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Reflection for Trinity Sunday 2021

Mystery & Challenge

“Go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you.”

Trinity Sunday, and every pastor is suddenly digging into the Church Fathers, the great theological treatises, and some good old-fashioned bad analogies so they can explain the mystery of God to their congregations. I even witnessed a brother in the clergy ask an entire group: ‘How are you going to approach this Sunday?’

I am thankful, not because I have the answers, but exactly because I do not, nor do I have to try. There is no theology, no treatise I can share that adequately captures the mystery of God: Father, Son, and Spirit. What I can share is the word I will now repeat for the third time: Mystery.

People love to solve mysteries and expend a whole lot of energy trying to do exactly that. They engage in an effort to unlock the secret of God’s self-revelation as Father, Son, and Spirit, and in doing so focus on the wrong mystery. We must ask then, what mystery does God wants us to focus on?

Indeed, God has called us to do something far different. He challenges us to focus on a different mystery, one easily solvable. His challenge is far different than a scientific study of an unfathomable mystery. God calls us to spend our time on the mystery and challenge of love.

I told the brother who asked: Skip the bad analogies and focus on the attributes of God.

You see, people get to know one another through the attributes they see in the other. He or she is good, caring, spends time, is cautious, is deep, likes to share. We get to know people that way. So, it is with God. How do we know His mystery? It is through His attributes and the attribute of the Trinity that has been and is ever before us is the attribute of love.

The mystery of love is God’s challenge to us. When He said: Go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you He was not speaking of any other rule, any other thing than love. Teach, show, and welcome in love.

See how God has revealed His love: In creation – particularly that of humanity, saving His people, rescuing them, and finally sending His Son and punishing Him for our sakes, sending the Holy Spirit to be with us. Even though we may ignore His call, He remains with us. He tells us, we have the Son’s inheritance even though we would otherwise be unworthy. All because of God’s attribute of conquering love.

Love’s mystery is the call to give fully for the other. How can we do that? The answer is that we, as God’s children, can do it exactly because God loved us first in Jesus. God showed us all His love. Now we understand the mystery and set out to live the challenge of love.

Christian Witness, Homilies, PNCC, , ,

Reflection for the Solemnity of the Holy Family 2021

By what standard?

Wives, be subordinate to your husbands, as is proper in the Lord. Husbands, love your wives, and avoid any bitterness toward them. Children, obey your parents in everything, for this is pleasing to the Lord.

Straight to the point. I ought to start this by saying that today’s Epistle, as outlined in the Lectionary gives us two choices. We can read all of Paul’s admonitions in Colossians 3:12-21 or we can skip over the hard parts, things that make us uncomfortable.

We all know what God wants, right – to skip over the hard parts? 

We can certainly agree that God never wants us to skip over the hard parts of His instruction. Jesus told us: “In this godless world you will continue to experience difficulties. But take heart! I’ve conquered the world.” (John 16:33).

What disturbs us about Paul’s words is that we read them from a perspective that the godless world pushes on us. That perspective is one in which there is no analysis, there is no search for deeper understanding. We somehow believe that English is the anointed language by which all must be understood, and heaven forbid that anyone use the word subordinate. Obviously, I, me, comes first.

I, me first, is not of Christ.

In Genesis, God creates a model of family and as we heard in today’s gospel, His very Son, Jesus, lived within that model. But let’s not just stop at the outward appearance of that model, because the inward nature of the family model is brought to the fore by St. Paul in his writing to the Colossians.

Paul is discussing an inter-relationship among the faithful. We are first and foremost a community that practices mutual love and respect. We offer each other heartfelt compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience. We bear with each other and forgive one another just as the Lord has forgiven us (catch that – live as the Lord lived). Above all we put on love as our mutual bond of perfection. Is that hard?

Jesus was born into a family that lived all that, and one in which each person lived a sacrificial existence, where the good of the other came before their own good. That is what being subordinate is. That is what love and obedience are. That is what total giving is.  In family we must be willing to decrease so that our wives, husbands, and children may increase. That is love in mutuality. Is that hard?

Never mistake this direction as having to do with being a slave. A slave does not have a choice in the giving of self. We do. 

The bottom line – How are we to live together? What do we consider hard? For us the standard within family and community is God’s standard. A life of total self-giving should not be hard for Christians.

Christian Witness, Homilies, ,

Reflection for the 4th Sunday of Advent 2020

Love!

Mary said, “Behold, I am the handmaid of the Lord. May it be done to me according to your word.”

In the first three weeks of Advent we focused on hope, peace, and joy and how those key elements of God’s Kingdom life must be shown in our lives and conveyed by us who are His people, the brothers and sisters of His Divine Son, Jesus.

Our kingdom tasks – what we are to convey – is:

  • An offer of hope to those we encounter;
  • To be peace in the midst of the communities we are involved in – our neighborhoods, workplaces, social groups, and families; and
  • To be promoters and bringers of joy, bearers of a joyous message – Jesus has saved us and is available to each and every person. Come meet Him.

In this final week of Advent (lasting less than a full week), we focus on our responsibility to love.

The Alan Jackson’s song, ‘I Need A Love Like That,’ as certain songs do, conveys what we seek, our need for a love that surpasses time and space, a love that takes hold of us, completes us, and makes us whole. We all need a love like that.

God understands that need, for He Himself is love. So, God determined to act and give His all, His very Son to us. He carried out His plan to show us the immensity of His love by engaging people who would respond in love. We know their names: Mary, Joseph, Elizabeth, Zachariah, Simeon, Anna, and John. We know their occupations: shepherds and Maji, Levites and prophets.

By the giving of God’s greatest gift, and our acceptance of that gift, we follow in the footsteps of love. We become bearers of the central element of God’s Kingdom – love. 

As with those who responded to God’s plan with love, we respond in love. We show forth the all-encompassing love that surpasses time and space. We bear that love which has taken hold of us, that has completed us, and that has made us whole.

Indeed, God has engaged us because He knows we are people who will respond in love. We know our responsibility is to love and by love to draw people to Jesus. 

Our names inscribed in the Book of Life are known to God. Our professions, whether accountants, civil servants, service workers, business owners, healthcare workers, or even priests give us the opportunity to show love. Our times and circumstances allow us to hear those who say, ‘I need love’ and answer with Jesus, the love that will take hold of, complete, and make them whole.

Christian Witness, Homilies, , , ,

Reflection for the 30th Sunday in Ordinary Time 2020

Charity = Love

He said to him, “You shall love the Lord, your God, with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the greatest and the first commandment. The second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself.”

The end is near! Well, the beginning of the end. As Christians we are to always be prepared for the end times, for the last things, for we will be called to account for how we have carried out our lives, how totally on-board with Jesus we were. So, let us begin again today.

The scriptures for today introduce us to the beginning of Jesus’ teaching on the end times. In the end it is how we live the commandment of love. The first reading from Exodus calls us to awareness of our obligation to others. It opens us to the idea that how we encounter others must be in line with God’s way of love. If it is not, the consequences. We will be killed with the sword; the voices of our accusers painting us with the blood from their suffering. 

Wow, that’s dark – but yes, it is that serious. In the language of scripture, particularly the New Testament, the word for love is the same word used for charity. That favorite wedding reading, and the greatest of these is love, is also translated, and the greatest of these is charity.

Our loving, our charity must be complete and other directed. In Exodus, God calls His people to account for how they actually live. Don’t just say it, don’t just pray it, don’t just speak it, live it. He reminds us that He hears of our actions, He sees what we do. We cannot hide.

Each day we walk the road to the end. Where we end up, how we are recompensed, is totally dependent on whether we are, as St. Paul says, a model for all the believers. Their testament in the end times: in every place [their] faith in God has gone forth. God grant that this be said of us.

The end is near! Well, the beginning of the end. We begin again today to approach the moment of accountability.

Jesus sets the ultimate standard of love and charity for which we are accountable. He stresses the interconnectedness of love for God and others. As St. John would later write: Little children, let us not love in word or speech but in deed and in truth. Now it is up to us.

The reality goes beyond our usual ideas of what love/charity are. For God, our love is shown by our dedication, worship, and communication with Him, not forgetting Him. For others, it is more than dropping a few bucks. It is looking in their eyes and gaining an understanding of the truth of their pain – then showing love in working to relieve that pain. The end – let us not show up empty.

Christian Witness, Homilies,

Reflection for the 15th Sunday in Ordinary Time 2019

The
Goal.

“Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?” Jesus said to him, “What is written in the law? How do you read it?” He said in reply, “You shall love the Lord, your God, with all your heart, with all your being, with all your strength, and with all your mind, and your neighbor as yourself.” He replied to him, “You have answered correctly; do this and you will live.”

The age-old question, ‘How do I get to heaven?’ A young man, a legal scholar, approaches Jesus to ask exactly that. How do I receive a share of heaven, how do I inherit a place there?

Of course, the scholar came to the right person. Who better to ask than the King of heaven and earth, who dwelt in heaven from eternity? We will cover Jesus’ answer later.

For now, let us focus on the various attempts at human answers to the heaven question.

For some, heaven is an impossibility, a fantasy. It is something made up by primitive people who needed answers to the world’s mysteries. They have no need for an answer on how to get there because no one gets to heaven. Rather, they are readying themselves to flash out of existence.

On the opposite end are people with vague notions of spirituality. They have squishy notions of what heaven is, an indeterminant place of peace and contentment, the fulfillment of whoever conjures a fantasy of what it will be. In their estimation, everybody (except the usual suspects) gets to heaven.

The other major religions of the world have amazingly similar perspectives on how to get to heaven. It is as simple as checking off items from a to do list. For the Jewish people, it is the keeping of the Law. For Muslims, at a basic level, the following of the five pillars, righteous actions, and striving will lead to heaven.

God instructs us differently. Our call is to get to the core of all lists, laws, and rules. God’s way is love. So, how do we achieve our inheritance and get to heaven? It is faith based devotion of our our hearts, souls, bodies, and minds on the Lord. Love of God, in and of itself, is the first commandment. This love extends through and beyond God – and must also be focused on each person we encounter. With faith in Jesus as the way, we are to love, get to building the kingdom here and now, and thus gain the inheritance.

Christian Witness, Homilies, , , ,

Reflection for the 7th Sunday of Easter 2018

Teaching love for
me too.

Beloved, if God so loved us, we also must love one another. No one has ever seen God. Yet, if we love one another, God remains in us, and his love is brought to perfection in us.

Are ways of behaving learned or innate (i.e., natural)? A bit of research will show that behavioral scientists have opinions on both sides. This question seems to puzzle us more than in the past. Is parenting natural or learned? Is love natural or learned?

One of the best reflections on this subject states that it is a little of both. The Natural Law tells us that there are certain aspects of every person that are God created. We have built in tendencies to do right, moral, good things. We are naturally drawn to God. We have the call to love within us. Of course, those things can be thwarted by experience or by choice to sin.

Yet, one of the most wonderful aspects of the human person is an individual’s ability to overcome. A great illustration of the ability to overcome is “The Other Wes Moore.” Two kids named Wes Moore were born blocks apart within a year of each other. Both grew up fatherless in similar Baltimore neighborhoods and had difficult childhoods; both hung out on street corners with their crews; both ran into trouble with the police. How, then, did one grow up to be a Rhodes Scholar, decorated veteran, White House Fellow, and business leader, while the other ended up a convicted murderer serving a life sentence?

The Christian community faced a very hostile world. They were all Wes Moore. Life was cheap. The haves had, the have-nots were slaves. Women and children had no value – were no more than property. Power ruled all, all else bowed. Nevertheless, the natural call remained, the ability to overcome existed.

The love of Christ overcame for that very reason. The message of the gospel and the example of Jesus allow us to overcome and win. Jesus took what is innate in us and said follow me – and you will flourish. God so loved us – and we can be just like Him. People heard of the power of God’s love and said – me too!

So we must put message of the Gospel first. We must love, value, and break down barriers and obstacles like God. The world needed this then, the world needs this now. The old ways have re-emerged, so the triumph of God’s love must once again offer ‘me too’ to everyone through us.

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Reflection for the 25th Sunday in Ordinary Time 2017

Let Me tell you
about My Father.

When it was evening the owner of the vineyard said to his foreman, ‘Summon the laborers and give them their pay, beginning with the last and ending with the first.’ When those who had started about five o’clock came, each received the usual daily wage. So when the first came, they thought that they would receive more, but each of them also got the usual wage.

All of Jesus’ coming, His life, His worship and prayer, His healings, His poverty, His message, and His life, death, and resurrection are about one thing – Jesus showing us the Father. Jesus plainly told us: Anyone who has seen Me has seen the Father. After hearing Jesus’ words today, how do we better get the Father?

The late workers were amazed by generosity. The early workers felt ‘cheated,’ as if something due them was taken away. But it really wasn’t specifically about any of that. Rather, Jesus uses all His parables and allusions to more fully describe His Father. He walks about the cities and countryside living a very particular way – to show us the life of the Father. He calls us to understand, to comprehend, to allow our hearts to be touched by the reality of the Father. He says – let Me show you My Dad. Get to know Him. He is amazing.

Again, this parable is not specifically about workers feeling cheated, nor a generous landowner with no business sense. It isn’t really about getting more than we deserve for our work. It is not, in any special way, about people who come to the faith in their youth versus those who come late in life, or toward the end of time.

This parable is about revelation. It is a look into the life of God – something formerly beyond understanding, and now revealed. In every word of this parable, Jesus is saying – let Me show you My Dad. I love him so much. I want you to know what He is like because He is so amazing.

Like the workers, we face a bit of a problem. Our understanding is often blocked because we let our minds get in the way of falling into the love of God. We let minor parts of parables become the reason for the parable, and we miss the revelation. We should ask ourselves, ‘What do I know about the Father that I didn’t know before?’

What we now know is that the Father’s love is so all encompassing, so magnificent, that in complete trust we can fall into Him no matter where we are in our lives, no matter what happened the day before, or a few minutes ago. We may have run head on into the Father’s love in our life and were changed by it. We may be experiencing it today for the first time, or the first time in a long time. We may still be waiting for that revelation. No matter, Jesus opened the opportunity for us – to know the Father and to fall into His love.

Christian Witness, Homilies, , , , , ,

Reflection for the 18th Sunday in Ordinary Time

5529

I can’t help myself.
Isn’t it ok?

“Take care to guard against all greed, for though one may be rich, one’s life does not consist of possessions.”

The theme of our readings and gospel all center on doing things for the right reason, having the right priorities. They obviously focus on avoiding greed as the antithesis of proper living, “…the things you have prepared, to whom will they belong?”

As Christians we are to guard against placing our priorities wrongly. As we reflect on Carson’s baptism, we should recall our baptism. We descended into the waters of baptism, dying to the world and buried. Emerging we came into new life in the resurrected Christ. As people living in the resurrected Christ we have new priorities.

St. Paul says this plainly: For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. He reminds us that our focus must be changed – and we need to be reminded because we forget: If you were raised with Christ, seek what is above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God. Think of what is above, not of what is on earth.

The problem we face in setting priorities as Christians is how far and how fast we need to go in re-ordering our reasons, focus and priorities.

Can we find a word that simply expresses the overwhelming love and dedication we are supposed to have for Jesus Christ? It has to be a word that describes a love and dedication that is more than something that just bubbles under the surface, but rather radiates out of us, making our lives evidently different to all those we meet. Perhaps the right word is “crazy?” Crazy can mean mentally deranged; demented; insane; senseless; impractical; totally unsound. It can also mean intensely enthusiastic; passionately excited.

So how do we get to the kind of crazy that shows an enthusiastic and passionate life with Christ? It starts with commitment and practice. Baptism is the first step in commitment and dedication. From there, with the help of our parents, we practice – in Church, by reading scripture, and in regular prayer – learning Jesus’ way, focusing on educating ourselves about Jesus’ direction for our life, and working in community to do His will. With that education and practice we learn to live the right way and with the right priorities.

When we get to the kind of crazy that radiates passions in line with Jesus’ priorities we become restorers of hope in the midst of our families, workplaces, neighborhoods, and in the wider world. We find that we cannot help ourselves in a way that is absolutely ok – more that ok – it is wonderful. It is crazy right.

Homilies, PNCC,

Conception of the B.V.M. and the Feast of Divine Love

When our church was young, Bp. Hodur and the Church’s Holy Synod transformed the so called Feast of the “Immaculate Conception” of Blessed Virgin Mary to the Feast of Divine Love.

The entire construct of the so called immaculate conception was based on a legalistic understanding of “original sin.” If everyone is born in a sinful state, in original sin, inherited from their parents through the sexual act of procreation, then there has to be a specially created individual – Mary – who was preserved from original sin. Some have even extended Mary’s uniqueness and separateness from the rest of humanity by arguing that Jesus’ birth was a bloodless, painless event where the infant simply floated out of the Blessed Virgin’s womb.

St. Thomas Aquinas wrote against the innovation that Mary’s birth was unlike that of others. He argued that this contradicted the very purpose of Jesus’ Incarnation, which was that He received our human nature through Mary. If her nature is unique, then Jesus’ connection with the rest of humanity is severed. (ST 27 2r).

We have not dogmatized this belief, nor do we recognize it. This is not an article of Divine revelation. As Polish National Catholics we believe that Mary was preserved from sin, and remained sinless and pure from the time of her birth. But, we do not need to construct a special status for Mary because her birth and our birth are all without sin. We do not countenance the idea of original sin in such a legalistic way. We do not accept accept that humans are sinful in their birth.

Instead, we teach that we are all created in the image and likeness of God. We profess that creation is not evil, but that it is an expression of Divine Love. Evil is certainly real, and present in the world, the result of humanity’s fall. We all fall into sin, but it is our responsibility for failing to act according to goodness of our creation.

Creation is good says Genesis, and human creation is very good. Rather than speak of the unique status of Mary, the Feast of Divine Love speaks about the goodness of creation in general as an expression of a good Creator.

The Feast of Divine Love encapsulates so much of what is positive about our Church, its focus on love and human potential. To the 1928 Synod our organizer declared: “Everything else [besides God] is transitory, but this divine element [of love] is immortal.” God never abandons His love toward us even though we do fall into the sinfulness that exists in the world.

Our Church sees Divine Love in God’s sharing of wisdom and free will. The Divine Love of creation is that we are made “very good” (Genesis 1:31) in the image and likeness of God. When we fall into sin, we know that we can always turn to God. God loves us so much that He sent His only Son to us to redeem us from our fall into sinfulness; from our unfortunate propensity to reject God’s Divine Love.

Christian Witness, Homilies,

Reflection for the 31st Sunday in Ordinary Time

First and 10
2 to go…

“One of the scribes came to Jesus and asked him, ‘Which is the first of all the commandments?’”

It is Sunday – God first, but of course football.

Let’s think about football math. We all know that when our favorite team gets the ball they start their march down the field with a first and ten – first down and ten yards to go to get another first down. Going from first down to first down, the successful team works its way down the field until (if all goes well) thy score.

It can seem daunting, especially if you are starting at the far end of the field, with almost 100 yards to go against very strong opposition.

Now imagine if your team could get to that touchdown in two yards, in just two steps? It is first and ten, two to go.

Before the scribe came to Jesus the Pharisees, Sadducees, Herodians, chief priests, and elders had been hammering Jesus with questions. Jesus’ answers didn’t matter to them at all. All that mattered was their ends – trapping Jesus and shutting Him down.

Scribes were a class of experts in the Mosaic Law, all 613 laws. This scribe seems sincere in coming to Jesus. He wants to hear how Jesus interprets the 613 laws, and which one He finds to be the greatest one.

Jesus shows the scribe that love of God and love of our brothers and sisters are the two most important commandments. He tells him that these two key commandments are the two yards He needs to go.

These two commandments depend on each other. We are to give our whole hearts to God who is love, and love Him completely. By loving God, and experiencing His love, we learn to love better, stronger, more completely. Eventually we learn to love like God loves. We must take our learning and apply it. Our love for God and His love for us cannot exist in a vacuum. It has to grow, toward others, drawing them into this relationship of love.

Sometimes people separate these two commandments, saying one or the other is what we really need to do. Jesus responded to the question: Which is the first, with two commandments. Jesus indicates an order – one comes first. But He also teaches us that the two are inseparable. Our lives and our faith must be based on love: on a relationship of love to God, and on the sharing of God’s love with others. Having only one misses the touchdown.

Love breaks down all opposition. Our touchdown is heaven – and it only takes two steps to get there, two steps and one theme – love.

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