Sunday, December 23, 2012

Great joy


It has been a most harrowing week for Newtown, a week which no one in their worst nightmares could have imagined.  Tears flow from Newtown as we witness the pain and anguish of those who lost their most precious, their most dear.  Our hearts are broken.  Deep sadness and dark sorrow pervades our very souls.

But soon we will hear the angel declare – except for those of us of a certain age, it is not the voice of an angel at all, but that of a small boy standing next to a bedraggled tree, clutching a blanket in one hand and a shepherd’s crook in the other – “Fear not: for, behold, I bring you tidings of great joy, which shall be for all the people.”

The joy of Christmas is near upon us.  But where can we possibly find joy amid such sadness and woe?  We look for it wrapped in paper under the tree.  We look for it in the pleasure and comfort of the traditional Christmas feast.   We look for it in the warm company of family and friends.  We find moments of happiness, yet no joy.  For no matter how gaily decorated the tree, no matter how well-filled our wish list of presents, no matter how merry the family gathering, we cannot forget, we cannot stop sighing, we cannot stop longing to turn back the clock, to make what was done be undone. 

Yet the angel – God’s messenger – announces great joy.  The root of all joy is to know that we are accepted; that we are wanted; that we have a purpose; that we are loved.  Yet loving ourselves is never sufficient, for self-love only becomes real when it is affirmed by others.  Who does not feel joy at hearing those three simple words – I love you.  Certainly, we have felt much joy in the outpouring of love and support from around the world in the wake of our tragedy.  But all human love, by its very nature, must be temporal and finite, bound by time and circumstance.  For great joy, joy which wipes away every tear, joy which shines through our darkest gloom, we need great love, unbounded love, love without condition or limit.

In faith, this is what we celebrate at Christmas – joy inherent in and an indelible mark on every soul.  Christmas reminds us that as humans, we are created in the image and likeness of God, validated by the unconditional love of God, saved by the infinite mercy of our God who so loved us that he gave us himself to share our pain, to share our suffering, to share our death, and then to show us the way beyond the pain, the suffering and the death to eternal peace.  We celebrate joy as the present tense of hope.  Our hope for a future of eternal life in the peace of the risen Christ is made present to us in God’s infinite and eternal love made evident by birth of the child Jesus, Son of God, Emmanuel, God-with-us.  At Christmas, we celebrate that, in Pope Benedict's words, it is good that we exist; it is good that we are human beings, even in these most difficult times. 

Despite our sadness, we are filled with great joy, for we are loved beyond measure.  We are needed now as we have never been needed before to confront the culture of death that has entwined itself so deeply in the fabric of our lives.  We have a purpose - to share God’s infinite love and grace with all the people who seek joy outside of the source of all life, the source of all love, the source of all that good, all that is noble, all that is holy. 

Fear not: for behold, I bring you tidings of great joy, which shall be for all the people.

Sunday, December 16, 2012

Why, why, why


We are stunned by the horrific evil.  We are devastated by the loss of so many innocent lives.  We are frightened by our fragility.  We are frustrated by our impotence to control the seeming randomness of our lives.  Why has this happened to us?  My God, my God, why have you abandoned us?

God, if you are all-loving, how could you let this happen to us who are your beloved children?  If you are all-powerful, why didn't you use your power to prevent this evil?  If you are all-benevolent, why did you not want to protect us from this horror?   Why, why, why?

There are many who ask these questions and lose all faith in God.  They feel that a God who would allow such things to happen cannot be a God worth having at all.  And I would agree with them completely.  God would never allow, never condone, and would never use such evil for any purpose at all.  Our God is not some divine puppet master, pulling the strings that cause our world to go round, tugging us this way and that, controlling our every move, our every moment.

We ask why God cannot do more for us by protecting us from such evil, but He has already done what He can – and it is more than enough.

First, He has created each one of us out of love in his own image and likeness, vesting us with the capability to love as he loves, to look beyond our selfish interests to the needs of others.  He has also given us free will, as love cannot exist without it, for Christian love is a choice, the desire and the will to work for the best of the other.  We choose love and life when we choose to include God in our lives.  We choose hatred and death when we choose to exclude God from our lives.

Evil is not a physical thing.  It only exists in an absence.  It only exists in the absence of God.  It is overcome and conquered by the presence of God.

As I looked around the church on Friday night as two thousand people gathered to celebrate a vigil Mass, many of them huddled outside the open windows of the church that could hold less than half their number, as I looked out at one overflowing congregation after another on Sunday morning, even as we were being forced to evacuate the noon Mass due to more threats of violence, I remembered the words of St. Peter as he stood on the mount of Transfiguration, “Lord, it is good that we are here.”  For in God’s presence, evil has no power.  And nowhere are we more present to God than gathered together at Mass.

For God not only created us out of love in his image and likeness, he so loved the world that, as we will soon celebrate on Christmas Day, he gave his only Son to reveal himself to us in a most perfect way, to be present to us in a most personal way, and to show us, though his life, his death, and his resurrection, and his gift of himself in the Eucharist, the way back to God, the way back to joy, to peace, to love.

To complete His work, God sends us his Spirit, filling us with the power and grace of God, gifting us with all the strength that we need to stay present to God, to be present to each other, to make God’s kingdom present to all of God’s creation, to conquer hatred with love, evil with good, and death with life.

It is only by God’s love that we have life; it is only with God’s mercy that we are saved; and it is only in God’s spirit that we are strong.

Lord, it is good that we are here.

Wednesday, December 12, 2012

As it was then, is now


Elizabeth, filled with the Holy Spirit, cried out in a loud voice and said,
“Most blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb. And how does this happen to me that the mother of my Lord should come to me?
  For at the moment the sound of your greeting reached my ears, the infant in my womb leaped for joy.” (Lk 1:41b-44)

Oftentimes, people would visit Mother Teresa in Calcutta to observe her as she and her sisters served the poor.  One day, such a visitor accompanied Mother as she made her way through the streets.  She knelt down to embrace a person who was apparently dying in the gutter, asking her sisters for help to bring this man to shelter, to bathe him, and feed him.  Her visitor was amazed.  He told Mother Teresa that he would not have done what she did then for a million dollars.  Mother Teresa smiled and said she would not do it for a million dollars either.  But she would do it for Christ.

Blessed Teresa of Calcutta is an Elizabeth for our times.  Like Mary’s kinswoman, the Holy Spirit filled Teresa, giving her the eyes to see Christ in the poor and destitute of Calcutta, giving her the strength to serve Christ in the poor and destitute of Calcutta, giving her the courage to proclaim the advent of Christ, and, in turn, to be the advent of Christ to the poor and the destitute of Calcutta.

Larry DePrimo is also an Elizabeth for me, an Advent reminder that Jesus comes into my life every time I am faced with someone in need, someone created by God in his image and likeness, someone who Jesus came down from heaven to save, someone who Jesus insists I should help, for in helping that person, I am helping Jesus.  You may not know Larry DePrimo, but you have probably seen him.  He is the New York City policeman who, on his rounds one frigid night a few weeks ago, saw a barefoot beggar huddled on the sidewalk.  Officer DePrimo, moved by pity – and, I would assert, filled with the Holy Spirit – bought the man thermal socks and warm boots with his own money.  A tourist happened to snap a picture of him helping the man, and this picture quickly became a viral sensation on the internet.

I come to realize that my own life is filled with these advents, these comings of Jesus, if only I pay attention; if only I let the Spirit fill me as it filled Elizabeth, as it filled Mother Teresa, as it filled Larry DePrimo.

One of my favorite Advent hymns - one of favorite anytime hymns – is O Come, O Come, Emmanuel.  Perhaps I should add a companion hymn - Come Holy Ghost.  For unless the Holy Ghost takes up his rest in my soul, I’ll miss the advent of Emmanuel who every day presents himself to me, who ransoms me from exile, who teaches me wisdom’s way of to go, who is my victory o’er the grave.

Happy Advent.

Friday, December 7, 2012

your praises we sing


When I was a young boy – long, long ago – competition broke about between my brothers and me about this time of year.  Who did mom and dad love the most?  The answer would come under the tree on Christmas morning.  Of course, our parents would tell us they loved each of us exactly the same and that you couldn’t equate that love with the size, quantity, or desirability of the presents we each received, but we knew better.

It was only when I grew up, got married, and had my own small children – still a long, long time ago – that I found out my parents were right.  For I saw the same competition break out between Mary Kate and Joey, and while I faithfully repeated my parents’ reasoning, I’m sure they thought that I was just as dense as I thought my parents were.  Come to think of it, they probably still think I’m just that dense.

Our faith teaches us that we cannot equate gifts with love.  We also know that some people seem to be greatly talented, gifted far beyond normal folks like you and I.  Some people are gifted with plentiful wealth, countless friends, and perfect health – and others not so much.  Yet, God loves each of exactly the same, with infinite, unconditional, everlasting love. 

One person in history actually received a gift from God that had never been given before.  It was a most amazing gift, a gift which led to the salvation of everyone in this church, everyone in this country, everyone in the world.  That person, of course, was Mary.   What was her amazing gift?   Listening to today’s Gospel passage, we may think that her gift was getting to be the mother of Jesus, the mother of God.  But that wasn’t it at all.  That was her vocation, what God called her to be and to do.  It was the most important vocation – God never had called anyone to do this before and He will never call anyone to this vocation again.  It was such an important vocation, that God needed to give Mary an equally significant gift to help her accept His call.

The angel Gabriel gives us a clue when he says, “Hail Mary, full of grace.”  Our church understands this salutation to mean that Mary, at the time of the angel’s visit and for all her life, from her very conception in the womb of St. Anne, was filled with God’s grace, unstained by sin, even unstained by original sin, that predilection to turn away from God that bedevils each of us.

God’s great gift to Mary was given not because he loved her more than any of us; it came precisely because he loved each of us so much he would send His son to become one of us, to accept death for each one of us, to save each one of us.  Filled with God’s graces from the moment she was conceived, Mary had the strength to say yes to God, to accept a vocation which seemed to make no sense at all – a powerless peasant girl in a dusty backwater of the world who God had chosen to bear His son – how silly was that.  She accepted a vocation which exposed her to great danger, for an unmarried, pregnant girl in Mary’s world would be stoned to death as soon as her pregnancy became known.  She accepted a vocation which would cause her great pain, to see her only son arrested, tortured, and brutally killed, while the crowds mercilessly jeered and mocked his suffering and death.  What more pain could any parent endure?

This was a big request for God to make of her.  Could she have said no?  Certainly she had the free will to do so, but by eliminating the weakness caused by original sin, God empowered Mary to say yes and she answered His call.  The rest, as they say, is history.

But this theology doesn’t just end in history.  Just as Mary was called to a vocation particular to her, God has called every single person in this church to a particular vocation.  And just as God gave Mary the gift necessary to fulfill her vocation, he has given each and every one of us the gifts necessary to fulfill our own particular vocation. 

Figure out what gifts God has given to you, and you may gain some insights into what God has called you to do.  Figure out what God has called you to do, and you discover the gifts that he has given you to live your vocation.  But how do any of us figure out God’s call for us or the gifts we have to live out that call?

The short answer: prayer.  How can we possibly know what God has in store for us if we don’t listen to him?  But sometimes God speaks to us through his messengers.  Mary heard from the angel Gabriel.  We often are surprised when others see talents in us we never realized we had.

Listen to people who know God, listen to people who live close to God.  Most especially, listen to the one who lived closer to God than anyone else in history.  Listen to Mary, full of grace.  For Mary’s vocation continues today.  As she cooperated with God to bring Jesus into our world two thousand years ago, she continues connecting us to Jesus today.  She can help you discover what will make you truly happy, being the person that God has called you to be, the person that Jesus has saved you to be, the person that the Spirit has gifted you to be.

And the rest, as they say, is joy and peace.

Wednesday, December 5, 2012

A prayer for hunger


In an economy based on subsistence agriculture, desperate, life-threatening hunger is just one bad harvest away.  When one is hungry to the point of starvation, finding food becomes an obsession.  Nothing else matters.  Virtually everyone in Jesus’ day – as is true in many places of the world today – would have known times of extreme hunger.

For this reason, scriptural images of heaven often centered on feast of rich foods and fine wine in abundance, as we see in Isaiah’s vision in today's reading.  Many of Jesus’ parables of the kingdom also featured such feasts.  Today’s miracle of the feeding of four thousand was such an important story for the early disciples that it is included six times in the four Gospels.  Other than the resurrection, it is the only miracle story recorded in all four gospels.

I have never experienced the pangs of hunger as Jesus’ disciples often did.  I have always known that the next meal is only hours away - and snacks are even closer!  I take food for granted.  Perhaps this is my good fortune, but it is also my loss.

For Jesus wants us to experience hunger – spiritual hunger for Him and for God’s kingdom.  He wants us to seek him out as a starving person seeks food – constantly, persistently, and obsessively.  Put all other things aside, we must have Jesus.

Advent is a time for us to assess our hunger for Jesus.  Do we constantly seek to be close to him, to follow him, or do we simply take him for granted?

On many mornings, I realize that it’s already 9:00, I have been up for several hours, and I have yet to pray that day, yet to thank God for the life he’s won for me, yet to offer the day to the him, yet to seek his help for all that I am to do that day.  Haven’t I taken Jesus for granted?

When I sit down to eat while reading the paper or scanning email, not remembering to thank God for his providence, haven’t I taken Jesus for granted?

When I pass by a homeless person or a beggar on the sidewalk without stopping to talk or to offer some small piece of the abundance that God has given me, haven’t I taken Jesus for granted?

This Advent, I pray for hunger, hunger to be near Jesus, hunger to learn from Jesus, hunger to follow Jesus as if my very life depended on it.

Because it does.