Immigration is a hot political topic today. It’s not just an issue here in America; it’s a world issue. Millions of people all over the world are on the move today because of wars, violence and because they can’t make a living on lands affected by climate change.
Our first reading today at Mass is about Abraham, the “wandering Aramean” whom God blessed as he went from place to place. May God bless those wandering from place to place today.
Today also is St. Patrick’s day. This was a big day in the place where I was born and raised, Bayonne, NJ, a city of immigrants, many from Ireland. The Irish went to church today to thank God for the faith brought to them by St. Patrick and for being able to live in a country where they could make a living and bring up their families, hoping for a better life.
Years ago, I visited the place where some of my relatives came from in Donegal, in northern Ireland. I saw the little abandoned farm house, with no roof, where some of them lived. An old man in the neighborhood remembered the day they left for America, three young people carrying away their simple belongings. It was all they had. There was no work for them there anymore.
When they came to America they took whatever jobs they could get. It had to be hard for them making their way in a new land and another way of living. But they helped one another, and that’s one of the things I remember about that immigrant generation. They helped one another.
I took a picture of that abandoned house in Donegal and gave it to my relatives. I see it’s still hung proudly in their house when I visit. We have to remember where we come from. We’re children of Abraham, on our way to a place that’s still before us. We have to stick together.
Since the days of St. Paul of the Cross, the Passionists have turned to the Cross and asked “Who is this?” and “Why is he here?”
Paul did this in the 18th century in the squares of poor little Italian towns of the Tuscan Maremma where he would preach for a number of days before going on to the next town. He preached and prayed before this image and told his hearers to keep in mind the Passion of Jesus. Many were illiterate so crucifixes and pictures in their churches and homes, as well as wayside shrines, were ways they related to the life, death and resurrection of Jesus.
In the early church there were no crucifixes, of course. At least for the first five centuries there were no realistic portrayals of Jesus on the Cross. Why? Because crucifixion was a common form of execution in the Roman world and people found it too horrible to speak about or visualize.
That reticence appears, for example, in St. Luke’s account of the disciples on the way to Emmaus after Jesus was crucified. A mysterious stranger asks why they’re sad. “One of them, named Cleopas, said to him ‘Are you the only visitor to Jerusalem who does not know of the things that have taken place there in these days?’And he replied to them, ‘What sort of things?’ They said to him, ‘The things that happened to Jesus the Nazarene, who was a prophet mighty in deed and word before God and all the people, how our chief priests and rulers both handed him over to a sentence of death and crucified him.’”
All they say about “the things that happened is “… Our chief priests and rulers handed him over to a sentence of death and crucified him.”
Jesus tells them then to take a look at these things in another way: through the scriptures. Through Moses and the prophets, he describes what happened to him. Later, the Passion accounts of the four gospels rely heavily on these same scriptures for framing the story of the crucifixion and events around it.
So many of our media portrayals today, like Mel Gibson’s The Passion of the Christ, Bill O’Reilly’s Killing Jesus, the specials from CNN and the other networks seem to me to be interested more in the historical aspects of the gospels than their meaning.
The great questions still are: “Who is this?” and “Why is he here?”
Who is he who cries out “My God, my God why have you forsaken me?” God made flesh?
Then why did he come, why did he die in such a way? Questions that send us to the scriptures and bring us before God and cause us to wonder and praise.
To listen to today’s homily, please select the audio file below:
Scholars say this story is not found in the original versions of the gospel of John but was inserted later into that gospel. The story’s language and style are not like the language and style found in John’s gospel. Even so, the Catholic church accepts the story as an authentic part of scripture, however it made its way into the gospel of John about the year 100 or so.
If you look at the part in John’s gospel where the story occurs, you may see why it was placed there. Jesus is in Jerusalem celebrating the Feast of Tabernacles, an autumn feast to thank God for the harvest that had just been gathered in. Without God’s blessings of rain and good weather there would be no harvest, and so water and light are the gifts of God celebrated on the feast. They bring life.
In the temple area at the feast, Jesus proclaims that God sent him to bless the human family with life. He’s the water bringing life, the warm Sun bringing a harvest beyond any they could imagine. But when he says that, the leaders of the people begin looking for ways to put him to death. He claims to be the Messiah and God’s Son.
They brought him a woman caught in adultery and asked if she should be stoned to death for what she had done. That was the law given to them by Moses. “’So what do you say?’ They said this to test him, so that they could have some charge to bring against him.” They didn’t care about the woman, if she died by being stoned to death. They were after him. On this feast celebrating life they wanted him to die.
Jesus doesn’t answer them. “Jesus bent down and began to write on the ground with his finger.But when they continued asking him, he straightened up and said to them, ’Let the one among you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.’”
What was Jesus writing on the ground with his finger? We don’t know. Most likely it was an act of utter disgust at what they were doing to the woman. Treating her as if she were nothing. So he has nothing to say to them except finally, ‘Let the one among you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.’
“And in response, they went away one by one, beginning with the elders.”
The story has that beautiful ending. “So he was left alone with the woman before him.” “Only two remain, the poor woman and Incarnate Mercy,” St. Augustine writes.
Then Jesus straightened up and said to her,
“Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?”
She replied, “No one, sir.”
Then Jesus said, “Neither do I condemn you. Go, and from now on do not sin any more.”You wonder if the scribe who put this story into John’s original gospel recognized how appropriate this place was for a story of God’s mercy from Jesus’ lifetime? God wants people to live, not die. God respects people no matter what. His mercy is like the rain and the sun that bring a harvest of good things. Mercy does not condemn. “Go ,” he says to the woman. “forgetting what lies behind, but straining forward to what lies ahead” continue toward the goal, the prize, that’s promised to all.
We may get bogged down in the readings from the gospel of John we’ll be hearing these last days of lent, which are long and often difficult to understand. Today’s reading (John 5, 31-47) seems like a reading from a court trial, and in many ways it is. Jesus presents his witnesses who testify for him, vouching for his claims.
He claims to be God’s Son, true God from true God.
Today’s lengthy reading, unfortunately, may cause us to forget what sparked these claims.Jesus has come up for a feast. ( John 5,1-14) We don’t know what feast, but on a Sabbath day occurring during that feast, he meets the poor fellow who’s paralyzed, who can’t get into a pool of water near the temple to be cured.For 38 years he’s been there. Jesus cures him and tells him to take up his mat and go. The man is confronted by the Pharisees who criticize him for carrying his mat on the Sabbath and criticize Jesus for curing on the Sabbath.
It’s a dispute about the Sabbath Rest, and we see what side Jesus takes. He cures the man because of mercy, and mercy doesn’t take a day off. God is merciful every day and so should we be. But Jesus doesn’t leave it at that, he takes it much further. He is the Lord of the Sabbath, God from God, Light from Light, true God from true God. He makes a divine claim. (John 5,17-30)
Father Francis Maloney in his commentary on John’s gospel ( The Gospel of John, Francis Moloney, S.D. B. Sacra Pagina, Liturgical Press) suggests when we read a gospel like this to take a look at the many issues it raises. Don’t give up or move too quickly away from readings hard to understand. The Old Testament reading for today, likeother readings before the gospel from our lectionary,offers some help. Jesus, like Moses, always pleads for mercy for us, a stiff-necked people.
Besides other lectionary readings, keep in mind too the issues raised in our gospel besides the identity of Jesus. For example, the Sabbath Rest. I’m sure Jesus kept the Sabbath Rest all his life, and he must have kept it mercifully, as his cure of the paralyzed man shows. At the same time, he must have recognized the value to the Sabbath Rest. It wasn’t a slavish law; it was a call to contemplation.
In his encyclical Laudato si, Pope Francis sees the Sabbath Rest still needed today “when many people sense a profound imbalance which drives them to frenetic activity and makes them feel busy, in a constant hurry, which in turn leads them to ride rough shod over everything around them.”
The law of weekly rest forbade work on the seventh day, “so that your ox and your donkey may have rest, and the son of your maidservant, and the stranger, may be refreshed” (Ex 23:12). Rest opens our eyes to the larger picture and gives us renewed sensitivity to the rights of others.” (LS 237)
A nice understanding of what the Sabbath Rest means. We need contemplative time that “opens our eyes to the larger picture and gives us renewed sensitivity to the rights of others.” We also need contemplative time to recognize the claims of Jesus. He is God and man, divine and human, and he came to live and die for us. We need time to know him.
To listen to today’s homily, please select the audio bar below.
The story of the prodigal son is one of the longest in the gospel and it’s also one of the most important. It’s not just about a boy who goes astray, of course, it’s about the human race gone wrong.
“Give me what’s mine,” the son says boldly to his father. We all tend to say that. And he takes off for a faraway country, a permissive paradise that promises power and pleasure, in fact, it promises him everything, where he can do anything he wants.
But they’re empty promises, and soon the boy who had so much has nothing and ends up in a pigsty feeding pigs, who eat better than he does.
Then, he takes his first step back. He “comes to himself,” our story says; he realizes what he has done. “I have sinned.”
How straightforward his reaction! Not blaming anybody else for the mess he is in: not his father, or the prostitutes he spent so much of his money on, or society that fooled him. No, he takes responsibility. That “coming to himself” was the first gift of God’s mercy.
He doesn’t wallow in his sin and what it’s brought him, either. He doesn’t let it trap him. He looks beyond it to the place where he belongs, to his father’s house. It wont be an easy road, but he keeps his eyes on it and starts back home.
There he’s surprised by the welcome he receives. More than he ever expected. The father takes into his arms and calls for feast.
His story is our story too.
In these days of Lent, many of us approach the sacrament of reconciliation.That sacrament is very much like the journey the son takes back to his father. First of all, we look for the mercy of God to come to ourselves, to know our sins and to look for our place in our Father’s house.
Bless me, Father, for I have sinned. we say beginning our confession. The prayer of the son has become our prayer. We acknowledge our sins.
Then the priest who represents Jesus, who speaks for his Father in heaven, says.
God, the Father of mercies, through the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, has reconciled the world to himself and sent the Holy Spirit among us for the forgiveness of our sins.
Through the ministry of the church, may God grant you pardon and peace, and I absolve you in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
We receive pardon and peace, the gift of God’s mercy.
How easily we leave your side,
Lord God,
for a place far away.
Send light into our darkness,
and open our eyes to our sins.
Unless you give us new hearts and strong spirits,
we cannot make the journey home,
to your welcoming arms and the music and the dancing.
Catholics are not going to Mass as much as they did. People are busy, of course. Some say they don’t get much out of it. Whatever the reasons, US Catholics aren’t going to Mass as they did before.
We have new texts for Mass, will they turn things around? I don’t know. Better preaching? That would help. But there’s more. We need to look at the way we pray and participate at Mass. The Mass is the central act of our faith, and we need to bring everything we have– our bodies, our minds, our memories, ourselves– to it.
We’re there to pray, from the moment we enter the church to the moment we leave. Only by praying at Mass will we appreciate it.
The way we pray at Mass is simple. It begins as we enter church and make the Sign of the Cross. It’s a key to a world of faith. Taking holy water we bless ourselves “In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.” We are reminding ourselves that we’re blessed by God with the gift of life and everything it means through Jesus Christ. Water is a sign of that life. 60% of the human body is made up of water, and so it’s a reminder we are being blessed by the God of life.
Water, like bread, is a sign of life.The signs of water and bread stand for the totality of blessings we receive , and we acknowledge our blessings and give thanks through them.
Jesus said “If anyone is thirsty come to me.” He also said “I am the bread of life.” As we make the Sign of the Cross, we’re reminded we’re at the source of life now and of life everlasting, Jesus Christ. We’re blessed by his life, death and resurrection. We trace his sign on ourselves, on our foreheads, our hearts and our shoulders. We’re blessed in mind and heart and all our being.
So, as Mass begins, the priest leads us into this great act of blessing and thanksgiving by inviting us to make the Sign of the Cross.
Notice we bless ourselves a number of times at Mass besides its beginning. We bless ourselves as the gospel is proclaimed, asking that our minds and hearts be blessed to hear God’s Word. We bless ourselves as we leave the church at the end of the Mass, because we carry God’s blessings to our world.
Besides the Sign of the Cross, simple acclamations at Mass draw us into this blessed mystery. So, as the priest concludes a prayer or action, we often say “Amen” an ancient Hebrew word, which means “Yes” we agree. The “Amen” at Mass calls us into the blessing of God. Simple word like “Amen” draw us to the prayer of the church.
“The Lord be with you.” “Lift up your hearts.” “Let us give thanks to the Lord our God.”
Listen carefully to those words and the readings, the songs and the music at Mass. Say them and mean them. Sing them when they’re sung, for“Someone who sings well prays twice.” So we join our voices in song. At Mass we pray together.
We pray with our eyes, too, as we see the actions and signs of Mass. Walking, kneeling, standing are prayers. Simple actions, like bowing and offering our hand to receive the Host are prayers. At Mass we pray with our whole being. Our walking, seeing, listening, speaking become acts of prayer that bring us into the presence of God.
Of course, we often come to Mass with a lot of things on our mind that distract us from this great mystery. So often we’re on overload. Our faith may not be the strongest. We have our doubts. We get sunk in the everydayness of our own lives.
But God’s grace is here in this great mystery and God will draw us–weak as we are–into this great mystery. God will give us– all of us– the gift to pray and find blessings here. God draws us here to bless us.
Readings
Talk of devils and demons and miracles by God, so common in the bible, sounds strange to people today, especially in the western world. We think other forces are at work when something remarkable happens, as it did to the man in today’s gospel who couldn’t speak.(Luke 11,14-23) Must be a natural explanation–maybe the power of suggestion; whatever it was, we’ll discover it. We find it hard to see “the finger of God” causing miracles today.
Miracles of healing were among the signs that pointed out Jesus to his early hearers, but they weren’t the most important. After Pentecost, Peter describes Jesus of Nazareth as “a man attested to you by God with deeds of power, wonder and signs that God did through him among you, as you yourselves know,” But the culmination of signs, the apostle says, is his own death and resurrection.
No one can explain this mystery, surpassing all others. Taking on himself all human sorrows– the sorrow of the mute, the deaf, the paralyzed, the possessed, the dead, the sinner far from God– Jesus gave himself into the hands of his heavenly Father on the altar of the cross. And he was raised up and gave his life-giving Spirit to the world.
Some deny this sign too. but it’s the great sign that we celebrate in this holy season.
“You have signs clearer than day that God loves you and he’s at work in you. Humble yourself, nothing as you are, and let your nothingness disappear in the Infinite All that is God. Then lose yourself and take your rest adoring the Most High in spirit and truth.” (Letter 954)
I see the great Sign you have given, O God,
the mystery of the death and resurrection of your Son.
Place it in my mind and heart,
let it guide my thoughts and draw me to love.
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