Follow Me

The gospel of John is read at Mass these last days before the Feast of Pentecost. We’re brought to the Sea of Galilee where the Lord first called Peter and John and others to follow him. Now, from the shore the Risen Jesus calls them again. They’ve fished all night and caught nothing. Not only are their boats empty; some days earlier in Jerusalem they deserted the One they promised to follow forever. Their spirits are empty.

From the shore Jesus tells them to cast their nets into the sea again and an abundant catch of fish pours into their boats. Calling them ashore, Jesus feeds them some loaves and fish. As he did in the supper room the night before he died, Jesus offers them his life-giving love.

Taking Peter aside, he asks the disciple who denied him three times “Do you love me?” “Yes, Lord, you know I love you,” Peter answers three times. “Feed my sheep,” Jesus tells him.

Then, renewing the invitation he made at this same shore at the beginning of his ministry, Jesus says to his disciple, “Follow me.”

The Feast of Pentecost is a feast for a church that has failed, for disciples facing their weakness and broken promises, for those who work and have nothing to show for it. The Holy Spirit, whom Jesus breathed upon the disciples after his resurrection, comes to our world as he promised, to renew the face of the earth. “Come follow me,” the life-giving Spirit says.

Weekday Readings: 5th Week of the Easter Season

Monday Acts 14,5-18; John 14, 21-26
Tuesday Acts 14,19-28; John 14, 27-31
Wednesday Acts 15,1-6; John 15, 1-8
Thursday Acts 15, 7-21; John 15, 9-11
Friday Acts 15, 22-31; John 15, 12-17
Saturday Acts 16,1-10; John 15,18-21

The gospel readings for the remainder of the Easter season are from the Farewell Discourse of Jesus from John’s gospel. Jesus is going to the Father and his disciples will no longer see him. How will he be with them? In many ways, they appear to be similar to Mary Magdalene in the garden whom Jesus tells: “Do not cling to me. I have not ascended to my father and your father, to my God and your God.”

He will not leave them orphans, yet he will not be with them as he was formerly with them in the flesh. Yet, Jesus will be with them as God is always with them. From now on, the Paraclete, the Spirit of truth, will teach them all things; Jesus will be present in sacramental signs and the words they hear from him.

The successful missionary efforts of Paul and Barnabas among the gentiles in Asia Minor in the cities of Lystra, Derbe, and Pisidian raised questions in the Jewish Christian community at Jerusalem about the future of the Christian movement. Born in Judaism, it looks like the Gentiles are taking over. To meet what is a threat to some and an opportunity to others, a council is called in Jerusalem and representatives go back and forth. It’s a situation that has enormous consequences for the church.

Pope Francis made some wonderful remarks yesterday about this conflict which would see the church grow.”But some in Jerusalem, when they heard this, became ‘nervous and sent Barnabas on an “apostolic visitation”: perhaps, with a little sense of humor we could say that this was the theological beginning of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith: this apostolic visit by Barnabas. He saw, and he saw that things were going well.”

Previously in his homily, the pope made the point that when persecution or crises occur, growth also occurs in the church, sometimes hidden. I think that happened in the 1960s and 70s when the church in the western world entered critical times. of But with decline in the western world, tremendous growth took place in Africa, Asia, and South America. 1.2 billion Catholics in a world of 6 billion people.

The Paralyzed Man

Let’s compare the paralyzed man at the pool at Bethesda, whom we hear about in today’s gospel, with the official in our previous story from John’s gospel. The official came to Jesus in Cana in Galilee looking for a cure for his son. Obviously, he was important. He knew how to get things done and came to get Jesus to do something for him. He’s a resourceful man.

The paralytic at Bethesda, on the other hand, seems utterly resourceless. For 38 years he’s come to a healing pool– archeologists identify its location near the present church of St. Anne in Jerusalem– and he can’t find a way into the water when it’s stirring. Paralyzed, too slow, he can’t even get anybody to help him. He doesn’t approach Jesus; Jesus approaches him, asking: “Do you want to be well?”

Instead of lowering him into the water, Jesus cures the paralyzed man directly and tells him to take up the mat he was lying on and walk. The man has no idea who cured him until Jesus tells him later in the temple area. He’s slow in more ways than one.

“God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; God chose what is low and despised in this world, things that are not, to reduce to nothing things that are, so that no one might boast in the presence of God,” St. Paul tells the Corinthians.
Here’s one of the weak, the lowly, the nobodies God chooses, and he wont be the only one. But are we far from him?

Lord Jesus,
like the paralytic I wait for you,
not knowing when or how you will come.
But I wait, O Lord,
however long you may be.

The Weather of God’s Blessings

The first reading from today’s Lenten Mass describes God’s blessings in terms of the weather.

“Just as from the heavens

the rain and snow come down, and do not return there

till they have watered the earth,

making it fertile and fruitful,

Giving seed to the one who sows

and bread to the one who eats,

So shall my word be

that goes forth from my mouth;

It shall not return to me void,

but shall do my will,

achieving the end for which I sent it. (Isaiah 55,10)

Can this reading help us understand how God blesses us?  Like rain or snow God’s blessings come, making our lives fruitful. Yes, they will surely come, but how about the times we have to wait, when no rain or snow comes at all?

God’s blessings are like the weather.

Or think of God’s blessings through the Sign of the Cross. We say “we bless ourselves” when we make this sign. Sometimes God’s blessing comes through the cross of glory and we receive blessings never imagined through his tender mercy.

Sometimes his blessings takes another form of his cross; disappointment, suffering, failure, sickness, death. There God’s blessings are mostly hidden and hard to see.

In Matthew’s gospel today Jesus offers us a way of praying. Does this blessing also follow the weather. Prayer is a gift, but it’s a gift like the rain and snow. It’s one of God’s greatest gifts to us, yet sometimes we find it hard to pray while at other times it wells up within us.

The blessings of God are like the weather.

Zechariah in the Temple

It was “in the days of King Herod” that the Angel Gabriel came to the priest Zechariah who had been chosen to bring incense into the sanctuary of the temple in Jerusalem to honor the Lord God. The angel speaks to him next to the altar of incense where we would expect an angel to be. “Your prayer has been heard,” the angel says to the old priest. “Your wife will bear you a son.”

Surely, though, the old priest no longer prayed that prayer. Their childbearing years were long over. The promise of new life was long gone. They would pass on with hopes unfulfilled.

But the angel speaks of a child “great in the eyes of the Lord” who is to be called John. He will more than fulfill their hopes, turning “many of the children of Israel to their God.”

Yet, the old priest persists in doubt and the angel punishes him with silence. He cannot speak. Only after the child is born will he speak again, as he announces to those at his birth that “his name is John.” You lose your voice when you lose hope in God’s promises.

When John is born, Zechariah will sing a song of praise.

Readings here.  Homily here.

Is Faith a Ticket to Success?

You can’t listen to the story of the Prophet Jeremiah, our first reading these days,  without thinking about the passion of Jesus.  In fact, readings from the Book of Jeremiah are the dominant readings for Holy Week. We see Jesus in Jeremiah.

God tells Jeremiah to “hold nothing back,” but speak the truth to those in power, no matter how unpopular it is.  Jesus did the same.

Like Jeremiah, Jesus was innocent, but was framed by the powerful as guilty. They questioned his authority, but he would not deny his mission.

Only a few voices seem to stand up for Jeremiah and only a few stood up for Jesus. Neither had many faithful followers at their time of trial. Yet both were carried along by God’s power and their names vindicated.

Our gospel reading recalling the lonely death of John the Baptist at the hands of Herod Antipas adds him to this brave company.

Some would have us see our faith as a ticket to success, an inoculation against failure or suffering.  Believe and nothing bad will happen to you. Yet, as you look at Jesus, the prophets and the saints, you see a more realistic profile of faith. We’re promised victory, yes, but only by accepting the mystery of the cross.

Keep an eye on Jeremiah and John. Keep an eye on the passion of Jesus. Follow them.

Jesus Loves You

I’m getting ready for a session on Advent and Christmas next Monday evening at St. Mary’s Parish in Colts Neck, NJ and I prepared two short video for children. One about Jesus, the other about St. Nicholas.

We have to reclaim Christmas. Might as well  begin with the little children.

My Thoughts are not Your Thoughts

Last Sunday religion played a part in the tenth anniversary of 9/11, though some wanted to be silent about it. At the anniversary ceremonies, we heard words of belief among the questions and the tears.

Religion always has a role when something tragic like 9/11 happens. That’s because a tragedy like that– and it was tragic on a grand scale– is something we can’t measure or understand, and so we look for meaning and support in a power and a wisdom beyond our own.

People from many religious traditions died in that tragedy, and many turned to their own religious traditions for support. Of course, some had nothing to turn to.

As Christians we believe that God’s not silent in tragedy. God speaks to us through Jesus Christ, his Son. Yet, even so,  God’s wisdom is not so easy to understand.

“For my thoughts are not your thoughts,

nor are your ways my ways, says the LORD.

As high as the heavens are above the earth,

so high are my ways above your ways

and my thoughts above your thoughts.”  Isaiah 55, 8-9

In situations as simple as that described in today’s gospel, the parable of the workers in the vineyard, God’s ways are not our ways.  They’re higher and deeper.

At the heart of the tragedy of 9/11 is the mystery of death,  a reality common to all that lives.  Nature in our part of the world is now  experiencing a kind of dying as leaves turn and fall. We human beings die too, but death for us is different than it is for the rest of the natural world. We have a strong unique desire for life within us, for our lives to continue, and that makes us different.

Death happens to us in many ways. Some of us will die from natural causes, like sickness or old age. Some may die in accidents, earthquakes, floods. And then, some die because other human beings cause their death. That’s what happened at 9/11. That’s what makes that event so tragic; an evil injustice caused them to die.

Over the ages, there’s been a lot of reflection about death. Of course, today we don’t like to talk much about it. It’s become a taboo in our society.

But for Christians, death is important. The heart of our faith is about death and resurrection, which we see in the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. We hear about  it over and over in our liturgy. And we reflect on it.

Some theologians, reflecting on sources like  St. Paul’s Letter to the Romans (Chapters 4-5), speculate that in the beginning God planned death of another kind for the human race, before sin intervened. If human sin had not entered the world, they suggest , maybe human beings like us would reach a climactic moment in the normal course of our lives when God would invite us to another higher life. It would be an invitation we’d welcome, we’d freely choose it, sure that a new and better existence waits for us with our Creator.

But it was human sin that darkened that moment in the beginning and made it the death we know now. So, instead of an experience of joy and adventure and new beginnings,  death became for the human family a moment of fear and suffering.

We believe Jesus came as our Savior and Redeemer to enter that dark, fearful moment and change it to a moment of salvation. “Dying, you destroyed our death; Rising, you restored our life,” we say in our liturgy.

To save and redeem us, Jesus truly experienced death in all its ferocity. The gospels clearly say he did.  Jesus faced a death,  not from old age or from sickness, not from some act of nature, but from sinners. He was put to death by evil injustice. It was death at its worst that he faced.  But when he died, he conquered death and evil and gave us hope by rising again. He “destroyed our death” we say.

He gives us now the power to face death, to go through the moment of death, even at its worst, and to know resurrection. He’s there at the moment of our death; he’s there with all who die; he’s there as our Savior and Redeemer. None of us dies alone.

After the tragedy of 9/11 you may remember they found a cross of twisted steel from the   wreckage of the World Trade Center and placed in the ruins. I think that cross hangs now outside St.Peter’s Church a few blocks away. For religious reasons, of course, it probably will remain there.

But the wisdom of that Cross, hard as it is for us to understand, speaks to that tragic place. His ways are not our ways, his thoughts not our thoughts, but God is not silent, God speaks  in the death and resurrection of his Son.

Following Jesus, our Teacher

Jesus Christ is the teacher of the ages. His Sermon on the Mount offers a lasting wisdom,  and so he speaks to us as well as to the people of his time. It’s up to us to listen to him and keep our eyes on him, even as others vie for our attention with their wisdom and their wishes. Like sheep, our eyes and our attention are on the next step we take; we have to listen for the Shepherd’s voice and turn to see where he is leading us;

Here’s a selection from St. Gregory of Nyssa in the Office of Readings for today:

 

“We shall be blessed with clear vision if we keep our eyes fixed on Christ, for he, as Paul teaches, is our head, and there is in him no shadow of evil. Saint Paul himself and all who have reached the same heights of sanctity had their eyes fixed on Christ, and so have all who live and move and have their being in him.

As no darkness can be seen by anyone surrounded by light, so no trivialities can capture the attention of anyone who has his eyes on Christ. The one who keeps his eyes upon the head and origin of the whole universe has them on virtue in all its perfection; he has them on truth, on justice, on immortality and on everything else that is good, for Christ is goodness itself.

The wise, then, turn their eyes toward the One who is their head, but the fool gropes in darkness. No one who puts his lamp under a bed instead of on a lamp-stand will receive any light from it. People are often considered blind and useless when they make the supreme Good their aim and give themselves up to the contemplation of God, but Paul made a boast of this and proclaimed himself a fool for Christ’s sake. The reason he said, We are fools for Christ’s sake was that his mind was free from all earthly preoccupations. It was as though he said, ‘We are blind to the life here below because our eyes are raised toward the One who is our head.’”

 

Called by God’s Word

Yesterday’s gospel for the feast of St. Andrew the Apostle says that Jesus called the two fisherman, Peter and Andrew, from their boat on the Sea of Galilee to follow him as his disciples. We easily picture the scene–the sea, the fishing boat, the smell of the nets, two men in a boat facing another on the shore.

Not so easily pictured is the mystery enveloping the scene. Who calls the two ordinary men from the shore?  Why are they called? They’re not just to accompany him for a few days, or a few years. Who is he?

“The very Son of God, older than the ages, the invisible, the incomprehensible, the incorporeal, the beginning of beginning, the light of light, the fountain of life and immortality, the image of the archetype, the immovable seal, the perfect likeness, the definition and word of the Father: he it is who comes to his own image and takes our nature for the good of our nature, and unites himself to an intelligent soul for the good of my soul, to purify like by like.

He who makes rich is made poor; he takes on the poverty of my flesh, that I may gain the riches of his divinity. He who is full is made empty; he is emptied for a brief space of his glory, that I may share in his fullness. What is this wealth of goodness? What is this mystery that surrounds me? I received the likeness of God, but failed to keep it. He takes on my flesh, to bring salvation to the image, immortality to the flesh. He enters into a second union with us, a union far more wonderful than the first.”  (St. Gregory Nazianzen)