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Homily – November 10, 2013

Sunday, November 10th, 2013

We believe in Life

November is the month of the Holy Souls. During this month especially we pray for all those who died. The Hebrew Scripture tells us that it is a good and holy thing to pray for the death that they we loosed from their sins.

Death is a reality of life. As someone once said, ‘no one gets out of this world alive.’ Yet death is a no no subject for a lot of people. Death is like a four letter, we never say some died, we say they ‘passed’ or ‘passed on’ or they are ‘no longer with us.’

As Christians we endure death but we believe in life, endless life and so we do not grieve like people who have no hope, we believe that Jesus rose again and that it will be the same for those who die believing in him; God will bring them to himself.

Our first reading in today’s Mass tell of this heroic family, the Maccabees who all died painful deaths rather than deny their faith in the God of the universe who would raise them up to an everlasting renewal of life.

In the gospel the Sadducees, who did not believe in life after death used this silly example of the woman, married to the seven brothers and asked Jesus whose wife will she be when she dies. Probably with great patience, Jesus tried to set them straight. Firstly, the resurrection is not a prolongation of our presently earthly life. There will be a new heaven and a new earth and an entirely new mode of existence in which marriage will not be an issue.

We have no idea what life after death will be like. St.Paul tells us that ‘the eye has not seen, nor has the ear heard, nor has it entered into human mind the things God has prepared for those who love him.

We can look at death in another way. There are people who can be so upset that a loved one died and there wasn’t a priest present. One priest I knew had a great thing to say to such good people; ‘if you tell me how he lived I can tell you how he died.’ We can believe that there is no discontinuity between this life and the afterlife, there is just life and so the way we live now will be the way we will live always. Think about it.

If our lives are open to others and the needs of others, if we are willing to love as we have been loved, if we are willing to forgive as we have been forgiven then we can trust the truth that ‘as it was in the beginning, is now and will be forever – in this world and the next.

Every Sunday we rattle off the Nicene Creed, our ancient statement of faith that goes back to the early days of the church. The final words of our statement of faith are, ‘I look forward to the resurrection of the dead and the life of the world to come. We endure death but we believe in life, endless life.

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Homily – November 3, 2013

Sunday, November 3rd, 2013

I was reading an article in a Catholic magazine and it was on the different reactions people had to Pope Francis’ recent interview with an Italian editor. One Catholic author wasn’t all that impressed with the interview. He thought the Pope should be more cautious in his replies to interviewers. She thought the Pope was like ‘a person unburdening oneself with friends after a good dinner and plenty of wine.’ The author of the article had this observation about that remark, ‘that this is a pretty fair description of the Jesus of the gospels.’ He said that many biblical commentators have suggested that the gospels might be classified as Jesus’s “table talk”.

As for the comment about plenty of wine he reminded us that the first miracle of Jesus was supplying a young bride and groom with an abundance of wine so that the celebration of their life and love could go on. His enemies referred to Jesus as a wine bibber.

But Jesus taught us many things while enjoying a meal. He warned us to come properly dressed for a meal, he cautioned us not to take the first place at table lest we be told to give up that place to someone more important. We should always respond to an invitation to a meal. He told us that when we invite people to a meal it is best to invite those who do not have the means or ability to invite us to their home. It was at a meal he accepted the gratitude and love of the sinful woman. It was at his final meal, after a long conversation with his friends and plenty of wine that Jesus gave us the gift of the Eucharist we are now celebrating, offering us his body and blood as our nourishment.

In today’s gospel there is a bit of a switch. Usually people invited Jesus to a meal. In the gospel Jesus invites himself into the home of Zacchaeus –‘I must stay at your house today.’

By choosing to be a tax collector Zacchaeus had separated himself from the Jewish community. He was working for the enemy, the pagan Romans. But he must have heard of Jesus and was curious about him otherwise why make the effort of running ahead of the group and climbing the tree.

One commentator says the Zacchaeus was basically a good man, he made his profits for sure but he also gave generously to the poor and he promised Jesus that if it was shown he cheated anyone he would generously make it up to them. Other people grumbled about Jesus going and being a guest of a sinner but Jesus was really reaching out to this good man and by dining with him he showed Zacchaeus the respect his neighbours denied him.

We see so much of this in the ministry of Pope Francis. He visits a prison and washes the feed of young men and women; he goes to a port city to be with refugees who risked their lives to find freedom. He welcomes and is willing to meet with believers and non-believers. He reaches out to those alienated from the church. In this he follows Jesus as we are all meant to do. We are to reach out to the new comer, we are to reach out to the poor, the needy, the homeless and the hungry, and we are to reach out to those men and women who are exploited by employers. How can we do this? That goes back to our own ingenuity and generosity, our own willingness to help or be present to others. Charity begins at home. If we are alienated from some family member, some relative then we make the effort to reach out to them and make peace with them.

As we continue to celebrate and share in this Eucharistic meal with one another and with Jesus we pray that just as Jesus reached to Zacchaeus and changed his life we too will have the generosity we need to reach out to those who need our help, our love our healing.

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Homily – October 27, 2013

Sunday, October 27th, 2013

I Have Kept the Faith

I’d like to share a few thoughts on the second reading of today’s Mass, Paul’s letter to his friend and disciple Timothy. From Paul’s strange encounter with Jesus on the road to Damascus until the day he died Paul cared for nothing else but to know Jesus Christ and Him Crucified. He said of himself, ’for me to live is Christ and he encouraged all of us to grow to full maturity in Christ. Paul’s life as a preacher of the gospel was not an easy life. He tells of the number of times he was whipped, the number of times he was stoned, the number of times he was run out of town, the number of times he was ship wrecked. But nothing could stop him from telling all those who entered his life about Jesus, crucified and risen. “Woe is me if I preach not the gospel.” When he wrote this letter to Timothy Paul was in prison. He knew his days were numbered. As he wrote, ‘the time of my departure has come.’ If he had any regrets it was that he was given no more time to preach the good news of Jesus’ love for each one of us. Looking back of his life and ministry he said ’I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith.’ What a way to sum up one’s life.

I spent some time with a woman the day before she died. She and her family came to Canada from Holland after the Second World War. They suffered severely during the German occupation of Holland. They came to Canada to start a new life. Their first years were not easy but with the help of others they found work and raised a family. She was the housekeeper and her husband was the grounds keeper of a well to do family. Talking about her life she had no regrets, she knew she did the best she could as wife and mother. She was a woman of faith and could honestly say,’ I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith.’ Death was no fright to her.

A German psychiatrist named Erik Erikson developed a theory of the seven stages of growth through which we live our lives. He named the final stage ‘integrity’. As we grow older we tend to slow down, we are not as productive as we used to be, and we don’t have the energy. It can be that at this time in our lives we look back on the lives we lived, the good we’ve done, the things we’ve left undone, the mistakes we’ve made. Because of good old Catholic guilt this can be a rough time for us. Mistakes, sins and failures blind us to the good things we’ve done in life. In times like this we feel our lives are unproductive and we are dissatisfied by the life we’ve lived, we may even fall into depression.

But if we have trust in the mercy and love of God, a love and mercy made visible for all to see in the passion and death of Christ crucified then, by God’s grace, we can see beyond our faults and weaknesses and acknowledge the good things we’ve done and acknowledge that when all is said and done, we are good people. We can say, ‘I did the best I could’ and look back on our lives with a sense of completeness and accept death without fear.

Paul the Apostle was not a perfect person. I think he would be a difficult person with whom to work. Like the rest of us Paul was a mistake making being trying to be faithful to his vocation as a preacher of the gospel.

Paul faced his imminent death with a sense of his own personal integrity he could truthfully say,’ I have fought the good fight, I have finished the course I have kept the faith.’ Paul knew his reward would be great in heaven.

May we pray for one another that we be blessed with that gift of integrity that allows us to truthfully say,’ I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race I have kept the faith’ and leave the rest to the mercy and love of God.

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Homily – October 20, 2013

Sunday, October 20th, 2013

Today’s parable is meant for people like us – people who grow weary of trying to do good and are tempted to give up on praying. How often have we had the experience of asking and are convinced we are not being heard? How often have we knocked til are knuckles were bare and no door was opened? How often have we searched and never found? How often have we asked ourselves,’ what’s the use, is anyone there?

How often do we read reports of people demanding an inquest into the cause of someone’s suspicious death, or a suspected misuse of influence by a politician and they get stone walled by those in authority? But, like the widow in our gospel they will not go away, they pester and cajole and finally get what they want?

I read somewhere that the word for widow in Hebrew means, silent one, and a voiceless person. But this widow certainly had a voice, she would not be silent. Every time this widow made her appeal for justice it was in a public gathering – an open court – she would be heard. For all his boasting and bluster the judge was aware of public opinion, he was concerned about his public image and it was probably public opinion that made him give in. For his own sake he had to get this voiceless woman off his back.

So often when it comes to praying we have our own needs in mind. We may be praying for our health, our family, our security, our peace of mind. As a parish family we pray every Sunday that we may live this Mass outside these walls. We do this when we make the concerns of others, civic and public concerns our own. We live this Mass outside these walls when we make ourselves aware of the issues of the blight of our first nations peoples living on the reserves, the homeless men, women and children of our city, the children of this city who go to school hungry, the many desperate young men and women who can’t find work, for all their education. And we make these concerns the object of our prayers. In so many ways these good people are the widows of our time – the voiceless. In so many ways they tend to lose heart, give up. They lack the stamina of the widow. We not only pray for these good people we try to stand with them and work to change public opinion. We can support movements such as Occupy Toronto or Idle No More or pro-life movements or the Peace Now movement. In whatever way we can we try to give voice to the voiceless. We can let our city counsellors know, our parliamentarians know that we seek justice for the have-nots of our society.

The widow of the gospel challenges all of us to give voice to our brothers and sisters who have lost heart.

We have a wonderful example of someone who would be heard in that young Pakistani high school student, Malala Yousafrai, who defied the Taliban order to put an end to the education of young girls. They tried to silence her by shooting her and their act of violence gave her a worldwide platform from which to plea her cause. She is voiceless no more.

As we continue to celebrate this Mass we ask for the courage and the stamina of our gospel widow. Like her may we never lose heart but keep on praying and working for justice and fairness for all, especially for those who have no voice to speak for themselves.

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Homily – October 13, 2013

Sunday, October 13th, 2013

The leprosy we hear of in our first reading and in the gospel is not the Hanson’s disease we know to be true leprosy. Hanson’s disease is only mildly contagious. The leprosy of biblical times was feared not because it was contagious but because it was unclean, it was dirty and so a leper would cause the family or the whole community to become dirty, ritually unclean.

As we know lepers were not allowed to live in the family or community. They had to live apart. They had to warn people of their presence by calling out ‘unclean’. They knew their place, their social boundaries.

Anthropologists point out that a society concerned with maintaining safe and secure body boundaries is also concerned with safe and secure societal or geographical boundaries. Rules governing the physical body replicate rules governing the social or geographical body. So we have such sayings as ‘you’re in my face or you are invading my space. We want people to respect our boundaries. We set social boundaries for ourselves. We all know of the mentality, ‘NIMBY – not in my backyard – we have our restricting immigration laws and our restricted membership clubs.

We have those who wonder if we are saved, if we are within the restrictive boundaries they’ve set for God’s life and love.

In the gospel Jesus respected the boundaries of the time. On other occasions he touched people, laid his hands on them. In today’s gospel he didn’t invade the space of these ten men who kept their distance, who didn’t invade his space. Jesus simply told them “go and show yourselves to the priests”, which they did, even though one of them knew he would not be allowed into the temple grounds because he was not a Jew.

On their way they realized their leprosy was gone, they were clean and they were no longer confined to their unclean space. In their excitement they immediately thought of their own families, their homes, their friends. Being cleansed they knew they would be welcomed into their spaces. In their excitement they forgot the priests and the temple and they headed for those most important to them, their families.

Except for the Samaritan who knew he would always be an outsider, a leper in Jewish society. Jesus probably wasn’t surprised by the behavior of the nine. When you are raised to believe you are special to God, you end up taking God for granted, they would find time to thank God later. Not the Samaritan, his heart was filled with gratitude as he fell before Jesus and poured out his thanks.

Today’s scripture emphasize the importance of thanksgiving. We all have so many blessings for which we should be thankful. One of the saints said,’ If the only prayer we prayed was ‘thank you’ that would be enough.

But the gospel tells of the social and religious barriers of those days and with that in mind we might ask ourselves;

What are the barriers of our lives? Who do resent or resist entering our space? Who are the people we keep at a safe distance because of the way they live their lives, because of their racial or cultural or social status? Do we have open minds or closed and rigid mindsets? Are we willing to follow Pope Francis as he calls us to be a welcoming church, an understanding church rather than a judgemental church? Are we willing to remove any barriers that make us unresponsive to the needs of the poor, the un-employed or under employed? Are we willing to do away with barriers that hide from us the realities around us; hungry children, single mothers on welfare, victims of the civil strife, victims of the sweat shops of the world? These are the concerns of Pope Francis and he wants them to our concerns too.

As we continue to celebrate our Eucharist may we all be given the strength and willingness to tear down the barriers that separate us from family and strangers. May our hearts be open to all those who come into our live and be thankful for the blessing with which our lives are blessed.

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