Caritas Christi Urget Nos

Category: Christmas

  • The Holy Family of Jesus, Mary and Joseph

    The Holy Family of Jesus, Mary and Joseph

    Today’s readings

    It’s certainly appropriate that we celebrate the Holy Family today, just a few days after Christmas.  This feast helps to underscore that Jesus came to live among us in a very ordinary way: by taking flesh and becoming one of us, even to being part of a family.  So we look on the manger scenes that still are on display here in church and in our homes, and we see Jesus, Mary and Joseph beginning their lives together.  We  still sing Christmas carols that extol the peace of his coming.

    Our thoughts about that beautiful family might run along the lines of “how nice for them!”  I’m aware that some families who are here today may have just managed to get here on time, or a little after.  Maybe there was the constant argument with the kids about why they have to go to church.  Or maybe someone wasn’t quite ready on time.  It might have been hard to turn off the television or tear someone away from whatever it was they just got for Christmas.  And so, as they hustle in here to church and sit down, maybe the holiness of the family is, perhaps, the furthest thing from their minds.

    So it can be hard to relate, I think, to the Holy Family in some ways.  Maybe you’re thinking, “How do I get one of those?” There are all sorts of families out there: families broken by divorce or separation, families marked by emotional or physical abuse, families fractured by living a great distance apart, families grieving the loss of loved ones or agonizing over the illness of one of the members, families of great means and those touched by poverty, homelessness and hunger, families divided by immigration issues, families torn by family secrets, grudges and age-old hurts. Some are trying to form a family: they want to have children, but are unable.  There are healthy families and hurting families, and every one of them is graced by good and touched by some kind of sadness at some point in their history.

    Even the Holy Family, whose feast we celebrate today, was marked with challenges. An unexpected – and almost inexplicable – pregnancy marked the days before the couple was officially wed; news of the child’s birth touched chords of jealousy and hatred in the hearts of the nation’s leaders and caused the young family to have to flee for their lives and safety. Even this Holy Family was saddened, in some ways, by an extremely rocky beginning.

    The institution of the family is an extremely precarious thing. We know this. God knows this. Yet it was into this flawed structure that the God of all the earth chose to come into our world. Taking our flesh and joining a human family, Christ came to be Emmanuel, God with us, and sanctify the whole world by his most merciful coming.

    St. Paul exhorts us all to be marked by holiness, part of the family of God. We do this, he tells us, by showing one another “heartfelt compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience, bearing with one another and forgiving one another, if one has a grievance against another; as the Lord has forgiven you, so must you also do.” Living in a family, living the Christian life, requires sacrifice. Some days we don’t feel very compassionate, but we are still called to be that way. We might not feel like showing someone kindness, or patience, or being humble. But that’s what disciples do. But the real sticking point is that whole forgiveness thing. Because all of us are going to fail in compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience at one time or another. So just as the Lord has forgiven us, so many times and of so many things, so must we forgive one another. We live our whole lives trying to figure out how to do this.

    Even today’s Gospel portrays for us the challenges of the family.  The Gospel event, if it played out today, would be an Amber Alert!  Jesus is lost on a journey, and a frantic search turns up nothing.  It is only in returning to Jerusalem that they find Jesus, right where he’s apparently supposed to be: debating with the religious leaders in the temple.  Even so, one wonders if he did not end up grounded until he was thirty, based on the fact that we don’t see him again in the Gospel until he is a man beginning his ministry!

    And so I think what we’re supposed to be seeing in the Holy Family today is not some kind of idyllic perfection.  Certainly they attained more perfection than any of us could ever possibly hope for in this life, but that’s not what we’re supposed to be focusing on.  What I think is worth focusing on is that, even though they knew there would be hard times ahead for them, they faithfully lived their lives through it all.  They continued to be a family, Jesus continued to grow and become strong in his human nature, and to be filled with wisdom and the favor of God.  And that, for us, is something worth striving for.  Being perfect might seem impossible, but being faithful is possible and it leads us to holiness.

    For Jesus, Mary and Joseph, their faithfulness helped them to absorb the challenges of an unplanned pregnancy and the dangers of oppression from the government, and still shed light on the whole world.  For us, faithfulness can help us to get through whatever rough spots life may have in store for us and not break apart.

    I am aware, however, that as I speak about faithfulness, that it all can still seem insurmountable. Why should you be faithful when the hurts inflicted by other members of your family still linger? That’s a hard one to address, but we’re not told to be faithful just when everyone else is faithful. Sometimes we are called to make an almost unilateral decision to love and respect the others in our families, and let God worry about the equity of it all. I know that’s easier to say than to do, but please you have your Church family to support you with prayer and love as you do it.

    Every single one of us is called to be holy, brothers and sisters. And every single one of our families is called to be holy. That doesn’t mean that we will be perfect. Some days we will be quite far from it. But it does mean that we will be faithful in love and respect. It means that we will unite ourselves to God in prayer and worship. It means we will love when loving is hard to do. Mary loved Jesus all the way to the Cross and watched him die. What we see in the model of the Holy Family for us is not perfection, but faithfulness and holiness.

    That holiness will make demands of us. It did for Jesus, Mary and Joseph.  Mary may have kept today’s Gospel event, along with many other events, in her heart, but they had to be hard to understand in the moment.  Yet they continued to live their lives, aided by the Spirit of God, and they all grew strong in wisdom and grace.  Those same blessings are intended for us to, all of us who do our best to live according to the Spirit in our own human families, no matter what those families may look like.

  • St. Stephen, Deacon & Martyr

    St. Stephen, Deacon & Martyr

    Today’s readings

    St. Stephen was one of the first deacons of the Church, chosen to aid in the distribution of food to those in need, so that the Apostles could continue their work.  He was a man who was filled with the Holy Spirit, and was unafraid to speak the truth.  And that, of course, is what brings him to today’s celebration.  His unwillingness to cover over the truth and his powerful, indisputable words, did not make him friends with everyone, to say the least.  He was stoned to death, an event in which we see perhaps the beginning of the conversion of a man named Saul, who of course, we know, later becomes Paul.

    The truth may, as Jesus tells us, set us free, but not without cost.  Stephen, and later Paul of course, paid for it with their lives, as Jesus did.  But covering over the truth or refusing to speak the truth would have been death of a far worse kind: a death that had no hope of salvation.  Giving his life for the truth and for the faith united Stephen forever with his God, who was his salvation and his joy.

    And so on this Christmas day, we are reminded that Christ came to bring the truth, and that that truth would change everything, which was not always a welcome thing.  The gift of this Christmas day is the truth, given to us to guard and proclaim and shout without fear.  It is the Spirit who gives us the words of truth to say in any situation, that same Spirit who gave Jesus to Mary in the first place.  We too rely on that same Spirit to help us fearlessly witness to the truth, fixing our eyes as St. Stephen did on Christ, the Son of Man, standing at the right hand of God.

  • The Nativity of the Lord: Mass During the Day

    The Nativity of the Lord: Mass During the Day

    Today’s readings

    All during Advent, we have been yearning for the light.  Advent reminds us that the world can sometimes be a very dark place, that war and terrorism and crime and disease and sin and death can really give us a beating, that very often we experience life much differently than God intended us to, and that all of this darkness has kept us from union with our God.  But Advent also has reminded us that it’s not supposed to be that way, and that God has always intervened for love of the people he has created.  And so in Advent, we came to see that God promises salvation for the people that are his own, and that he would do everything to make that promised salvation unfold for us.

    The Old Testament unfolds for us the many ways that God has intervened in history to save his people.  He placed man and woman in the Garden of Eden, safe from all harm, should they choose to accept it (which, of course, they did not!).  He brought eight people through the deluge of the great flood on Noah’s Ark.  He promised Abraham his descendents would be as numerous as the stars of the sky.  He led his people out of slavery in Egypt, through the desert and into the Promised Land, protecting them and guiding them through the hand of Moses all along the way.  His love for his people, his desire that they be one with him, and his efforts to save them from their own folly have been abundant all through human history.  But as numerous as his efforts have been, so have humankind’s failures to follow him been numerous as well.

    Which brings us to the event we celebrate today.  Let’s be clear: this is not some last-ditch effort before he throws up his hands and leaves us to our own devices.  This is the saving event, par excellence.  This is the way to salvation that has always been intended and has been promised through the ages, from the very days of the creation of the world, when the Word, as St. John tells us today, was with God, and with God, was the Word through which everything in heaven and on earth came to be.

    This awesome event is the Incarnation: Jesus, the Word through which all were created, comes to be one of the created ones.  This is the primordial mystery of our faith: without the Incarnation, there could be no cross, no resurrection, no ascension, no salvation.  None of the savings events of the Old Testament could be as efficacious as the Incarnation and the Paschal Mystery: in fact, those previous acts of salvation led up to the salvation we have in Christ Jesus, and paved the way for that saving act.  In today’s feast, the great light of Christ has taken hold of the darkness this world brings to us and shatters it forever, shining great light into every corner of our dark world, and our sometimes very dark lives as well.

    That’s all very theological and theoretical, I know, and maybe it goes over our heads most of the time.  So let me put this all another way.  For this illustration, I have to thank one of my seminary professors, who beat this image into our heads over and over again.  Here’s the way it works:  God always intended for us to be with him.  But, that became impossible, because over time we developed this great, dark chasm of sin and death.  That chasm separated us from God, and we could not reach across it to get to God.  So, on December the 25th, in the year Zero, if you will, God sent his only Son to be our salvation.  He was born into our midst and became one of us: he walked our walk, he lived our life, and he also died our death.  But that death did not last forever: instead he rose to new life that lasts forever, canceling out that great chasm of sin and death, and forever uniting us to God, allowing us to live the life God always intended us to have.  Now, I should mention, he used to call that chasm the “deep dark yogurt of sin and death,” and he once explained that he used that image because he didn’t like yogurt!

    You get the idea.  This gift of the Incarnation is the best Christmas present we will receive – it is the best gift of any kind that we will ever receive, because in the Incarnation we have what’s necessary for us to be saved.  This is so important a mystery and so great a gift, that at the words of the Incarnation in the Creed today, we are instructed to genuflect, not just bow.  So we will genuflect when we say the words, “by the power of the Holy Spirit, He was born of the Virgin Mary, and became man.”  And we genuflect because we remember with great gratitude that if the Word didn’t become flesh, if he wasn’t born of the Virgin Mary, if he didn’t become one like us, if he didn’t pay the price for our sins, we would never have salvation, or hope of life with God.  Praise God for this great gift today!

    And so as we continue our prayer today, we offer God the darkness in our lives: our sins, our frustrations, our disappointments, our pain, our grief – and we hold up all of this to the great Light that is God’s Word, the one who became one like us, who pitched his tent among us, and who dwells with us now.  We pray that the Light of the world would banish our darkness, and help us to see the way to God from wherever it is that we find ourselves on the spiritual path today.  We celebrate that today and every day, Jesus Christ is the Light that shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.

  • The Nativity of the Lord (Vigil Mass): Joseph’s Story

    The Nativity of the Lord (Vigil Mass): Joseph’s Story

    Today’s readings

    Once, a very long time ago, there was a man named Joseph.  He was a well-respected and hard-working man, from the family of the great king David.  But since Israel hadn’t been a great nation in a long time, he wasn’t respected for being a great king himself.  Instead, people respected him for his carpentry work and for the fact that he was faithful and just.

    He was engaged to a young woman named Mary but was not yet living with her.  They would come together to be man and wife when the time was right.  One day, she came to him with an unbelievable story about being pregnant, with a child given to her by the Holy Spirit.  Joseph didn’t know what to think.  He knew he was not the father of the baby, and so he decided not to marry the young woman, but instead to let her go quietly, so she would not be embarrassed.

    The night he decided to do this, Joseph had a dream.  In the dream, an angel appeared to him and told him not to be afraid to take Mary as his wife, and that God wanted him to do just that.  The angel told him that the baby was very special, that would come to save all God’s people from their sins and would be called Emmanuel – a name which means that God is here among us.

    So Joseph decided to do what the angel told him.  Even though his friends thought he was crazy, he took Mary as his wife.  And about that time, an proclamation came from the government that said that everyone had to go and be registered as a citizen.  They had to go to the city where they were from to do that.  So Joseph made plans to travel with Mary from Galilee where they were living, to Nazareth, which was where Joseph was from.  The way was long and dangerous and, along the way, the time for Mary to have her child came.

    They looked desperately for some inn or any house to take them in, but every place was full because so many people were traveling.  Eventually, they at least found a shelter: a rickety little shack for farm animals, and they went in there.  That’s when Mary had her baby.  She was scared, and Joseph had never delivered a baby before.  But the child was beautiful, and Joseph held him while Mary slept, exhausted from travelling and giving birth.  They placed the baby in the manger, a feed-trough for the animals, and they named him Jesus.

    Later, they had visits from shepherds and from three astrologers from the east, who came to worship the child, because they had seen visions too.  Mary and Joseph were amazed at all that was happening, and the wonderful visits they were receiving.

    That night, Joseph had another visit from an angel in his dreams.  The angel told him that people were planning to harm the new baby.  So, at the angel’s instruction, Joseph got up from bed, took Mary and Jesus, and fled to the land of Egypt so that they would be out of harm’s way.  They stayed there until the angel told Joseph that those who wanted to harm Jesus were dead, and it was okay to go back to their own town now.

    Joseph watched the child grow up, and was so proud to be his foster-father.  He taught Jesus how to live and how to respect others, and all about the religious law, just like any father would do for his children.  In his private moments, Joseph always wondered what would become of Jesus, wondered what God had in store for him.  All he knew was that something wonderful was happening, and as hard as it was sometimes, he had been called to help it happen.

    And God wants to continue to do wonderful things for us.  Jesus didn’t just get born two thousand years ago; Jesus is born right here, right now for us, if we would just make a little space, a little shelter for him in our hearts.  Just as Joseph didn’t know exactly what God had in store for Jesus, we don’t know what God has in store for any of us in the year ahead.  But we do know this: God sent Jesus so that God could be here among us, and he is here among us now, leading us back to him, telling us that we are his special children, and loving us all with love beyond anything we can imagine.

    Just like things were hard for Mary and Joseph as they travelled along, trying to find a place to stay, sometimes things for us will be hard too.  But all along the way, there are angels, guiding us to where God wants us, watching over us, and helping us to find the Good News.  Today, God brings us here to worship, so that like the shepherds and astrologers, we can find Jesus again, and we can see Jesus in those who love us, and in our own hearts.

  • The Baptism of the Lord

    The Baptism of the Lord

    Today’s readings

    Let’s reflect on two things today: the violence and the voice.

    First, the violence.  Back on the first Sunday of Advent we read from the book of the prophet Isaiah.  That particular reading was focusing on how bad things had become.  People were cheating one another, especially the poor and the powerless.  Corruption was just kind of accepted as the way things were.  Worst of all, people had become rather callous or indifferent to it all; they were jaded and just accepted that bad was the new good.  I was thinking that the things Isaiah lamented could well be lamented in our own day.  The poor seem to get poorer, and more powerless, especially today as companies fail through the greed of a few, affecting the livelihood of thousands.  Corruption in our government has led to scandal in the highest office in our state.  And worst of all, we’re not surprised by any of it any more.

    On that first day of Advent, Isaiah wrapped up his lament of all that nonsense with the frightening words: “Would that you would rend the heavens and come down.”  It’s a pretty violent prayer that he’s praying.  Isaiah is acknowledging that very little is going to attract our attention any more, so the best God can do is to violently tear open the heavens, a kind of barrier between God and us, if you will, and come down.  Only by God’s walking among us and being one of us can things ever be made right.  We need that kind of violent act of God because nothing else has worked.  The flood didn’t work, the wandering in the desert didn’t work, the captivity in Babylon didn’t work.  Maybe those things worked for a while, but we fickle humans soon forgot the lessons we learned in those momentous events.  To get our attention and keep it, something truly earth-shattering, or rather heaven-shattering, had to happen.

    Today we celebrate that that’s exactly what happened.  We gather here today on the last day of the Christmas season, during our continued celebration of Epiphany that began last Sunday.  Epiphany means “manifestation:” we celebrate that God appeared among us, was made manifest among us, became one of us.  Last week’s epiphany was the three magi coming to meet the Christ child with their gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh.  They worshipped the child who would be king, would be our priest, and would die for our sins.  Today’s epiphany finds Jesus to be an adult, approaching the rivers of the Jordan for baptism.  As he enters those waters of baptism, he isn’t really changed or made holier by those waters.  No, he makes the waters holy by entering them himself.  Through this act, all of the waters of baptism, including the ones that bathed you and me, have been made holy.  And most importantly, that violent act that redeemed us happened: coming up out of the waters, the heavens were torn open – those are the words Mark uses here – “torn open.”  The barrier between God and humanity is sundered now, God has entered human history once again and in a decisive and heaven-shattering event.

    Second, the voice.  The voice in our Gospel story continues the epiphany, that voice comes from those heavens which have been torn open.  First, the Spirit descends on Jesus in the form of a dove, and then the voice roars out of those open heavens: “You are my beloved Son; with you I am well pleased.”  For that brief moment, we see the entire Holy Trinity together at one moment.  We have Jesus coming up out of the water, the Holy Spirit descending upon him, and the Father’s voice roaring out of the heavens.  The epiphany is complete: God the Father, Son and Holy Spirit are made manifest at the waters of the Jordan.  God has valued his creation of humanity so much that he appears among us in force, in the completeness of the Trinity, with all of the love that that Holy Trinity gives to us.

    Significant here is what the voice says in that moment.  “You are my beloved Son; with you I am well pleased.”  In saying that, the Father confirms the manifestation of his Son in  the world, gives him a Father’s blessing, and empowers his work of redemption.  The words are words of mission – being the Son means that he represents the Father in every act and word.  Now I don’t know about you, but I didn’t hear any voices at my baptism.  At least I don’t think so; I was a baby.

    But probably even those who were baptized as adults don’t remember any kind of extra special voice.  But the thing about baptism, is that we’ve all heard that voice at numerous times since, haven’t we?  Whenever we were faced with choices: the easy way out or the way of integrity; the truth or a lie; an opportunity to help someone, or move on; an effort to correct a wrong or turn a blind eye – didn’t we hear an interior voice reminding us who we are by our baptism?  “You are my beloved child with you I am well pleased.”  Didn’t we pray for guidance to make the right choices and strength to follow through on our decisions?

    At those decisive and testing moments did we turn to God for help?  Because the violence and the voice should be strong enough hints about God’s love for us to do that.  Or have we ignored the violence and the voice, turned instead toward more selfish motives, and become just as jaded as those Israelites who needed Isaiah to pray that God would rend the heavens and come down?

    Jesus’ baptism today is a decisive event.  It meant mission for him: God had the special act of human redemption to accomplish in the person of Jesus.  It meant authority for him: as God’s Son he had the authority of the Father to accomplish what desperately needed to be.  Our own baptisms mean mission and authority too.  We are given a mission of some kind – something specific God wants us to accomplish.  And we have the authority to do that mission by being called sons and daughters of God.  In our own baptism God says to us too: “You are my beloved Son – You are my beloved daughter, and with you I am well pleased.”  The rite of baptism says that explicitly.  After the act of baptism by water, the priest or deacon says, “They are now called children of God.”

    And so, on this feast of the Baptism of the Lord, this Epiphany day, this last day of the Christmas season, we celebrate vocation – the realization that every one of us has a mission as the result of our baptism.  We know that every person has a vocation. Every person is called on by God to do something specific with their life that will bring not only them, but also others around them, to salvation. Parents help to bring their children to salvation by raising them in the faith. Teachers help bring students to salvation by educating them and helping them to develop their God-given talents. Business people bring others to salvation by living lives of integrity and witness to their faith by conducting business fairly and with justice and concern for the needy. The list goes on. Every vocation, every authentic vocation, calls the disciple to do what God created them for, and helps God to bring salvation to the whole world.

    And so, to celebrate this week of Vocation Awareness, I invite you to do three things.  First, encourage people to embrace their God-given vocation.  Invite them to consider life as a priest or religious brother or sister.  Parents and grandparents are especially important in helping children know that a religious vocation is a viable option for them.  But everyone can encourage someone they know to embrace the vocation God has given them, whatever that vocation may be.  Second, I invite you to pray for vocations.  Pray for more men to accept the call to priesthood and men and women to accept the call to the religious life.  Pray for those preparing for their vocations: priests and religious in formation, and couples preparing for marriage.  Pray for the faithful living of all holy vocations in the world as a way to build up the kingdom of God.  And third, live your own vocation – whatever it may be – well.  When we do that, we’ll never have to worry about a priest or religious shortage, because if we all live our vocations faithfully and in holiness, then that witness will provide vocations of every kind to build up the Church.

    It’s all about the violence, and the voice.  God cared enough for us to rip open those heavens and come down.  And he continues to speak to all of us through our baptisms: “You are my beloved child; with you I am well-pleased.”

  • Friday After Epiphany

    Friday After Epiphany

    Today’s readings

    Today I used the readings from Epiphany because I was celebrating Mass with the school children.

    You know, I think it’s very important that we pay real close attention to where the wise men went, and what got them there.  These astrologers weren’t people who knew about Jesus.  But, as they told King Herod, they saw Jesus’ star at its rising, so they must have heard about Jesus somehow.  I just think that it’s interesting that as soon as they saw the star, they came to look for him so they could worship him.

    We know about Jesus, you and me, so we don’t have to spend a lot of time looking for him.  We know that he’s always present to us when we open the Bible and read about him.  He’s present to us when we come to church and celebrate Mass together.  He’s present to us when we receive the sacraments.  He’s even present to us when we gather together in his name for any reason.

    But sometimes, we can lose sight of him.  Sometimes we become selfish and so we shut others out, or bully them, or say mean things about them.  When we do that, we can’t see Jesus in them.  Sometimes we don’t make it to church to celebrate Mass on Sunday.  When we miss Mass, we don’t get to hear about Jesus in the Gospel or receive him in the Eucharist, or see him in the others who are gathered to pray.  Sometimes we go a long time without opening the Bible and reading it.  Then we don’t get to hear about how much God loves us.

    When we lose sight of Jesus, it can seem like the world is a very dark place.  We soon discover that shutting people out only makes us lonelier.  We soon discover that spending too much time thinking about ourselves instead of attending Mass and helping others and loving as we should, well that only makes us more lonely too.  Sometimes when people get too wrapped up in themselves, they can become depressed and the world seems very, very dark.

    And it’s then that we need a star, isn’t it?  Just like those wise men, those astrologers, looking up into the heavens, studying the stars and planets found a very special star, a star that told them something very important was happening, sometimes we need that kind of sign in our lives too.  And that’s when, maybe, someone comes along and says just the thing we need to hear.  Or maybe they are able to help us with a problem that’s been so frustrating for us.  Or maybe they invite us to come to Mass with them and sit with them.  When they do that, they give us some light, a kind of star, that guides us in the right way.

    And when we get that kind of light in our lives, we have to share it too.  Because that light comes from God himself, we’ll never run out of it by sharing it.  So sometimes it will be our turn to be the star for someone.  It will be our turn to say just the right thing, or help with a problem, or invite someone to Mass, or whatever they really need.  When we all start sharing the light of the star with others, our world doesn’t have to be dark any more.  It can be a very beautifully bright place, and it can help everyone to see the best in the world, the best in each other, and the best in themselves.

    At the end of the story, the wise men get a message in a dream, and they decide to take a different way back home to their own country.  When we have seen the light of Jesus, we too can be changed.  And when we’re changed, we might find ourselves taking a different way in life.  All we have to do is the same thing the wise men did: follow the star.

  • Thursday after Epiphany

    Thursday after Epiphany

    Today’s readings

    The feast of Epiphany is a celebration of the fact that Christian life looks like something.  Because Jesus has appeared on the earth and taken our own human form, because he has walked among us and lived our life and died our death, we know what the Christian Way looks like.  We know that the Christian life consists of embracing our humanity, with all its weaknesses and imperfections.  We know that it consists of living our own lives well, mindful of the needs of others, forgiving as we have been forgiving, and spreading the light of the Gospel wherever it is that God puts us.  The Galileans in the synagogue in today’s Gospel were amazed at Jesus’ speaking words of grace.  We too are called to do this so that all will speak highly of us and recognize in us the presence of Christ.

    Because Christ is still manifest among us.  Every encounter with someone else is an opportunity for Epiphany.  It is an opportunity for us to look for the presence of Christ in that other person, and for them to see Christ at work in us.  How we do that depends on the situation, certainly, but it must always be our top priority if we are eager to be called Christians.  John’s words in the first reading are clear, and are words of indictment on those times we forget to be the Epiphany to others: “If anyone says, ‘I love God,’ but hates his brother, he is a liar; for whoever does not love a brother whom he has seen cannot love God whom he has not seen.”

    Christ is made manifest in all of us and among all of us.  In the ordinariness of our lives, we can find Christ’s grace abundantly blessing us, or we can reject it.  If we make it our priority to be Christ’s presence in the world in every encounter with a brother or sister, we may find that we are blessed with epiphany upon epiphany, constantly growing in God’s grace.  This is all part of our faith, of course, and it is this faith, as John tells us, that conquers the world.

  • The Epiphany of the Lord

    The Epiphany of the Lord

    Today’s readings

    I’m going to make things pretty simple today.  If someone asks you what my homily was about, you’ll be able to sum it up in just four words: “Walk toward the light.”

    And that’s good advice, I think, for us who walk around in what can be a very dark world.  Today’s first reading speaks of that darkness: “See, darkness covers the earth, and thick clouds cover the peoples…” We’re not talking about some kind of simple darkness that is cured by simply turning on a lamp.  This darkness is pervasive, not just physical darkness, but a darkness that has psychological effects, and even affects communities and nations.  When Isaiah speaks of the thick clouds covering the peoples, that’s what he means: “peoples” means nations.

    And we don’t need to look too much farther than the newspaper or evening news to see that darkness.  The year ahead of us might seem rather foreboding.  I took my mother shopping in the pre-Christmas days, and as I drove through the shopping areas, I wondered what they’d look like in a year.  The economic downturn is a very dark place for so many people right now.  The wars raging in the Middle East, in Afghanistan, Iraq and Africa, all over the world really, those are dark places for combatants and non-combatants alike.  And let’s not even begin to speak about the scandal in the governor’s office and politics in general.  There’s plenty of darkness to go around, and it doesn’t seem like there’s enough light in all the universe to make it better, to illuminate that darkness, to help us to break free of it all.

    There may be darkness in our own lives too.  Maybe we have patterns of sin of which we cannot seem to break free, maybe there are family difficulties that cloud our day-to-day living, maybe there are old hurts among family or friends that prevent us from moving forward in grace.  Even our own personal and spiritual lives can be such dark places at times.

    Today’s Liturgy acknowledges all the darkness and invites us: “Walk toward the light.”

    Because the light that we have to scatter all that darkness comes from God himself.  Isaiah says again: “but upon you the LORD shines, and over you appears his glory.”  A darkness as pervasive as the one that covers all peoples takes a very bright light to scatter it.  Does this mean that all that darkness will go away immediately?  Of course not.  But it does mean that God has provided a way, lit up a path, for people of faith to take baby steps if necessary to walk toward that light.  We see that light in the Church, through the Scriptures, in the Sacraments, in our celebration of the Eucharist, in our interaction with each other as people of faith.  Those thick clouds may make it pretty hard to see at times, but ultimately they are no match for the bright light of the glory of the Lord.

    Isaiah goes on to point out that all that light isn’t intended just for us.  When we have approached the light, we need to share that light with others.  “Nations shall walk by your light,” Isaiah says, “and kings by your shining radiance.”  Having received the light of the glory of the Lord, we are meant to spread it over our corner of the world.  We are meant to radiate that light as a beacon in a dark place, so that all peoples – all those peoples that were covered by those thick clouds of darkness – can see their way to the Lord too.  We spread that light by changing our lives.  We spread it by being people of integrity.  We spread the light by paying it forward, by giving of ourselves, by having concern for those in our lives and those the Lord puts in our lives.  We spread the light by reaching out to those in need.

    And what is wonderful is that spreading the light never leaves us in the darkness.  There is always more light to shine on us.  Listen to Isaiah again:

    Then you shall be radiant at what you see,
    your heart shall throb and overflow,
    for the riches of the sea shall be emptied out before you,
    the wealth of nations shall be brought to you.

    The glory of the Lord is never diminished by shining on others.  In fact, when we share that light with others, we only receive more, so that our hearts are throbbing and overflowing, beholding all the riches that we could ever hope to find.  We may find a talent we never knew we had, one that can reach others for Christ.  We may find a new energy that comes to a spiritual life that was previously rather listless.  We may find new challenges, new opportunities, and always new grace.  The riches and wealth of our God is never exhausted.

    All we have to do is walk toward the light.

    The word “epiphany” means “manifestation.”  Today, and in the next couple of weeks, we will see Christ’s lordship manifested in a few different ways.  Each of these epiphanies will call us to a deeper appreciation of who Christ is in our lives and a deeper reflection on our own discipleship.

    The light that we walk toward today is very-likely life-changing.  The Magi came to seek the light in today’s Gospel reading.  All we get from Matthew is a description of the encounter.  But we have no idea what the encounter did in the lives of those wise astrologers.  We don’t know how it changed them, what it cost them, where it ultimately led them.  We see that the light was not intended just for the Jews, but also for all of the nations, pagans and religious people alike.  All could come to the light, all could be affected by the light, all could experience the true light of the world.

    And in just the same way, we have no idea how walking toward the light will affect us.  We don’t know how it will change us, what it will cost us, where it ultimately will lead us.  All we know is that, coming to the light, we will be changed, with the promise of grace upon grace.  Just as the Magi were led to return by another way, we too might find ourselves taking another way in our lives.  Epiphany is not the end of the story; it is just the beginning for us. What difference will what is manifested to us today make in our lives?  Will we accept the one who not only lies in a manger as a newborn, but will also be rejected?  Throughout this liturgical year we will hear Jesus’ preaching, observe his works, follow him to his death and then experience his resurrection.  We will be exposed to the light many times and in many wonderful ways.  It will be a year of many epiphanies for us.

    May this coming year find us walking toward the light countless times and in countless ways, and open to the many riches of grace that the Lord has in store for us.

  • Ss. Basil the Great and Gregory Nazianzen

    Ss. Basil the Great and Gregory Nazianzen

    Today’s readings

    St. Basil the Great was born in Caesarea in Cappadocia in the year 330.  He was known for his learning and virtue, and his fight against the Arian heresy.  He also wrote many wonderful works, the most revered of which is his monastic rule.  He is known as the father of Eastern monasticism.  Gregory Nazianzen was born in the same year.  He too pursued learning and was eventually elected bishop of Constantinople.  Basil and Gregory were friends, and Gregory reflected on their friendship in a sermon, of which I’d like to share some excerpts this morning.

    “Basil and I were both in Athens. We had come, like streams of a river, from the same source in our native land, had separated from each other in pursuit of learning, and were now united again as if by plan, for God so arranged it.

    “I was not alone at that time in my regard for my friend, the great Basil. I knew his irreproachable conduct, and the maturity and wisdom of his conversation. I sought to persuade others, to whom he was less well known, to have the same regard for him. Many fell immediately under his spell, for they had already heard of him by reputation and hearsay.

    “Such was the prelude to our friendship, the kindling of that flame that was to bind us together. In this way we began to feel affection for each other. When, in the course of time, we acknowledged our friendship and recognized that our ambition was a life of true wisdom, we became everything to each other: we shared the same lodging, the same table, the same desires the same goal. Our love for each other grew daily warmer and deeper.

    “Our single object and ambition was virtue, and a life of hope in the blessings that are to come; we wanted to withdraw from this world before we departed from it. With this end in view we ordered our lives and all our actions. We followed the guidance of God’s law and spurred each other on to virtue. If it is not too boastful to say, we found in each other a standard and rule for discerning right from wrong.

    “Different men have different names, which they owe to their parents or to themselves, that is, to their own pursuits and achievements. But our great pursuit, the great name we wanted, was to be Christians, to be called Christians.”

    Like John the Baptist in our Gospel today, Basil and Gregory sought to point the way to Jesus, the one among us whom people do not recognize.  It was their goal to help all to come to know him rightly, to make straight the way of the Lord.

  • Mary, the Mother of God

    Mary, the Mother of God

    Today’s readings

    bluemarMy mother has a lot of stories about me as I was growing up.  Some of them are funny or interesting, others are just a little painful or embarrassing.  I suspect your mother has or had stories like that about you too.  My mother tells the story about me as a toddler.  I don’t remember the story, obviously, but she thinks it’s pretty funny.  Now, anyway.  Apparently at that time, my parents had a habit of sneaking out of Mass after Communion.  I know nobody here would do such a thing, but they did.  So one day, if you can imagine this even possibly happening, I was making kind of a fuss – no way, right?  My dad picked me up to go to the back of church.  As we were headed to the back, I said in kind of a loud voice at a rather inopportune pause in the priest’s homily, “Are we going to get coffee cake and donuts now?”  As impossible as this story is to believe about me, this is the story that my mother kept and reflected on in her heart!

    But Luke tells us of all the amazing things that were observed and said about Jesus, even in his infancy, and all these things are what Mary kept and reflected on in her heart.  I think it’s fair to say that she probably didn’t understand all of them at the time, or at least she didn’t know where they were leading, although she certainly knew that her son was someone very special, the Son of God.  And so she keeps all these things and reflects on them in her heart.  She is the first, really, to receive the Gospel – observing it, as it were, as it was happening and unfolding.  And so she is the model for all of us hearers of the Word; we too catch little phrases or episodes that we later reflect on in our hearts.  When we first hear them, it might well be that we don’t understand them.  But we know that we can later reflect on them in our hearts, and the Holy Spirit will reveal their meaning.  Mary is the model for all of us hearers and lovers of the Word of God.

    The Church gives us this wonderful feast of Mary on this, the octave day of Christmas.  In a very real way, the Church still celebrates this day as Christmas day – that’s one of the wonderful things about being Catholic.  We don’t have to cast off Christmas with the wrapping paper; we get to celebrate for many days.  But to celebrate the eighth day of Christmas as the feast of Mary, the Mother of God is a wonderful and appropriate thing to do.  We all know that if Mary hadn’t said “yes” to God’s invitation and cooperated with his plan for her, that salvation history might have gone rather poorly, to say the least.  We are indebted to Mary’s faith, a faith which made possible the salvation of the whole world and everyone ever to live in it.

    More than that, Mary’s faith is a model for us.  We often do not know where God is leading us, but in faith we are called to say “yes” anyway.  We are often called upon to take a leap of faith, make a fiat, and cooperate with God’s saving plan for us and others.  Just like Mary, we have no way of knowing where that might lead us; just like Mary, that might lead to heartache and sorrow; but just like Mary, it may lead to redemption beyond belief, beyond anything we can imagine.

    And so, yes, Mary is the Mother of God.  And let me tell you, this was a doctrine that didn’t come without its own price.  People fought over whether a human woman could ever be the mother of God.  How would that be possible?  But the alternative, really, would be to say that Jesus was not God, because we clearly know that Mary was his mother.  So to say that Mary was not the Mother of God is to say in a very real and precarious way that Jesus was not God, and we know just as surely that that would be incorrect.  Jesus was fully human but also fully divine, his human and divine natures intertwined in his person without any separation or division or degradation of one nature at the expense of another.  And so, as theologians teach us, Mary is the Mother of God the Word according to his human nature.

    But Mary is also the Mother of the Church, leading its members to her son Jesus and to faith in God.  She is mother of priests, caring for us in a special way and interceding for the faithful completion of our mission.  She is the mother of mothers, interceding for them and showing them how to nurture faith in their children.  She is the mother of the faithful, showing us how to cooperate fully with God’s plan.  She is mother of scripture scholars and those who just love the scriptures, having seen the Word unfold before her and treasuring it in her heart.  She is the mother of disciples, having been the first of the disciples and the most dedicated of them all.  She is the Mother of God, and our mother, and we cannot sing our Christmas carols without singing her praises too.  We honor her faith and example today, and we ask for her intercession for our lives, our families, our Church and our world.

    Pray for us, o holy Mother of God, that we may be made worthy of the promises of Christ.