In these days after the Ascension, the Liturgy calls us to turn and find our hope in God. Even though he is unseen, he is still very much with us. He may be in the heaven of our hopes, but he also walks among us. We are sustained by the hope that we will join him one day in the place he is preparing for us. The world may very well scatter us and give us trouble; Jesus said as much. But we can take courage in the fact that Jesus has overcome the world and has not abandoned us.
Tag: Peace
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Tuesday of the Fifth Week of Easter
Paul was obviously a pretty tough guy. I don’t know about you, but if I barely weathered the storm of people throwing rocks at me and leaving me for dead, I might think twice about how I handled my ministry. That’s nothing to be proud of, but I think that’s part of fallen human nature. How blessed we are to have the saints, like Saint Paul, to give example of how to weather the storm and live the faith and preach the word. Indeed, if it weren’t for the grace-filled tenacity of those saintly apostles, we would very likely not have the joy of our faith today.
But contrast the storminess of Paul’s stoning with the wonderful words of encouragement and consolation we have in today’s Gospel reading: “Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give it to you. Do not let your hearts be troubled or afraid.” We can think of all sorts of situations in which these words would be welcome. We have all experienced health problems in ourselves or in those close to us, job difficulties, family problems, and so many more. How wonderfully consoling it is to know that in the midst of the many storms we daily face, our Savior is there: offering us peace.
But the peace Jesus offers us in this reading is a bit different from what we might expect. It’s not the mere absence of conflict, nor is it any kind of placating peace the world might offer us. This peace is a genuine one, a peace that comes from the inside out, a peace that calms our troubled minds and hearts even if it does not remove the storm. There is a contemporary song that says, “Sometimes he calms the storm, and other times he calms his child.”
God knows that we walk through storms every day. He experienced that first-hand in the person of Jesus as he walked our walk in his earthly life. He knows our joys and our pains, and reaches out to us in every one of them with his abiding presence and his loving embrace. He was there for St. Paul when he was being stoned, and he is there for us too. His presence abides in us through the Church, through the holy people God has put in our lives, through his presence in our moments of prayer and reflection, and in so many ways we could never count them all. This peace from the inside out is one that our God longs for us to know, whether we are traversing calm waters or braving a vicious storm.
We pray, then, for the grace to find peace in our daily lives, the peace that comes from Jesus himself.
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Wednesday of the Third Week of Easter
As Catholics, we believe that opposite things don’t necessarily cancel each other out. For instance, we believe, as our first reading today illustrates, that we can have joy in the midst of sorrow. The early Community found themselves severely persecuted. Saul, for whom God had future plans, was currently doing his best to destroy the Christian Way, and he was not alone. Many suffered and died as St. Stephen did in yesterday’s reading, and others were exiled from their homes. But even in the midst of that, St. Philip was doing Christ’s work quite successfully in Samaria. There was great joy in that city. To some, that would seem so contradictory and out-of-whack. But for us, we know that this is how life is. There is sadness, and there is joy, and all of it is a gift in some way. Even today, some of us may have sadness, and others joy. May we experience it with peace as the early Community did.
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Monday of the Third Week of Easter
So they drag Saint Stephen before the Sanhedrin, and make all sorts of false claims against him. Sounds familiar, doesn’t it? In fact, Stephen is in good company. He is brought to the same place where his Lord Jesus, and later Peter and the apostles, have gone before him. And just like all of them, even with all the lies and accusations flying around him, he is at peace. The source of his peace, is of course, his Lord who has gone before him, that same Lord who now fills him, as the first line of the reading says, with “grace and power.” We too, will be tested in this life because of our faith. We too, can rely on that same grace and power if we unite ourselves to our Risen Lord.
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Easter Thursday
I’m trying to get a picture of how the disciples were feeling at this point. Prior to today’s Gospel selection, the women found the empty tomb, Peter has seen the Lord, and the two disciples had experienced him in the breaking of the bread on the way to Emmaus. Their minds were most likely reeling with excitement; trying to get a grip on the things he had said to them while he was still with them. I’m sure they were trying to figure out what all this meant, what they needed to do next.
I think that’s why the Lord’s initial words to them are “Peace be with you.” And it doesn’t work, because they think they’re seeing a ghost. After he eats some fish and speaks to them of the Scriptures, he sends them on mission with the words: “You are witnesses of these things.”
The peace that Jesus gives them is not the absence of conflict. That they will be witnesses to the fulfillment of the Scriptures will be anything but peaceful for them. They will have to make sacrifices – sacrifices of their very lives – to witness as Jesus calls them to, but there is no other choice. They are now beginning to understand the significance of what has happened among them, and they must go forward to do what they had been chosen to do.
When we have to make the decision to follow God’s call in our lives, we too will have to sacrifice. Not our lives, probably, but we will have to sacrifice our own comfort, our control over our own lives, our own point of view. But just like the disciples, we must remember what we have been chosen to do, and follow where we are being led.
We are witnesses of these things too, we are called to live and proclaim the Gospel. May we too receive the peace of Christ that we might focus on our call.
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Tuesday of the Fourth Week of Advent: Come, O King of all the Nations
We hear a similar song from Hannah and Mary today. In fact, many Biblical scholars suggest that the song of Mary we heard in today’s Gospel is a restatement of the song of Hannah that we have in today’s psalm. Whether or not that is true, it is clear that both women give birth to a child by the grace of God, and both women’s sons are destined for greatness. Samuel’s strength is a foreshadowing of the strength of Jesus Christ who will overcome sin and death.
Samuel becomes a great king, but it is Jesus who becomes King of all the Nations, which is the title of Jesus we celebrate in the “O Antiphons” today. The verse from vespers prays, “O King of all the nations, the only joy of every human heart; O Keystone of the mighty arch of man, come and save the creature you fashioned from the dust.”
Today we anxiously await the strength of Christ, King of all the Nations, the only joy of every human heart. He alone can save us from our sins. He alone can unify the hearts of all humankind, putting to an end, once and for all, the sad divisions that keep us from the communion we were always meant to have with one another.
And so we pray, Come, O King of all the nations. Come, be our strength, be the One who leads us in the ways of righteousness, be the joy of every heart that seeks you. Help us to find the peace that only you can bring. Come, Lord Jesus, come quickly and do not delay!
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Memorial of 9-11-01
Today’s readings
I think many of us will never forget where we were eight years ago today. People say that about the day that President Kennedy died, or the day when the space shuttle Challenger exploded. But in a particular way, I think we will never forget September 11, 2001, because it was a day that changed our world in some very unpleasant ways and shattered whatever remained of our innocence. Traveling and doing business has changed so much in these years. So many of us have known people who have died in the twin towers, or in the war that has raged since.
I remember the weekend following that horrible day. I came home from seminary to visit with my parents, and we came here to church to pray. The church was packed, on a Friday night. And I know that in every church in America, pews were full every day and every weekend for quite a while. Look around now, though. Where is everyone? Now that the world isn’t going to end as fast as we thought, do we no longer need God? Or have we grown weary of the war that has been fought since and the changes in our world and just given up on God?
I think that as the war continues, and the lack of peace seems to continue, and the somewhat subdued, now, but ever-present sense of terror continues, it might just be time for us to do some examination and to discern what has led to that sense of unrest. Today’s Gospel gives us the examination of conscience that will help us to do that. What precisely is the plank of wood in our own eyes that needs to be removed before we can concentrate on the splinter in the eye of another? What is it that is un-peaceful in us that contributes, in some small but nonetheless very real measure to the lack of peace in the world?
We all have to do that on an individual basis to start with. St. Paul does it in our first reading today when he admits to his friend Timothy, “I was once a blasphemer and a persecutor and an arrogant man…” And he acknowledges with deep gratitude and profound humility how God changed his life, had mercy on him, forgave him his sins, and gave him charge over one of the most significant evangelical and missionary ministries in the history of the world. We, too, are blasphemers, persecutors and arrogant men and women, and it is time for us to humbly acknowledge that and urgently beg from God the grace to turn it around, that all the world might be turned around with us.
But we also have to do this on a communal basis as well. We don’t go to salvation alone; that’s why we Catholics don’t get overly excited about having a personal relationship with Jesus. For us, a personal relationship with Christ, is like that first baby step; once we’re there, we know that we cannot rest and admire our work. A personal relationship with Christ is certainly a good start for us, but we know that we have to be faithful in community or nothing truly great can ever happen. So it’s up to all of us together to work for true peace, figuring out what in our society has led to unrest and mercilessly casting it out, opening ourselves to the peacemaking power of God that can transform the whole world. Together, as the Mass for the Feast of Christ the King will tell us, we must work with Christ to present to God “a kingdom of truth and life, a kingdom of holiness and grace, a kingdom of justice, love and peace.”
I get a little worked up when I think about this kind of thing, because I’ve come to realize this is the only way it’s all going to get wrapped up rightly. Only when all the world has come to know the saving power of our God will we experience the return to grace that we lost in the Garden of Eden. And that will never happen until all peoples have learned to love and respect one another, and have come to be open to the true peace that only God can give us.
It didn’t all go wrong on 9-11; if we are honest, that horrifying day was a long time coming. But that day should have been a loud, blaring wake-up call to all of us that things have to change if we are ever going to experience the peace of Christ’s kingdom. We are not going to get there without any one person or even any group of people; we need for all of us to repent if any of us will ever see that great day. Today, brothers and sisters in Christ, absolutely must be a time when we all hear that wakeup call yet anew, and respond to it from the depths of our hearts, both as individuals, and as a society.
Truly we will never forget where we were on that horrible day of 9-11. But wouldn’t it be great if we could all one day look back with fondness, remembering with great joy the day when we finally partnered with our God and turned it all around?
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Sometimes He Calms the Storm
This is the song I refer to in this weekend’s homily. Scott Krippayne, “Sometimes He Calms the Storm.” You can get it on Amazon.com
or iTunes.
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Memorial Day
Today’s readings: Isaiah 32:15-18, Philippians 4:6-9, Matthew 5:1-12a
Memorial Day originally began in our country as an occasion to remember and decorate the graves of the soldiers who died in the Civil War. Later it became a holiday to commemorate all those who had died in war in the service of our country. This continues to be the main focus of Memorial Day but this day has also become a time to remember not just those who died in war, but also all of our loved ones who have died. It is above all a time to remember.
One of the aspects of human nature is that we tend to look for heroes. People we can look up to, who have buoyed our spirits in difficult times, who have turned our attention to the best parts of our humanity. These are the people we wish to emulate, the people who bring us hope in a darkened world. The problem is, the heroes our popular culture would give us tend to be pretty unworthy of the title. How many political heroes have turned out to be corrupt? How many great athletes have given in to drug abuse? How many entertainers have done horrible things to people close to them? We need true heroes on this day, and every day.
Maybe the ones we should look to are not people who are great from afar like all those other flawed characters of popular culture. Maybe we should look a bit closer, to loved ones or people in our communities who have done great things. People who have sacrificed for the good of others.
On this day we especially look to those who have been heroes in war. People who have given their lives for peace, justice, and righteousness. The beatitudes that we just heard in the Gospel proclaim them blessed: blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, blessed are the peacemakers, blessed are they that are persecuted for the sake of righteousness. We have heard these before, but it’s so important that we hear that these people are blessed, these people are true heroes because of what they sacrifice and stand for and fight for.
I am hardly the person who is going to glorify warfare. I think our Church’s teachings counsel that war is not the way to peace and that developed societies like ours can and must use our resources to seek other ways to solve problems. But I certainly acknowledge that there are and have been times in our nation’s history that have called on good people to fight for our freedoms and to fight for justice. Today we honor their memory with immense gratitude, because without their sacrifice we might not enjoy the blessings we have today.
Those who have been part of our lives, and the life of our country, who have been people of faith and integrity are the heroes that God has given us. These are the ones who have been poor in spirit, who have mourned, who have been meek, hungry and thirsty for righteousness, merciful, peacemaking, and all the rest. If we would honor them on this Memorial Day, we should believe as they have believed, we should live as they have lived, and we should rejoice that their memory points us to our Savior, Jesus Christ, who is our hope of eternal life.
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Tuesday of the Fourth Week of Advent: O Emmanuel
“Lift up your heads and see; your redemption is near at hand.” So says the psalmist today and all indications are that that psalmist is absolutely right! Even the last-minute shoppers are starting to panic, there’s only one door left on the Advent calendar, and our Advent wreath is fully ablaze with all four candles lit. But more than that, the psalmist is right about our redemption. God has chosen to be near us, he has chosen to become flesh and dwell among us, he is Emmanuel, God with us.
That’s our “O Antiphon” for today – “O Emmanuel” – and we sing it in the very first verse of “O Come, O Come Emmanuel.” Israel may mourn in lowly exile, indeed we might all be mourning the incompleteness of our lives, or the pain we experience, or the sadness that this world can bring us. But none of that is able to overcome the joy of our God, our Emmanuel, being one with us and leading us through the Cross to the Resurrection and eternal life. The Son of God has indeed appeared and will appear again.
And so we rejoice at the nearness of our God, we rejoice that grace and peace have come to us, we rejoice that we are not what are sins may appear to make us, we rejoice that there is eternal life, that there is grace, and peace for all men and women of the earth.
In these last hours before Christmas, we need to all take a few minutes to stop all the preparations, to put aside the cookie-making and gift wrapping and all of the other preparations just for a while. We need to make that quiet space within us so that Christ can be born in us again, so that we can be filled up with the love he wants us to share, so that the peace on earth we desire can be born within our hearts.
O Emmanuel, our king and our lawgiver,
the hope of the nations and their Saviour:
Come to save us, O Lord our God.
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