No Idols

The Trinity (c. 1562), Tintoretto

What would you say is the most terrible sin? Murder? Adultery? Theft? Certainly, those are all very bad. Perhaps some of us would say something more general, like: pride, or greed, or anger. Again, all very bad. 

However, none of those are the most terrible sin. If you look through the Scriptures, the most terrible consequences do not come from violence or lust or jealousy, but rather from the sin of idolatry. The sin that God becomes most frustrated with is the worship of other, false gods. That is why the very first commandment that God gives to Moses and the Israelites is, in a sense, the most important one: “I am the Lord your God, and you shall not have other gods besides me.” Before anything else, God wanted Israel not to fall into idolatry.

Unfortunately, it seems that Israel often did just that. The Old Testament is full of examples of times when God’s Chosen People abandoned him and began to worship the false gods of other nations. They did so for various reasons: because they felt God had abandoned him, because they felt they were safe and secure and didn’t need God’s help, because they became too friendly with those who held beliefs contrary to theirs. Each time, they turned their back on a relationship with the living God and worshipped idols made of wood and stone.

Today we celebrate the Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity. Each year, after Easter and Pentecost, as we begin Ordinary Time again, this feast reminds us that like the Israelites before us, we are called to worship the one true God. Believe it or not, idolatry is still a major temptation even in our day. While most of us are not tempted these days to worship statues made out of wood and stone, but we are tempted by idols of different kinds.

Some of us are tempted especially by the idol of worldly things: we are dominated by a driving desire for money or possessions, by having a taste for the finer things, by rationalizing away why we cannot contribute to the poor or support our church. Others of us are inclined to the god of pleasure: we want to enjoy all of the wonderful things about life and none of the bad, and whatever makes us happy in the moment is what we set our sights on, even if it is superficial, fleeting, or even deadly. Many of us surely are attracted by the idol of prestige: we love to be popular and can’t bear to be thought poorly of by others, and we will compromise our values or tear down others in order for others to think well of us.

These are just a few of the many idols that are out there. If we look hard enough, each of us will probably find that there is something in our lives that we are making a god out of something that is not God. In that case, what do we do? Like the Israelites, we turn back to the true and living God. Fortunately, for us as Christians, we have the benefit of knowing something the Israelites did not know, something which Jesus revealed to us: that God is a Trinity of Persons, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

In ancient times, people had to develop stories about deities to explain natural world and how human beings came to be. But as Christians, we do not need to invent mythologies to tell us about what really is, because God has revealed himself to us. The most fundamental reality of all – something beyond the galaxies and the stars, beneath the atoms and molecules and quarks, before all else that is – there is a communion, a Trinity, of relationship. The eternal Son of the Father, Jesus Christ, has revealed to us the love of his heavenly Father, and through the Holy Spirit, he has won for us redemption from sin and death and given us the promise of eternal. Now, we too can share in the life of the Most Blessed Trinity – through the presence of divine grace, and the power of the sacraments, we too can become part of that communion of divine love that is the Holy Trinity.

In our Gospel today, Jesus tells the disciples that he has been given all power, all authority in heaven and on earth. He sends them forth, commanding them to go and preach and baptize in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Jesus wants all people to come to know the relationship of love and communion that is the Holy Trinity, and even more than know it, to become part of it. He relies upon us to continue that work – to share with those who are worshiping false gods the experience and knowledge of the true and living God. This is not just the work of priests and bishops. It is the duty of every Christian to orient our lives in such a way that others see that what we value most is not possessions, or power, or prestige – not any idol, whether physical or spiritual – but a relationship of love with the true and living God.

Friends, as we celebrate this Trinity Sunday, we should examine our own lives to ensure have not abandoned the worship of the true God for the false idols of pleasure, prestige, or possessions, or any other thing. At times, we can be tempted to turn away from the Lord: because we feel he has abandoned us, because we feel secure and do not need him, because the views of others can influence our own. But those occasions of idolatry can be resisted, if we recognize when they happen and renew our act of faith we have made in the one true God. The Lord has revealed to us his own inner being – the communion of love that is the Trinity, which he invites us to share, and to which he calls us to invite others. May the true and living God – the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit – help us to always keep our hearts focused upon him, in true worship and praise, so that one day we may behold him face to face.

The Language of the Spirit

“What language do you speak?” 

I was asked that question a few years ago when I was traveling abroad in a country known for its multilingual citizenry. The lady working in the café was a bit amused at my poor attempts to speak French, the only one of the languages spoken there that I knew a little bit of. She looked at me quizzically and then asked me that question in English. Clearly, she was asking me to say whatever I was saying again, just in a different language.

Language is a funny thing. On the one hand, it’s essential to how we live, how we relate to the world. By language, we learn, we express ourselves, we communicate with each other. Language unites us; but it also can separate us. Because language shapes how we understand culture and history and daily life, it can lead to differences and even division. Certainly, we are all familiar here how in Northwest Arkansas, especially in our Catholic community, the fact that people speak different languages or come from different cultures creates challenges and sometimes even resentments, unfortunate as that is.

Language plays a very important role in the feast of Pentecost which we celebrate today. Gathered together in the Upper Room after Jesus’s Ascension, the Apostles, and the Virgin Mary, receive the Third Person of the Holy Trinity. The Holy Spirit, whom Jesus had promised to send, descends upon them like tongues of fire and immediately they are empowered in a fascinating way. Filled with boldness, they begin preaching throughout Jerusalem, and though they are all from the same region of Galilee, people from all over the world – people who spoke many different languages – hear their words and understand.

The miracle of the gift of tongues, as it is called, would have had a special significance for the Jews of the time. Remember the Tower of Babel story from the Book of Genesis? The men and women of the time desired to build a great city, with a tower reaching into the heavens, to make a name for themselves. But because they did so apart from God, they were left confused and divided, separated from understanding each other because of language, their work unfinished. At Pentecost, the apostles’ gift of speaking in tongues understood by all peoples is a kind of reversal of the sin of Babel. The apostles spoke in strange tongues, and yet they were understood, they were united to those with whom they were different. The language of sin and division which had separated humanity is reversed by the language of the Spirit. 

William Congdon, Pentecost 4 (c. 1962)

Such is the meaning of Pentecost. Throughout the year, we celebrate the way in which God is revealed to us: through the Incarnation of Jesus, through his Passion and Death, through his Resurrection. Finally at Pentecost, we celebrate that God has not just been revealed to us but also given to us, individually and collectively. By means of our baptism, our confirmation, by means of all of the sacraments, the Holy Spirit has taken up a dwelling place within us: within the Church as a whole and within each of us by grace. Why? So that we can speak, in a sense, a new language, a language not of confusion and division but one of peace, forgiveness, and love that unites and speaks to all people.

In the Gospel today, the Risen Jesus appears to the disciples and tells them that he is sending them out into the world. Such is the life of every follower of Christ – to receive the Good News of Jesus’s victory over death, and then be sent forth to share it. To do so we rely not upon our own efforts and powers, like the people of Babel, but upon the grace of the inner gift given to each of us, upon the Spirit active within us. With his gifts – wisdom, understanding, right judgment, fortitude, knowledge, piety, and fear of the Lord – we are sent forth as peacemakers, bridge-builders, healers, missionaries. We can converse in a language beyond mere human words and feelings and ideas; we communicate to each other the very presence of God.

So, my friends, what language do you speak? As we conclude this Easter season, take some time today to reflect upon the power of speech in your life. Think about how you use words at home, at work, to your spouse, to your coworkers, to your kids, to your friends. Try to look beyond the obvious. Ask yourself: “Am I someone who too often uses language for selfish, even sinful purposes?” – tearing down another, swearing, lying, complaining, participating in gossip? Think: “When others hear me, do they hear someone filled with the Holy Spirit?” – or do they hear negativity, fear and anxiety, bitterness? “Where can I be better in communicating the presence of God?” – by comforting another, by whispering a prayer, by teaching a child about Jesus, by gently correcting a friend who has started to gossip, by speaking words of kindness to someone who isn’t my favorite?

Jesus sends us out to share the Good News – just as the Father sent him, just as he sent his apostles. But we don’t have to travel to different lands and learn new languages to spread the Good News; we need only to begin speaking the language of love in daily life – the language of God’s love, the language of the Spirit who has been given to each of us and is active among us. Be a missionary for Christ – in what you say, what you do, how you live. “Come, Holy Spirit, fill the hearts of the faithful and kindle in them the fire of your love.”

Surprised by Joy

The Last Supper (1886) by Fritz von Uhde

One of the challenging things about becoming an adult is the diminished capacity for surprise. Spend a little time around a child and it is hard not to be impressed, and often amused, by the sense of wonder they have for all that is around them: they are amazed by the phenomena of the natural world; the simplest game or trick can entertain them for hours. It is a bit hard not to be jealous of the simple wonder of youth.

The good news is that, while they are a bit fewer and farther between, surprises do not disappear completely with adulthood. I often find that spending a little time in nature reawakens in me a sense of surprise. Spend a little time gazing at a tree or a flower and you can’t help but be amazed at all of the wondrous things around us. You may have to look for them for a little harder, but life still offers plenty of surprises.

In the Gospel today, Jesus surprises his disciples. He calls them “friends.” We might gloss over these words and miss their importance, because we would tend to think, “Of course, the disciples are his friends!” It is true that Jesus lived with his disciples, spent his time with them, and shared everything with them. But it is also true that they were not until this point friends in the way we typically think of them; he was the Teacher, the Master, the Rabbi, and they were the disciples. For Jesus then to call him his friends implies a change in relationship. Their following him is no longer about following commands – it is about understanding the mind of the Master, and as his friends, doing what he has done.

Jesus says to them, “I have told you this so that my joy may be in you, and your joy might be complete.” We might think that Jesus has come to teach us obedience, or devotion, or piety. But instead he says that his true purpose is to fill us with joy, and to make our joy complete. Indeed, he wants to give us his joy – the joy that comes from knowing the Father, and from being loved by the Father as the eternal Son. When Jesus invites his friends into his joy, it is a joy that cannot be taken away by any sadness or pain or suffering. Jesus spoke these words at the Last Supper, when he himself was at the brink of his own suffering and death – aware that in just a few moments one of these men whom he had called a friend would betray him and the rest would abandon him – and yet he was filled with joy because of knowing the Father’s love.

A few weeks ago, Pope Francis wrote a letter to every Christian entitled “Gaudete et Exultate” – “Rejoice and Be Glad”. I have been reading through it a bit lately. It is a series of reflections about the way in which God wants to inspire each of us to love, about the call to holiness that he calls each of us to. Pope Francis notes that too often we tend to think of holiness as piety, devotion, an overly strict sense of religiosity, when in reality it is simply living in authentic joy and holding on to that joy so that we can love more deeply. “Keeping,” he says, “a heart free of all that tarnishes love: that is holiness.”

As we come to the end of a semester at the university, perhaps it is a good time for each of us to reflect upon where our joy comes from. Do we feel the authentic joy that comes from knowing God, knowing of his love for us, and keeping that love free from tarnish? Or are we searching for something lesser? The Christian writer C.S. Lewis once wrote that the joy which comes from love is not the same as pleasure or contentment; those things are much more commonplace and unremarkable. True joy, he said, doesn’t come from “security or prosperity” or the satisfaction of any desire. Rather it is a feeling of childlike delight: it “jumps under one's ribs and tickles down one's back and makes one forget meals and keeps one (delightedly) sleepless o' nights.” True joy cannot be duplicated or bought or faked; it is authentic.

Friends, we may struggle at times to experience surprise as we get older, but there is one thing that should never cease to surprise us: that Jesus has made us his friends. Jesus invites us to share in his joy, to make our joy complete by the knowledge of the Father’s love. More than obedience of piety or devotion, the Lord wants our relationship with him to be one of friendship, one that is rooted in the joy of love. God’s love is given to us freely without cost, so that we can respond freely to love him. When we know the mind of Jesus as our Friend, then we can act as he did, and love as he loved. The holiness he calls us to is nothing other than loving, joyful friendship, and who does not want that? May the Eucharist that we will celebrate in a few moments be a confirmation of the Lord’s great love for us, and a foretaste of the authentic joy of the heavenly kingdom.
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