you are joined to the Catholic church even if you are baptized in a non-denominational community. In this respect, it corresponds to the circumcision of the Jews, as Paul teaches in Colossians 2:11. Note that circumcision took place typically on the eighth day after birth for Jewish boys, so by necessity, it was done on infants. If that is the case, it follows that baptism too is legitimately done on infants, and nothing in scripture indicates otherwise.

I love baptisms, and I have a special reason to celebrate this sacrament today as we [will be baptizing my first godson, Maverick Wimer, in just a few moments] [just baptized my first godson, Maverick Wimer, during the 8:00 AM Mass].

So baptism joins us to the Church. If you have been baptized, you are a member of the Body of Christ. Even if you aren’t Catholic and you’ve been baptized, you’ve been joined to the Church.

That’s the first of the Sacraments of Initiation. Two other important sacraments are also part of this group of sacraments of initiation: Confirmation and Eucharist. Now, Confirmation is important, but I want to focus on the Eucharist as it is central to our worship and also central to our understanding of what it means to be the Church.

The word “Eucharist” comes from the Greek word meaning thanksgiving, which is appropriate, as it is the full expression of the early Jewish todah or thanksgiving offering of bread and wine. But note that we so frequently refer to it by its other name—communion. Communion. One name reflects what we do—notably, giving thanks. The other name reflects what it does—brings about communion. It makes us one with Christ and with each other.

I don’t hear this old aphorism very often any more, but it was very popular back in the 70s and 80s: you are what you eat. The point then was that if you ate something healthy, you’d be healthy, and if you ate junk, you’d feel like junk. But it applies in our case. We are joined to the Body of Christ in baptism, and when we receive Eucharist, we receive the body, blood, soul, and Divinity of Christ. And if we are what we eat, that means we become—more and more—the Body of Christ. And that means that we are not simply joined to Christ, but we are joined to each other. Communion is both vertical, with God, and horizontal, with each other.

We are members of the Body of Christ! Appendages! Extensions!

And this status implies something about how we are supposed to be in the world. We all have different roles to play. As Paul notes, some of us are called to preach and teach, some to give hospitality, some to interpret and others to prophesy. We all have a calling to do something for Christ. We are, as some have put it, His hands and feet. We are one of the primary ways in which God works in the world. He can intervene through miracles. He can reveal Himself directly to people in mystical experiences. But for the most part, what He uses to bring about His will in the world is you and me. We are His instruments—His hands, His feet, and His heart.

You see, we as Catholics believe that sacraments have effects. They change us. They are not merely empty symbols. Some sacraments are a point of no return. They make, what philosophers call, an ontological change in us. They mark us and change our very being permanently. Baptism is one such sacrament. But all have effects on us because all of them convey grace. That is part of the definition  of a sacrament: a visible sign instituted by Christ to give grace.

The Eucharist—communion—is a tremendous gift to the Church and the central act of worship for the faithful. It is a primary means that Christ gave us for our sanctification. It should change us more and more to be like Christ, and that enables us to go out into the world as Christ’s hands, feet, and heart.

We need to be Christ in the world. We need to be the gospel in the world. Some people will never set foot or never consider setting foot in this cathedral. They will not encounter the Gospel here unless they encounter the Gospel in you. You may be the only Gospel they ever hear. So preach it in your actions! Let your Catholic Christian freak flag fly!

[8:00 AM – We’re going to encounter these two sacraments today—baptism and Eucharist—these powerful mysteries of our faith. These sacraments can change our lives, but only if we allow the grace they give us to work in us. Jesus wants to come into our lives and transform them. But to do that, we have to surrender our lives to Him. Only then can we truly be His hands, His feet, and His heart to the world.]

[10:00 AM – We’re going to encounter the sacrament of Eucharist today—this powerful mystery of our faith. This sacrament can change our lives, but only if we allow the grace it gives us to work in us. Jesus wants to come into our lives and transform them. But to do that, we have to surrender our lives to Him. Only then can we truly be His hands, His feet, and His heart to the world.]

The Holy Family of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph

Sirach 3:2–6, 12–14; Colossians 3:12–21; Luke 2:22–30

Today is a feast in honor of families, and particularly, the most Holy Family of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph. Our readings from Sirach, Colossians, and Luke all focus on the obligations of family and of family members to each other. And for good reason. The family is the most basic building block of society, the most foundational structure that gives context, sense, and meaning to our lives. The family is also foundational for the handing on of the faith, so much so that the Church refers to the family as the Domestic Church in Lumen Gentium (11), one of two dogmatic constitutions of the Church from Vatican II.

The Domestic Church—the Church of Home. When we say the blessing over the fathers during a baptism, we say these words:

With their wives they will be the first teachers of their children in the ways of the faith. May they also be the best of teachers, bearing witness to the faith by what they say and do, in Christ Jesus our Lord.

I want to point out the final words of that prayer: “bearing witness to the faith by what they say and do, in Christ Jesus our Lord.” All of our readings today point to that one statement in our baptismal blessings.

However, I’d like to do a thought experiment. I occasionally present at conferences for my industry, and one of the more recent presentations I did was called something like “How to have an awful system implementation.” And then I went through all of the factors that lead to businesses having horrible experiences implementing new software, hardware, or network infrastructure in their places of work. So I’d like to propose to you some ways, based on Sirach, Colossians, and Luke 2, how you can have a miserable family and a crumbling domestic church.

Let’s start with one that is so very common in our culture right now: parental respect. Sirach says, “Whoever honors his father atones for sins… he stores up riches who reveres his mother.” Or this: “Even if his mind fail, be considerate of him.” Do we honor parents in our culture? Do we honor fathers in our culture? A quick look at the shows on mainstream television will tell you all  you need to know: Family Guy, American Dad, the Simpsons. I recall Al Bundy, but that’s the last live action character I can think of. Now, if you search on “buffoonish TV dads,” the number one hit is a cartoon. That should tell you something.

That’s the image of fatherhood in our culture. So what does it say of how we view fathers, particularly when they get older and don’t quite have their wits about them as they used to? If we imagine that to be the place of fathers in our culture, what happens to fatherhood?

Or let’s turn our attention to what motherhood has come to entail. How often is motherhood honored in our culture in and of itself? It seems that women are encouraged to be everything else first and to be somehow settling for less if they choose to focus on the family home. It’s fine to be a superwoman and do it all. It’s fine to supersede the role of the father, or have no father in the picture whatsoever. But suggest that somehow being a mother is a worthy ambition in and of itself, and some people look at you like they don’t understand the words coming out of your mouth. What does that say about our culture’s evaluation of motherhood? The latest incursions of gender ideology are yet another attempt to dissuade women from embracing maternity and femininity. A current Catholic educator and theologian said in an article in the latest National Catholic Register that gender ideology “denies the meaning and value of womanhood and condemns motherhood as oppressive.”

We can take this approach from any angle and see how our culture constantly sets us against each other. Father and mother against children, siblings against each other and against parents. Our readings, though, advise us otherwise. Sirach tells us that reverence of parents is the surest way to be blessed, and certainly science backs up the idea that people who are grateful are happier in their lives. Gratitude and reverence to parents are their own reward.

St. Paul exhorts us in Colossians to “put on… heartfelt compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience, bearing with one another and forgiving one another.” He outlines the obligations we have to each other: wife to husband and husband to wife, father to children, and children to parents. There is no familial relationship that does not bear an obligation to others in family. Where does the radical individualism of our current culture, where the desires of the individual supersede all other values, fit into this Christian ethos outlined by Paul? Quite clearly, it does not.

Our gospel reading from Luke today presents to us the preeminent family, the iconic Domestic Church, the Holy Family of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph. By the standard of their times, they are not what you would call impressive. Joseph offers two turtledoves for the ritual cleansing of Mary. The offering of two turtledoves is prescribed for those who cannot afford to offer a lamb and a turtledove, so Joseph is clearly a poor man. They’re from a quaint backwater called Nazareth, which is so obscure that it finds no mention at all in ancient literature prior to the references in the gospels.

This is the quintessential domestic church? How could it be? Well, let’s start with their example. Joseph takes his family to Jerusalem to the temple to perform the ritual works required by Jewish law. He was performing one of the many mitzvot or commandments described in Jewish law. Now we’re often told that our faith shouldn’t be about our actions but about our assent that Christ is Lord. That’s fine, but that’s the most minimal statement of faith there could be. Faith that doesn’t reveal itself in works is dead faith, as James said in his epistle. Joseph demonstrates not only his commitment to the Judaic law, but also his commitment as the head of the Holy Household. His role is very clearly spelled out. He offers a sacrifice of atonement for Mary, and he consecrates Mary’s firstborn to God. So Joseph is fulfilling his religious duty on behalf of the Holy Family.

No doubt Mary also played her part in the Holy Family. One of the traditions of the Jewish males is to sing the Eshet Chayil on the Sabbath. It’s a passage from Proverbs 31 that sings the praises of the valorous woman: “A woman of valor, who can find? Far beyond pearls is her value” is how that passage begins. The blessed Mother was and is the most valorous woman. Her obedience to God was no doubt reflected in her service to Joseph and Jesus. I can just imagine hearing the voices of Jesus and Joseph on a Sabbath evening singing together her praises.

And finally Jesus Himself had a part to play as a dutiful son, as Luke 2:51 says: “And he went down with them and came to Nazareth, and was obedient to them.” This is Jesus, our savior—the Word through whom all things were made. Yet He submits to Joseph as His earthly father, just as Mary, the Queen of Heaven, submits to Joseph as his spouse, as was expected of Jewish women of the time. Everyone had a role in the Holy Family, and everyone played their part.

In our modern era, we seem confused about the roles of parents and children in the family. Some parents don’t feel comfortable with the role of disciplinarian, so instead they try to be their children’s best friends. That’s not what children need. They need structure and discipline in the context of a loving family. We expect the single mother to teach her son to be a man and are stunned to learn that she can’t do it herself. That’s a father’s job. And a father’s job is also to demonstrate to his daughters his respect and esteem for them as women, but that doesn’t happen if there is no father in the house. That is why the Church so insistently holds up the nuclear, biological family as the ideal context in which to raise children in the faith. But all too sadly, reality falls short of the ideal. Not all fathers are images of Joseph; not all mothers are reflections of the Blessed Mother; and few of us image the child Jesus as we should. As the family goes, so goes the culture. Certainly that should give us all pause in our current social climate.

But the Holy Family is presented to us as an example to emulate, an example of the Domestic Church. It should not surprise us that our example is a Jewish family. After all, they are our elder brothers in faith. The Catholic faith is sometimes called the fulfillment of Judaism. The Eucharistic liturgy, the paschal mystery in which we will share together in just a few minutes, is the Jewish Passover transformed into Christ’s Passover. The prayers that begin the Eucharistic liturgy recall the same prayers offered over bread and wine in observant Jewish households every Sabbath. As Jesus says to the Samaritan woman in John 4:22, “Salvation is from the Jews.”

So follow the lead of this most holy Jewish family, and may our households be blessed as their household was undoubtedly blessed.

Fatima Exposition and Benediction—Aug. 13

Matthew 28:16–20

Our reading from the Gospel of Matthew is that final passage that is known as the Great Commission. This is Christ’s sending of the Apostles out to evangelize—to spread the good news. When we look at this passage, we see a number of important directives. First is to baptize in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. We recognize in this statement the foundation of the sacraments of initiation. But it is also our call to evangelization—go out and make disciples of all nations.

How does this passage, then, relate to the apparitions of Our Lady to Lucia, Jacinta, and Francisco? Well, for the very simple reason that their mission was the same as the Great Commission. The Blessed Mother’s message was for them to make disciples, to help convert the world through the intercession of Her Immaculate Heart.

Evangelization always has two core elements, the first one being that the evangelized need to understand their condition. They need to understand their need for salvation. Perhaps the world of Lucia, Jacinta, and Francisco was ripe for such a message. World War I was raging. The Russian revolution was in full swing. The civil wars in Spain and the various secularist movements in Europe were pushing the Church to the peripheries. Perhaps the people could see clearly their need. But in their time as in ours, it is far too easy for people to just keep moving and to ignore the structures of society crashing down around them. In our own time, most people don’t even recognize that something is missing from their lives. So part of the message of evangelization is to get those who need to be evangelized to wake up.

The second part of evangelization, once people recognize their utter need, is to let them know that there is an answer. In that time, the Blessed Mother beckoned all to find refuge in her Immaculate Heart, but Our Lady’s ultimate aim is always to draw people to her Son. And the Son is the answer. He is why we call the message euangelion—the good news. The good news is that there is a way out of misery, a way out of the calamity of original sin, and a way back into the embrace of our Lord.

That was the mission of Lucia, Jacinta, and Francisco. That, too, is our mission—the Great commission. Let us begin by consecrating ourselves to the Immaculate Heart of Mary, and then let us take up what Padre Pio called his weapon—the Holy Rosary—and pray for the salvation of the world.

Chaire, Kecharitomene—Fourth Sunday of Advent (Cycle B)

2 Samuel 7:1–5, 8b–12, 14a, 16; Romans 16:25–27; Luke 1:26–38

            “Chaire! Kecharitomene!” This is Gabriel’s greeting. “Hail, full of grace!” In this fourth Sunday of Advent, we celebrate the one named full of grace, the one whom all generations will call blessed.

            Our reverence for the Blessed Mother is often not understood by our Protestant brethren, but it has been celebrated by the Universal Church, the Catholic Church, from the earliest days. The Gospels contain the first indications that we should honor her. The first chapter of Luke gives us the first two assertions of our prayer, the Hail Mary:

The angel Gabriel says to her, “The Lord is with thee.”

Her cousin, Elizabeth, says to her, “Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb.”

Each of these points come directly from scripture, in fact, from Luke 1 where we get the passage I proclaimed to you a few moments ago.    I want to talk a little bit about this meeting between Gabriel and Mary, and then I want to talk about its larger implications in salvation history.

            As I mentioned, our Protestant brethren are often ambivalent or even downright scandalized by our devotion to the Blessed Mother. It was not always so. All of the reformers of the 16th century had a devotion to the Blessed Mother. It wasn’t until the sterilizing effects of the Reformation and the later Enlightenment that devotion to Mary was rejected.

            What is it that we believe about Mary, and why does it matter? Well, to start, all love and devotion that we have for the Blessed Mother is rooted in our love for Christ. If you love someone, you love—or at least respect—the people who are most important to them. If I say that I love my wife but show disrespect to her mother, how will that make my wife feel? Certainly not respected. How much more, then, is it fitting for us to honor the mother of Jesus?

            But it goes beyond that. Scripture shows Gabriel honoring her by giving her a title. Fr. Jerry mentioned this two weekends ago. Gabriel isn’t just saying, “Hey, how’s it going, Mary.” He says, “Hail, Full of Grace.” Or if you use a non-Catholic translation, you might read, “Hail, highly favored one!” But either way, she is given a title—a new name. She herself ponders what this greeting could mean, and Gabriel assures her, “Do not be afraid! You have found favor with God.” The title itself is significant, as any act of renaming or title bestowal is.

            Whenever someone in scripture receives a title, it marks a change in their status and mission. Let’s start at the beginning. Adam renames the woman Eve. Prior to this, he is Adam—simply man—and she is Ishah, which means woman. After the fall, Adam renames her Chava or Eve, which means “mother of all the living.” When God changes Abram’s name to Abraham, he goes from being an “exalted father” to “father of a multitude.” When God renames Jacob Israel, he identifies Jacob with the nation that will come from him.

            The same occurs in the gospels. Mary is given the title kecharitomene—full of grace. Now, notice that Gabriel doesn’t announce it in the same way as these others. He doesn’t say, “You are now full of grace.” He refers to her as “Full of Grace” as if it is something she is. At the moment of his greeting, she is already full of grace. She is already redeemed. She has been in the state of grace from the moment of her conception, which is what we mean by the Immaculate Conception. This scripture is at the root of our belief in the Immaculate Conception. So Mary is given this new title, Full of Grace, and that implies that her role is changing. She is being given a divine mission.

            Both of these titles convey something special about Mary, but they are hardly the only ones. We have an entire litany dedicated to the various names and titles of the Blessed Mother. However, the next three are critical for understanding the role of Mary in the economy of salvation: the new Eve, the Ark of the New Covenant, and the Mother of God.

            St. Paul, in 1 Corinthians 15, says, “‘The first man Adam became a living being’; the last Adam became a life-giving spirit.” As Jesus is the last Adam or second Adam, the Blessed Mother is the new Eve. St. Irenaeus of Lyon was the first of the early Church Fathers to identify Mary with Eve in this fashion. Woman is born from the first Adam’s side; the second Adam is born from Mary’s womb. Through the first woman’s disobedience, we are subject to death; through Mary’s obedience, we can now enter into new life through her Son. Adam calls her “woman,” but renames her Eve, the mother of the living; Mary names her son Jesus, and he renames her woman. You can see the series of reversals in our fallen state that come about through Mary’s fiat, her willingness to submit to God’s will.

            She is the ark of the New Covenant. Recall that the Israelites carried with them the Ark of the Covenant, containing a golden bowl of manna; the two tablets on which the ten commandments were inscribed; and Aaron’s staff, which had sprouted almond blossoms. Each of these items is a reminder to the people of Israel. The bowl of manna reminds them of how God fed them in the wilderness. The tablets remind them of the law that God gave to them. The sprouted staff reminds them of how they rebelled against God’s judgment. Mary, as the Ark of the New Covenant, carries all three in the person of Jesus. He is the bread come down from Heaven to feed us in the wilderness. He is the Word become flesh. He is the sign of contradiction, whom the people of Israel rejected.

            Finally, she is the Mother of God—the Theotokos or God-bearer, which points back to her title as the Ark of the New Covenant. She bears God’s body into the world. Our salvation, the Incarnation, is born through her and through her willing submission.

            All of these titles represent the reasons we should show honor to the blessed Mother. Her obedience brought about our salvation. Through her, the Incarnation—Emmanuel, God with us—became present here among us. In Bethlehem—literally the House of Bread in Hebrew, she laid her son—the bread of life—in a manger, a feeding trough. She submitted to God’s will and all that it entailed: the threat of rejection and even death, the suffering she would encounter because of her Son’s ministry, and ultimately, her suffering in His death. All of these are sufficient reasons to love and honor her.

            But let’s make it simple. When we encounter someone who loves another friend of ours, don’t we connect with that person in a very different way? Don’t you grasp their hand and say, “He’s my best friend!” or “She’s been my greatest confidant.” Don’t we look with wide eyes and joy at the other common friend and exult in that connection? And then we share those stories we have about our friend with each other.

            That’s how we connect with the Blessed Mother. She was closer to Jesus than any of us. But she wants to share Him with all of us. She is the iconic Jewish mother: “Let me tell you about my son.” When we look at the Blessed Mother, it’s commendable that we recall her exaltedness, but we should remember also that she shares with us the joy of her Son.

            “Chaire, Kecharitomene!“

            “Hail, full of grace!” May we never be ashamed of praising her for her generous gift to us.