Homily: Tuesday, 1st Week of Lent

Readings: Is 55:10-11; Ps 34; Mt 6:6-15

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The “Our Father” is likely the prayer we pray the most. And the version we just heard from Matthew’s Gospel is the more complete version, the one with which we’re all familiar. Yes, indeed, the Our Father – or the Lord’s Prayer – gets a lot of coverage in our lives as Christians.

It was certainly among the first prayers I learned as a child. Our mother taught us the Our Father, the Hail Mary, the Glory Be, and the brief Guardian Angel prayer-poem. We learned them all by heart, back when we were still smart and could remember things well. And I expect most of you had similar experiences as children.

And most of us still pray the Our Father daily. Of course, we pray it during every Mass, and each time you pray the Rosary, you pray the Our Father six more times. Depending on how often you pray, it probably finds its way into other parts of your prayer life. I know it’s my last prayer before I go to sleep each evening. There’s just something soothing and all-encompassing about this prayer that Jesus taught to His disciples.

How did Isaiah put it in our first reading?

“So shall my word be that goes forth from my mouth; it shall not return to me void, but shall do my will…”

And because of this, because it’s the prayer of Jesus, it comes from the mouth of God and must have special meaning for all of us.

For me the very fact that Jesus asks us to call God our “Father” is particularly wonderful, especially for the Baptized who are His adopted children. That's a very special, very personal relationship that perhaps we don’t appreciate as we should. 

Jesus goes on to remind us that the Father’s name is holy, beyond anything we can imagine. He then includes the truth that our God’s will rules the entirety of creation, fulfilled in both heaven and on earth. A nice reminder that perhaps we should suppress our sinful wills and unite our wills to His.

Those few words should also generate a deep sense of humility within us. I’ve always believed humility to be the foundational virtue, without which no other virtue can exist. Humility is simply a manifestation of the reality of existence, an acceptance of the vast difference between God and me. It also helps me understand that I am no better than anyone else created by God.

The prayer then turns to a plea, asking the Father to provide all that we need to live His gift, this gift of life. Yes, we ask for “our daily bread” that which sustains us physically, but more than that, even spiritually, for Eucharistic Bread also sustains us, and provides the indwelling of God promised by Jesus Himself.

We then beg our Father for forgiveness, don’t we? But it comes with a qualification, doesn’t it?

“Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.”

How many of us consider the depth of these words? That we tell God not to forgive us if we fail to forgive others…for that’s exactly what we’re saying.

Now I’m not a priest. I’m just a deacon, a servant, but a lot of folks seem to confess a lot to me – not in a sacramental confession, just a human one. Most often they don’t realize they’re confessing. You see, they just talk to me and in doing so complain about all kinds of things. But so often it’s really about their anger, anger about something their kids or grandkids have done, or something a neighbor said or did, something they tell me they just “can’t” forgive. Of course, in truth it’s just something they won’t forgive, and I tell them so. They usually don’t like that.

I find it interesting that immediately afterwards this is the part of the prayer on which Jesus focuses. Perhaps Jesus sees it as the most important part since it can have such an effect on our salvation. I get the sense He wants to ensure we understand what we’re praying. Forgiveness is easy, brothers and sisters. After all it’s what we sinners expect from God and in our efforts to become more Christlike, God simply calls us to do the same.

Maybe that would be a good Lenten task for us today. Is there someone in need of your forgiveness? Don’t delay. Offer it to them. Or perhaps you need another’s forgiveness for something you’ve said or done. Humble yourself and ask for it. After all, by doing so you give them an opportunity to become more Christlike by forgiving you.

I think that’s enough.

God’s peace…

 

Homily: Tuesday, 6th Week in Ordinary Time

Readings: Jas 1:12-18 • Ps 94 • Mk 8:14-21

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Yesterday we saw the blindness of a Pharisee asking Jesus for a sign of His authority from God. Today we see the blindness of Jesus’ own disciples, still struggling to understanding who He is. They were neither evil nor stupid; they just hadn’t grasped that Emmanuel – God with us – quite literally meant that God was with them. Of course, this points to you and me as well, to our own blindness in not always recognizing the clear Presence of God in our own lives.

The disciples are traveling across the lake in the boat.  You would think that with 12 of them someone would remember to pack a lunch. But no. They had only one loaf of bread. As they cross the lake, Jesus is talking to them:

“Keep your eyes open; be on your guard against the yeast of the Pharisees and the yeast of Herod.”  

For the Jews yeast was a corrupting agent because it caused fermentation.  That was why at Passover they ate unleavened, incorrupt, bread. As Paul tells the Corinthians: 

“Get rid of all the old yeast, and make yourselves into a completely new batch of bread, unleavened as you are meant to be” [1 Cor 5:7].

Jesus is simply telling his disciples to avoid two opposing kinds of corruption: that of the Pharisees which is based on narrow-minded and intolerant legalism and that of Herod, is based on amoral and hedonistic pleasure-seeking. Of course, the disciples don’t listen; like us they tend to focus on their own little problems. They latch on to the word “yeast” and link it to their current obsession – not enough bread for them all. All they can think about is their lunch.

Jesus knows what is going in their minds. And so, he chews them out, scolding them for being so self-absorbed, for their continued worries of not having enough bread for their lunch. First, he tosses some rhetorical questions at them: Why are you worried about having no bread? Are your minds so closed, your vision so impaired you can’t see what’s right in front of you? Have you forgotten everything you’ve witnessed? Did it mean nothing?

But then He engages in a little Q&A with them: 

“When I broke the five loaves among the 5,000, how many baskets of leftovers did you pick up?” 

“Twelve,” they answer.  

“And when I broke the seven loaves for the 4,000, how many baskets of leftovers did you collect?” 

“Seven,” they reply.

“And still, you don’t understand?”

Five loaves for 5,000 people and 12 baskets of leftovers…Seven loaves for 4,000 with 7 baskets of leftovers…And you, a mere dozen men, are worried about being short of food when I am with you?

Mark tends to be hard on the disciples. They neither see nor hear, even when they witness the remarkable faith of others who encounter Jesus.They seem not to understand what is happening right before their very eyes. I suppose that’s to be expected. These were practical, down-to-earth men –fishermen, not mystics. They don’t yet know what to make of all the healings and miraculous things they’ve witnessed. A bit like you and me – so often we don’t see or understand what’s right in front of us.

But the disciples are learning…Indeed, only a few days after this event Peter makes His remarkable, Spirit-inspired testimony at Caesarea Philippi.

“Who do you say that I am? Jesus asks them.

And Peter replies, “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God” [Mt 16:16].

Mark, you see, isn’t really firing his shots at the disciples, because we know the end of their story. No, Mark is concerned about us, about you and me, for Mark knew what he was about. In the Acts of the Apostles, we encounter Mark as an evangelist, companion of Paul, and then Peter, a man who had seen the temptations James addresses in our first reading. 

Can we see? Do we understand? That God is with us? That He loves each of us with a very intimate, personal love? Or is our faith so weak we allow the little things in our lives to drive our thoughts and actions and blind us to the reality of God’s care for us? How about instead we focus on the big things:

On striving for holiness amidst the clutter of our lives.

On deepening our prayer life so we can stay in touch with God’s will for us.

On making disciples by taking Jesus to others

Do these things, the big things, and God will gladly lead us, and help us handle all the rest – the little things like bread, and illness, and family conflict, all the other worries that occupy our minds.

God cares for us, and He loves to take care of faithful ones.