Homily: Tuesday, 11th Week in Ordinary Time

Note: I didn't preach this homily today. Our celebrant decided to preach instead, which is his prerogative. It's no big deal since I always have a homily ready whenever I assist at Mass as the deacon. Sometimes I'm asked to preach, and sometimes I'm not. Anyway, this unpreached homily follows:

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Readings: 2 Cor 8:1-9; Ps 146; Mt 5:43-48

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On Sunday, one of my sons posted a Father’s Day note on Facebook. He began with a bunch of nice words about me, and then he added: “He wasn’t perfect, and he never said he was, unless he was joking.”

I wasn’t sure what to make of that, but it got me thinking of what Jesus told us in today’s Gospel passage from the Sermon on the Mount.

“So be perfect, just as your heavenly Father is perfect."

I suspect these words have made a lot of Christians suddenly pay attention and scratch their heads. Did He really mean that? How can we, these obviously imperfect beings, be perfect. Yes, indeed, Jesus sure can make life difficult, can’t He? 

Back when we were young and doing well in the world, a lot of us thought we were…well, if not perfect, at least pretty good. I remember the first time I realized I harbored some major imperfections – things that separated me from what God wanted for me. 

I was a Navy pilot during the war in Vietnam. At the time, I flew search and rescue helicopters. All I wanted to do was pickup American pilots who’d been shot down, and get them to safety. But at the time, the Communists of both North Vietnam and the Viet Cong were doing their very best to kill me. And here’s Jesus telling me to “love your enemies.” Let me tell you, that ain’t so easy when they’re shooting at you. Yes, they were an easy enemy to hate. But hating them troubled me because I knew what Jesus had commanded of us.

And so, one day I paid a visit to the Catholic chaplain and asked how we could reconcile loving our enemies with this conflict in which we were engaged. I’ll always remember that conversation. I won’t go into our rather lengthy discussion on the just war doctrine. That’s a subject for another time. But I will tell you what this young priest had to say about enemies and hatred and love and forgiveness.

He began by saying that if our enemies are those we hate, we have ceased being Christians. As disciples of Jesus Christ, we are to hate no one. But if our enemies are those who hate us, then we will always have enemies. After all, Jesus had many enemies because He did the Father’s will: He spoke the truth and He loved. He loved all, especially those despised by the world, and He spoke the truth even when it upset people.

Our enemies decide how they will treat us. We decide only to love them or hate them. Love and hate, then, are not emotions. They’re decisions. Jesus calls us to love regardless of the evil others do. And He calls to exclude no one from our love.

These are hard words for us, aren’t they? Hard indeed…until we come face to face with the Cross, and we hear His words:

“Father, forgive them, they know not what they do” [Lk 23:34].

There, on the Cross, we encounter Divine Mercy: God’s perfect love, a love that demands forgiveness. Forgiveness is the only thing we can do to those we are called to love. If we refuse to forgive, we refuse to love.

About 30 years ago I saw the movie, “Dead Man Walking” about a convicted killer named Robert Willie who'd been sentenced to death. Well, one person you won’t see in the movie is Debbie Morris, the one victim who miraculously survived her horrific ordeal at the hands of Willie. After Willie’s execution, she said, “Justice didn’t do a thing to heal me. Forgiveness did.”

Yes, it’s easy to hate and scream for justice, for man’s justice, but it never really brings healing, or the so-called "closure" the world promises. Only forgiveness does that. Only forgiveness heals.

Yes, we can defend ourselves from evil, but in defending ourselves we must not produce even greater evils. The world will never run out of objects for our hatred, especially today when enemies abound. How did Paul put it to the Corinthians:

“…test the genuineness of your love by your concern for others” [2 Cor 8:8].

After all, we were created in God’s image and likeness, so He really does call us to perfection, to live up to His expectations for us, to live up to that image and likeness. He calls each of us to view this life as a pilgrimage of love, one in which we seek out others, finding Jesus Christ in each person we meet, and letting them recognize Jesus in us.

Let God be the one who will judge His creations. We need only love and forgive. I’ve long thought this is what Jesus means when He commands us to “be perfect just as your heavenly Father is perfect.”

Happy Father's Day, St. Joseph

 I don't especially enjoy Father's Day. Don't get me wrong, I enjoy the cards and phone calls, and this year one of our daughters will arrive here tomorrow, along with her husband and our two young grandsons. We're looking forward to a nice visit, a Father's Day treat. What I don't enjoy are the thoughts this special day brings to mind. Every Father's Day I find myself recalling those times when I was particularly un-fatherly, the times I didn't come through as I should have for my children. I realize I can't undo the past, but that doesn't stop me from wishing I had been a better father.

Earlier today, as I dealt with these conflicting thoughts, I said a prayer to St Joseph, the man God chose to care for His Son. And I think he's worth our attention on the day devoted to fathers.

From the Gospel story of the conception, birth and childhood of Jesus, there emerges this quiet, modest figure, the perfect model for fathers today.

Just consider the sort of man Joseph must have been. God the Father, out of all the men who ever lived, chose one, Joseph, to be the guardian, the teacher, the guide of His only Son, Jesus. He also chose Joseph to love and protect Mary, the virgin Mother of the Son of God. Yes, Joseph must have been a very special man indeed.

In the Gospels we see a courageous man of honor who wants to protect Mary's reputation. Why? Because he is a righteous man and this is what God would want.

We see a man who then takes Mary as his wife even though the child with whom she is pregnant is not his. Why? Because God told him to take the Child and His Mother to himself. And so Joseph obeys. 

 We see a man who, to protect his young family, leads them into exile, into an unknown future. Why? Because God told him to do so. Joseph doesn’t wait to think it over; he doesn’t even spend a day planning the trip. No, he leaves immediately in obedience to God’s command. He “rose and took the child and his mother by night and departed for Egypt.”

What a mystery for us to ponder! That God, in order to protect His Son, the uncreated Word of God, should choose to do so through the mediation of a humble carpenter.  For this is a piece of the greater mystery of the Incarnation, in which the Father and the Holy Spirit now relate to the Son, not only as Divine Word, but also as incarnate Man.

Matthew, in his Gospel, glosses over the flight to Egypt in a few words, but the reality would have been a nightmare.Traveling by night and hiding by day, the Holy Family would have needed weeks to travel the several hundred miles through inhospitable desert from Jerusalem to Egypt.

Once in Egypt, as homeless refugees, the family would rely solely on Joseph to earn a living during their years of exile. And just when Joseph had probably established himself as a carpenter in this foreign land, God tells him to return to Israel, and once again he obeys.

The murderous Herod is dead, but in Judea and Samaria, his son, Archelaus, now rules. Joseph fears him, and rightly so, since Archelaus began his rule by slaughtering 3,000 of Judea's most influential citizens. And so Joseph, once more in obedience to God’s command, guides Mary and Jesus far to the north, to the safety of a small town nestled in the hills of Galilee, to Nazareth. So it is, through the obedience of Joseph, that the prophecies are fulfilled. "Out of Egypt I called my Son" and "He shall be called a Nazorean."

Again turning to Matthew’s brief narrative, we notice that God doesn’t reveal everything to Joseph at once. Instead, Joseph remains continually dependent on God’s next word. For Joseph, the just man, is nevertheless fully human, and like all of us he must learn to grow in God’s love and grace.

He must experience, as we all must, the trial of faithfulness, the trial of perseverance in seeking out the will of God in our lives. And so Joseph waits patiently for God to speak, just as God waits patiently for Joseph to grow in fidelity to His will.

It is in Nazareth, in the home of Joseph and Mary, that Jesus grows to maturity. It is here that Joseph, according to Jewish custom, teaches Jesus to recite his prayers, to sing the age old Psalms of David, and to read from the Torah, the Law of Moses. It is from Joseph that Jesus learns to appreciate, first hand, the importance of following the laws and customs of His people.

It is in Nazareth where, working alongside Joseph in his carpenter's shop, Jesus comes to recognize the value and dignity of hard work.

It is here, in the home of Joseph, where Jesus encounters daily a man who is happy in being poor in spirit, happy in being meek, happy in being just and merciful, happy in being pure of heart, in being singlehearted.

Later, when Jesus begins His  public ministry, he will often speak of God the Father as "Abba" or Daddy. But it was from a loving and caring Joseph that Jesus first learned what a daddy was.

At the very heart of Joseph’s sanctity is his obedience, an unquestioning obedience to accept the Will of God in his life…and to act on it. And because he obeys, God comes to him again and again.

God walks in Joseph's soul just as He walked with Adam in the garden. Is it any wonder that He entrusts to Joseph what is most precious to Him?

Mary and the child Jesus remain almost hidden in this Gospel narrative, contained in the decisions and actions of Joseph. Joseph leads, but he does not dominate. He leads by serving – by serving His God and by serving His family.

On March 19th, the Solemnity of St. Joseph, the priest honors this exceptional man when he prays these words from the Preface to the Eucharistic Prayer:

“He is that just man, that wise and loyal servant, whom you placed at the head of your family. With a husband’s love he cherished Mary, the virgin Mother of God. With fatherly care he watched over Jesus Christ your Son, conceived by the power of the Holy Spirit.”

We Catholics have always prided ourselves on our devotion to Mary, the Mother of God. How delighted she would be to see us, and especially those of us who are fathers, to deepen our devotion to her loving husband.

With Jesus we owe honor to Joseph, and honored indeed would Joseph be if fathers today would accept him as their model. And if single mothers would turn to him, asking for his fatherly intercession in the lives of their children.

And so, as we celebrate Father's Day tomorrow, let's pray for our families, and especially for fathers. Would that all fathers were just men, like Joseph, wise and loyal servants of the Lord who cherish their wives and watch over their children with fatherly care.

Happy Father's Day, St, Joseph. Pray for us.

Happy Father's Day

I was assigned to assist at one of our vigil Masses yesterday, and so find myself in the unusual position of being able to do virtually nothing on a Sunday morning. The fact that it's also Father's Day partially mitigates my sense of guilt for such slothful behavior. But despite this less than sincere mea culpa, I am enjoying the morning which inexplicably began for me at 5:45 a.m.

Adding to my happiness, my dear wife, Diane, gave me two wonderful, if unusual, Father's Day gifts: a selection of 10 international beers; and a rather fancy hummingbird feeder. Much like G. K. Chesterton and several other of my heroes, I enjoy an occasional pint of good beer. I have decided to pace myself and sample only one bottle per week, thus extending my enjoyment of this thoughtful gift throughout the summer. Diane also knows how much I enjoy watching the hummingbirds that occasionally flit about it our backyard searching for nectar. They are remarkable little creatures and I trust the addition of this feeder will cause them to flock to us in large numbers. Perhaps I'll be able to capture them digitally with my trusty Canon SLR and telephoto lens. I feel a challenge coming on.

One of my daughters gave me a gift certificate to the Olive Garden. (For those of you from other planets, this is a chain of Italian restaurants.) And so the other evening we and some good friends went to the local Olive Garden where I devoured several bowls of my absolutely favorite soup, Zuppa Toscana, along with a nice salad and glass of relatively good house wine. By any standard, it was a delightful evening.

Finally, on this Father's Day it is good to turn our thoughts and prayers to our Heavenly Father, whose love for us far exceeds that of any earthly father. It is He Who gave us our very being. It is He Who sent His Son to suffer and die for our redemption. And it is He Who has prepared a place for those who love Him and do His will. Thank Him!

Being is good. And a Happy Father's Day to all fathers out there.