Care from the Heart

The green vestments I am wearing indicate, if we weren’t already aware, that we are now back in Ordinary Time. In fact, we’ve been in Ordinary Time for a few weeks, ever since Pentecost Sunday. We’re only now switching to green vestments though because on the last few Sundays we’ve celebrated some special feasts that come this time of year: the Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity two weeks ago, and the Solemnity of the Body and Blood of Christ last Sunday.

There’s one more special feast that often gets overlooked, and that’s because it’s celebrated on a Friday – the Friday of this past week, in fact. The Solemnity of the Sacred Heart of Jesus is sort of the crowning feast of this time of year, and perhaps for that reason, the month of June has long been associated with devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus. The history of that devotion is too long to get into here, but briefly, in the modern form is roots date from the 17th century. Figures like St. Margaret Mary Alacoque and St. John Eudes, and groups like the Society of Jesus, helped to popularize the devotion of the Sacred Heart of Jesus and its basic message – that in the Heart of Jesus we see the depth of God’s love for his people.

In today’s Gospel, we hear more about Jesus’s Sacred Heart, and how it is moved with pity at those who are “troubled and abandoned.” Rather than merely feel compassion toward the crowds, Jesus acts to help them. He sends out select disciples to go and minister in his name, giving them the authority to preach, to heal, and to sanctify. And we are told the name of these twelve men, who are called apostles, which means “one who is sent.” They are the twelve apostles who will be Jesus’s closest collaborators throughout his ministry, and indeed the ones who will be charged with continuing that ministry in and through the Church.

In other words, the Gospel today tells us it is out of the compassion and love of Jesus’s own heart that he has called and sent ordained ministers to serve his Church. And that is still true today. Those who are trusted with ordained ministry – whether it’s the original twelve apostles; or their successors, whom we call “bishops”; or their collaborators, the presbyters; or the special servants that we call deacons – Jesus calls and sends all his ordained ministers to care for his flock with compassion – with love, and not just with their own imperfect love, but with the love of his Sacred Heart.

Sacred Heart of Jesus (1767) by Pompeo Batoni

I’ve found sometimes that there’s a danger when a member of the clergy starts talking about ordained ministry. It can come across as self-serving, as self-glorifying. Certainly we all know that there are some clergy who have sought to serve themselves, mistreating or even abusing the flock entrusted to them for their own gain. But the reality is that the majority of us clergy whom the Lord calls do what we do not for ourselves, but for you. We try to respond to the Lord’s command to sanctify, teach, minister – not because it’s all about us, but because it’s all about *you* and the Lord’s love for you. I think sometimes this basic point gets missed when we gather here on Sundays – how everything that is done here is done because of Jesus’s love for you. The Lord calls the priest and deacon to proclaim, to preach, to consecrate, to bless – all so that you can go forth from here to minister to the world.

And that’s the final takeaway for today. What Jesus gives you, he also asks you to share: as he says at the end of today’s Gospel, “without cost you have received, without cost you are to give.” Jesus loves you, and has compassion for you, and has sent his ministers to care for you, so that having been made holy, you will then go and share those gifts with others. We who are ordained ministers do that for you, the lay faithful. And you are called to do the same, in your own way – in your homes, in your places of work, in your families, in every aspect of your life. The Lord sends you now to those who whom you know who are troubled and abandoned, that they too might receive his care and love. In this way, the Lord is sanctifying all the world, making for himself what God foretold to Moses: “a kingdom of priests, a holy nation.”

Friends, as we prepare to celebrate the Eucharist, let’s remember that it is the transforming love of Jesus that has gathered us together this day. And, as priests and people alike, let’s focus ourselves anew on what the Lord has called us to, and what he sends us to do – to preach, to proclaim, to sanctify, each in our own way, always with the love and compassion of his Sacred Heart.

Believing in Love

It is a pleasure to be here with you all on Trinity Sunday. Today’s feast happens to fall this year on the first Sunday of June, a month which in recent years has become associated with cultural dialogues about love, identity, and the authentic nature of self. There’s a lot that could and should be said about those cultural dialogues and about how they relate to our lives and our Catholic faith. But for the moment, perhaps it’s enough to say that these themes of love and identity are at the heart of today’s feast – not only in terms of how we understand ourselves but in how we understand God. Allow me to explain what I mean.

The reading we just heard was short – only three lines taken from the Gospel of John, the first of which was: “God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him might not perish but might have eternal life.” This passage, John 3:16, is maybe the most famous in all of the Bible, and rightly so: it sums up perfectly, in his own words, Jesus’s identity. He speaks these words to the Pharisee Nicodemus, who has come to him at night in search of answers about who he is. And Jesus gives them to him: he is the Son of God, sent so that we might believe in him and thus receive salvation rather than the condemnation we deserve by virtue of our sins. Jesus’s presence among us, the whole reason for his coming, is due to love: the love of God for human beings.

How important it is for us to return to this idea again and again! So often our understanding of God, and our ideas about religion and faith generally, can become sidetracked into other things. We might even wonder, “Does God love me? Does he care about what I am going through?” And the answer is YES – God himself, in the person of Christ, tells us today that his love is at the root of everything. The foundation of God’s entire focus toward us human beings is saving love. And the reason for that is because God himself *is* love, as we know from the First Letter of John. That’s what we celebrate today in the Solemnity of the Holy Trinity. Who God is, is Love – a communion of Love, between the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. And as God reveals his own identity to us, he also invites us, amazingly, to participate in that identity: we as mere human being can come to know the divine love of the holy Trinity, be caught up in it even now, and even share in it forever in eternal life.

But if all of that sounds great, here’s the challenging part: where do we see God’s love most clearly and visibly? In the Cross. In the history of Christian art, some of the most frequent depictions of the Holy Trinity are with Jesus on the Cross, with the Father and the Holy Spirit above him, showing him to the viewer. That’s because more than any of Jesus’s sermons, more than any of his miracles, more than anything else he does, it is his suffering and death that reveal the depth and totality of God’s love. Jesus makes reference to this in the same dialogue with Nicodemus that our Gospel passage comes from. He says that we human beings are asked to believe in the love that is revealed when the Son of Man is lifted up – in other words, when he Jesus will be raised up on the Cross. It’s in the Cross of Christ that we come to know and believe in the saving love of God, the love he has for sinful humanity.

The Most Holy Trinity (1625) by Guido Reni 

And this is important for us, too, because if it’s true that we sometimes lose sight of love as being at the heart of who we are and what we believe, it’s also true that we too often think of love in some way other than how God reveals it – the love of the Cross. You and I experience love in all kinds of ways. We know it through our families, through our friends, through love of the world and what is in it, even through a proper love of ourselves and our own identities, unique among creation. But all of these loves, good as they may be in some way, also must be purified. Because we exist in a fallen world, and because we are ourselves are fallen, our loves can be distorted – they can distract us from or even lead us away from true Love itself, Love with a capital L, which is the love that Jesus has revealed on the Cross. This is the love that God has for us, but it’s also the love that he calls us to have – to imitate, to strive for, and to be purified in our own manner of loving, so that our love may be ever more fashioned in the love of the Cross.

Perhaps we might think today about how we think of love: love as an abstract idea, as a cultural touchstone, and above all love as it is lived out in our lives and the lives of those we know. And perhaps we might each ask ourselves: How are my notions and experiences of love rooted in the love of God? Are my loves self-serving, or do they try to imitate and be purified by the sacrificial love that God has revealed for me in the Cross? How can my ways of loving myself and others be directed not toward earthly ends but toward sharing one day in the eternal love of the Holy Trinity?

To answer these questions, my friends, surely all of us, in some way or another, must seek out Jesus, like Nicodemus did, and find in him again the authentic identity of what it means to love. This month of June that we have begun has for centuries been the month dedicated to the Sacred Heart of Jesus – the devotion which sums up everything I’ve said. The love of God, the love that is his very identity as Holy Trinity, is revealed to us in the Cross of Christ. He continues to love us now, and with the continuing love of his Sacred Heart, he calls us to encounter the love of the Cross, to believe in it, and to conform our own ways of loving to it. 

May the Eucharist that we celebrate this day help us to experience anew the saving love of the Holy Trinity, so that by our own sacrificial, Christlike love we may be led to eternal life.

The Goal of Heaven

May, traditionally, is known as the month of the Blessed Virgin Mary. And so it is appropriate to honor her in different ways in these days with special prayers and devotions and customs. For example, many people focus on praying the rosary each day of this month, and many parishes have a May Crowning to recognize Mary as queen of heaven and earth. That tradition may come from the fact that for centuries the last day of May was the Feast of the Coronation of Mary, although now that day is celebrated in August.

Since much of May falls during the Easter season, we also remember in this time that Mary is in heaven, body and soul, because of the Passion, Death, and Resurrection of her son Jesus. And today we celebrate the second to last feast of the Easter season, the great Feast of the Ascension. Jesus, as God and man, is himself the union of heaven and earth. But when he ascended, he brought what is earthly – our human nature – into the very place of God’s true presence. And in so doing, he paved the way for mere human beings to follow him – Mary, the saints, and eventually, we pray, us.

The notion of going to heaven is one that probably sounds familiar to us. Most Christians are aware that that is what we should be aiming for and what we hope awaits us at the end of our life. Perhaps the true danger in this day and age is presuming that everyone, or nearly everyone, will surely make it there, and assuming that certainly we ourselves at least will. With that assumption in place, then, heaven often just recedes from our daily focus, and becomes something of an implicit expectation that in reality we don’t think of too much.

Frankly, this is not really what the Lord wants or expects. Having gone ahead of us, Jesus wants us to make joining him in heaven the ultimate goal of our lives and the daily purpose behind everything we do. Think for a moment about all of the dreams and hopes and aspirations that people have, that you probably have: a good education, a successful job, a rewarding career, hobbies that you enjoy, a sense of purpose and fulfillment, a life partner who makes you happy, the blessing of children and grandchildren. All of these things are good and beautiful, and they are not in themselves contradictory with the Christian life. But it’s also true they aren’t the *goal* of the Christian life either – no single one, or even all of them together, are the purpose for which we were created or the ultimate goal of our daily existence. That is, and should be, getting to heaven.

Ridolfo Ghirlandaio, Coronation of the Virgin with Six Saints [detail] (1504)

It’s important, of course, to know how to get to heaven. Jesus tells us in today’s Gospel, just before he ascends to heaven: to make disciples of all nations. It is obeying this commandment that will bring us to where the Lord is. And so, everything we do should be about following Jesus ourselves, and about giving a sign to others of how to do the same. But the first step in living this out is learning to yearn for the goal we are striving for. Think of Mary, again: after Jesus ascended to heaven, she surely was a sign to others of the Good News of Jesus. How could she not be, as Jesus’s Mother? But surely she did all that she did because she desired to be with him again in heaven. How much she must have ardently desired that, at every moment – how much it must have been the singular purpose for everything she did! And as we know, that goal that was in her heart was rewarded at the end of her life when she was taken body and soul into heaven and crowned by her Son.

Friends, as we celebrate today Jesus’s Ascension into heaven, let’s ask ourselves how ardently we are yearning to join him there. The other plans and purposes of our lives can be good, and we can strive for them too, but never to the detriment of our ultimate goal of reaching heaven. And if Jesus should ask us to give up one or more of them in order to reach this goal, how greatly will he surely reward our earthly sacrifices with heavenly joys, just as he did for his Mother. O Blessed Virgin Mary, Queen of Heaven and Earth, pray for us!

Still With Us

Happy Mother’s Day to all. A few days ago, I was watching the nightly news, and at the end of the segment, the anchor went out into Central Park to ask a few kids about Mother’s Day. He asked them why we celebrate our moms and what they were preparing to do for the day. Finally, he asked them what word best describes their moms. One child said, “kind.” Another said, “caring.” One kid though responded, “stressed.” I bet he’ll never hear the end of that.

Whether as kids or as adults, at some point we all realize that our moms aren’t perfect. But we love and appreciate them anyway: because they love us, and they do their best for us, to nurture us, to teach us, to support us – no matter how old or gray we might get. So much of what we experience and how we see the world is shaped by what our moms have given us, how they have formed us, how they have made us who we are. That’s why we can say truthfully that they are always with us. No matter how physically separated we are from them – even when they pass from this world and await us in the next – they are with us.

In today’s Gospel, Jesus uses similar language to describe God’s fidelity and love. We are used to thinking of God in masculine terms, because that is how he has revealed himself to us: a Trinity of Persons, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. But we might also say that God’s love exhibits many of the same traits as those we admire in our mothers, only to a far greater extent. Even more than our mothers, God has formed us and given us life; he nurtures, teaches, and supports us; and he desires to be so connected to us as to always be with us. In fact, as we hear Jesus tell us today, God’s love is such that he gives his very self to those who believe in him, such that he dwells in them and they in him.

Jesus lays out how this works at the Last Supper, the context for our passage today. He explains to the disciples that he is about to go away from them, to enter into his Passion, Death, and Resurrection. At the same time, those very same events – what we call the Paschal Mystery – also become the means by which he remains with his disciples. We say that our mothers are with us always because of their profound influence on us, but God, because of his all-powerful love, actually does remain with those who love him. The proof of that love, Jesus explains today, is following his commandments. If we follow what Jesus has taught us, God reveals everything of himself to us and dwells within us by means of the Holy Spirit.

The Supper (19th cent.), Sebastian Winterhalder Workshop, Germany

Notice the clear causal connection: in order to receive this gift of God with us, we must love the Lord, and this is shown by being faithful to his commandments. In other words, loving Jesus is not primarily about having any particular sentiment; it’s about what we *do* – the way we live, and the purpose and intention for how we live. This is the most important reason to obey the precepts of our faith, to follow the teachings of the Church, and to strive to be more faithful each day – not because we make ourselves holy by following commandments, but because the Lord has promised *he* will make us holy if we do. He will give us the Spirit, who will enlighten us further on how we are to live, and he will dwell within us, giving us a share in his life that goes beyond the grave.

We give thanks for our mothers today, and rightly so. We think about the ways they have shaped us, and we recommit ourselves to doing our best to living out what they have taught us. The same should be true of us in relationship with God, only to a far greater extent. The Lord Jesus promised not to leave us orphans, but to remain with us, if we remain faithful to him. If he were asked to describe in one word how well we are living out his commandments, what would it be? “Well-intentioned”, “inconsistent,” “stressed”? Let’s strive today, as best as we can, to live out his commandments perfectly, proving our love for him anew each day, knowing that he will do his part – sending forth the Holy Spirit to give us peace, encouragement, and love.

Friends, as we prepare to receive the Sacrament of the Altar, we recognize that in the celebration of this mystery, the Paschal Mystery becomes present anew – and so too the Lord himself comes to be with us. Following his commandment to do this in memory of him, may we become aware of how his words are fulfilled in this very Sacrament: “Whoever has my commandments and observes them is the one who loves me. And whoever loves me will be loved by my Father, and I will love him and reveal myself to him.”

Open Wide the Doors

A few weeks ago, many of our priests and deacons gathered together at the diocese for our continuing education days, which we have twice a year. In one of the sessions, our speaker focused on the Gospel that we just heard, and he asked us to identify which word stood out to us – one single word. Was there a word that stood out to you? I can see some of you searching back through your missals right now. Don’t worry, I won’t call on you.

The word that immediately jumped to my mind then, and did again just now, is the word “locked”. Twice we read in this Gospel passage that the disciples were behind “locked doors.” At first, that might seem like an odd or irrelevant detail. We are dealing with the major events of Jesus’s death and apparent resurrection. What does it matter about the doors?

Sometimes, a good storyteller will include a detail which seems insignificant but which is in fact clues us in to what is really going on – and Saint John the Evangelist, the author of our today’s account, was a really good storyteller. By telling us that the doors were locked, what he’s really doing is telling us about the interior dispositions of the disciples. They were afraid, and more than afraid – closed off, shut down, locked away from everything outside of themselves. They were fearful of those who had put Jesus to death, they were fearful perhaps of further betrayal and division among themselves, and they may even have been fearful of Jesus himself – who, if he was risen, would perhaps surely be less than pleased that they had abandoned him in his time of need.

However, as we hear, locked doors are of no concern to the Risen Christ – not the physical doors that he passes through easily, nor the closed off doors of the disciples’ hearts. Twice he breaks through both because he desires to be *with* his disciples. He desires, as we hear, to stand in their midst, to show them his glorious victory, and to communicate to them his peace, a peace stronger than fear and death. The Lord’s peace is accompanied with the presence of the Holy Spirit, that heals and restores the friendship he has with his disciples, and which prepares them to be sent to communicate that same peace to others.

Image of the Divine Mercy (1982) by Robert Skemp

We might say that this peace that Jesus gives is also known to us by another name: Divine Mercy. Our celebration of the Sunday of Divine Mercy comes a week after Easter Sunday, at the end of our eight-day Octave of Easter, as a reminder that it is only in and through the Paschal Mystery of Jesus – his Passion, Death, and Resurrection – that God’s mercy is extended to us. We can have true peace, we receive Divine Mercy, because of what Jesus has done for us, and because in his new and risen life, we too are raised to something higher. Not only is our individual relationship with the Lord transformed, but also our relationship with all those to whom the same gifts are given. That’s why at Mass we exchange a Sign of Peace – offering it to each other as an expression of the grace of forgiveness that the Lord has given to us and which we freely extend to each other.

The peace of Jesus is also the instrument by which he opens the doors to our locked hearts. In one of the most famous images of Divine Mercy, he stands in front of a closed door, as if he has just passed through whatever was keeping him out. The season of Easter is a good time to reflect upon our interior dispositions – our fears, our anxieties, the sources of resentment and hardness of heart – and to pray intentionally for each of those things to be unlocked by the transforming forgiveness of the Risen Christ. Jesus can overcome any obstacle, any barrier that stands between us and him, and often he will break through them in a surprising way to show us the power of his love. And the same time, the Lord would prefer if we willingly open the doors of our hearts, welcoming him with faith and joy. Whatever our fear or anxiety, he urges us to remember those immortal words of Saint John Paul II, “Be not afraid… Open wide the doors to Christ!”

Friends, let’s reflect upon where we can do just that. Let’s ask ourselves, in the joy of this Easter season, “How can Jesus unlock new life for me? Where do I need to hear again his healing words of peace?” May this holy season be a time of renewal in our friendship with him, days of our continuing education in our discipleship, so that the merciful power of the Risen Lord may open wide our doors – to him and to all. “Peace be with you,” he says to each of us. “As the Father has sent me, so I send you.”

The Master Has Need of You

Palm Sunday is the only day of the year in which we hear two Gospel readings at Mass. We tend to focus on the reading we just heard, the narrative of Jesus’s Passion and Death. But it’s such a powerful reading; maybe it’s better to let it speak for itself. Perhaps a better way to enter into Holy Week is to take a moment to reflect upon the Gospel at the beginning of today’s liturgy, the story of Jesus entering into Jerusalem.

In that reading, we heard that before Jesus makes his way into Jerusalem he sends two disciples ahead of him to find an animal for him to ride in on: in Matthew’s account, a colt and a donkey. And Jesus tells those two disciples that when they are asked by the animals’ owner what they are doing they are to say, “The Master has need of them.” 

“The Master has need of them.” Interesting – Jesus is in need. He who is going into Jerusalem to fulfill his Father’s will, he who as God and Man is at the brink of undoing the ancient evil of sin and death and throwing open the doors of heaven, is himself in need of something first. The whole drama of God’s plan of salvation hinges upon those willing to cooperate with what the Lord needs.

James Tissot, The Foal of Bethpage (c. 1890)

And so it is still today. The Lord’s plan of salvation has been accomplished, but Jesus is still unfolding his redemption in the world around us. And he does so asking us to cooperate with him, asking us to bring him what we have because he has need of it. He has need of our generosity, our material goods, our work and our service, to bring help and healing to those in need, such as those who suffered damage and devastation from Friday’s storms. He has need of our mercy and our compassion, to help heal divisions, to bring peace to the brokenhearted, and reconciliation in homes and in families. He has need of our teaching, our example, our commitment, to give witness of our faith to the world, especially to our young people. In some way, the Lord calls each of us this week to do something for him, to be at his disposal, so that his work of redemption can take place in a fuller and deeper way. Even if we feel we have nothing we can give – even if we ourselves are suffering and in need – the Lord asks us to bring him our faith, our perseverance, our trust, so that even our emptiness can become a sign of his fullness.

Friends, as we listen this week to hear how the Master sends us, to see how he has need of us, let us also recognize our need for him. The meaning of this Holy Week – the whole point of our celebrating it – hinges on whether we realize anew how much we need Jesus’s redemption and so enter again into his saving mysteries. “Hosanna to the Son of David; blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord. Truly He is the Son of God.”

Rule of Three

Have you ever heard the saying, “Bad things come in threes”? Sometimes it seems like personal challenges, unfortunate events, even the passing of loved ones or celebrities come in threes. At the same time, we can also think of trios of good things. For example, the Declaration of Independence speaks of the inalienable rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. At the heart of our Christian life are the three theological virtues of faith, hope, and charity. Lately, I’ve been craving a good BLT – bacon, lettuce, and tomato sandwich. Probably only because it’s Lent.

But it turns out that the truth is not so much that things happen in threes but rather that is how we humans process what happens. Scientists say that our minds are naturally inclined to grasp information and concepts that come in threes, and so this Rule of Three, as it is known, is used by those who want to convey information to others – marketing executives, public relations professionals, and yes, preachers. If you noticed, I’ve used the Rule of Three so far in this homily, first by giving you three examples of bad things, then three lists of good things, and finally three groups of people that follow the Rule of Three.

In the Gospel today, Jesus is tempted by the devil three times. Considering the fact that he was in the desert for forty days and nights, he probably experienced more temptations than that, but we are told about these three specific instances. Perhaps that’s because they were the most insidious moments of temptation, or perhaps because they were the ones that came at the end of his time at the desert. Or maybe it’s because for some reason our minds can grasp these temptations and also how Jesus resisted them. That’s why the Church always gives us the story of Jesus’s trials in the desert on the First Sunday of Lent – not to focus on the deceptive words of the devil, but instead to understand how to imitate Jesus in recognizing and rejecting temptations. Let’s take a closer look at each of these temptations, but let’s do so while also considering another example of the Rule of Three: fasting, almsgiving, and prayer. If you came to Mass on Ash Wednesday, you heard Jesus speak about these three penitential practices and the particular way that he wants us as his disciples to do them. I think there are clear connections we can draw between those three penitential practices and how they can help us in moments of temptation.

The first attempt of the devil is to try to lure Jesus into giving in to his hunger by turning stones into bread. This temptation is rooted in the sensual desires of the body: our human appetites for food, drink, sleep, sexual desire, and leisure. These inclinations are part of our humanity, but they can go awry, and often we are tempted either to overindulge in these pleasures or to satisfy them in a way that is not in accord with the higher purposes of our souls. It is even possible for human beings to becomes slaves to our basic animal instincts, such that we ignore the spiritual calling that God gives to each of us.

Jesus resists this first temptation by continuing to do that which he was already doing: by fasting. He tells the devil, “One does not live by bread alone but on every word that comes forth from God.” Jesus would eat again eventually, of course, but at the moment he was focused on denying his bodily appetite for food in order to increase his spiritual reliance upon God. You and I need food to live, but we are not mere animals; we are not slaves to sensual pleasure. We are rational creatures with immortal souls, who survive not only by the desires of our bodies but also by the attitudes and orientations of our hearts. When our appetites for food, sleep, sexual desire – or for alcohol, social media, TV or internet, hobbies or entertainment, or whatever else – when these begin to go awry, fasting can help us to reengage with the God who has created us, redeemed us, and made us for himself. By fasting, we say “No” to the temptation to be dominated by the desires of our bodies in order to freely say “Yes” in a new way to God.

The second temptation is the devil’s attempt to have Jesus throw himself down from the parapet of the temple, telling him the angels will surely save him. This temptation is more subtle than physical desire; it’s an invitation to pridefulness and seeing the world through the lens of our own ego. When our day to day lives are focused on the satisfaction of our own wills, and if our relationships with others are mostly framed around the way in which they are beneficial to us, then we are probably falling victim to this temptation. This kind of pridefulness can even tempt us in our relationship with God, if we believe that he will always favor us in everything we do in this life and never permit any challenge or suffering to befall us.

Jesus rejects this temptation by telling the devil not to put God to the test. In other words, our reliance on God needs to be deeper than the childish attitude of demanding he prove his love for us. When we are inclined toward making ourselves the center of the universe, or even the center of our own universe, it’s a good moment to practice some self-denial, and giving alms can be a helpful way of doing this. The purpose of almsgiving is more than just giving money to the needy. It’s about remembering that all that we have is really a gift from God and that he will continue to sustain us in precisely the way we need, without asking him to constantly prove it. Almsgiving decreases our overdeveloped attention to ourselves and increases our focus on both God and neighbor.

Ilya Repin, "Get Behind Me, Satan!" (1895)

In the final temptation, Jesus is shown all the magnificent kingdoms of the world. He is told that these will be given to him if only Jesus bows down in worship to the devil. This temptation is maybe the most devious, the most insidious. This is the classic “deal with the devil,” in which we are told that all of our human desires will be fulfilled if only we hand over our souls. This temptation sometimes manifests itself in greed, or in the temptation to power, and it is connected to the previous temptation, to pridefulness and ego. But at its heart, it’s rooted in the willingness to seek our ultimate fulfillment in something or in someone in this life, rather than in God and in eternal life with him.

Jesus’s response to this last temptation is very straightforward: God alone is to be worshiped and served. In a sense, this is the answer to every temptation. Every day we are tempted to sin, sacrificing sacrifice some lesser good for the ultimate good of eternal life with God. In this way, we are always being tempted to worship something in place of God. That’s why prayer must have a principal place in our lives every day, a time and a location in which we can remember that the God of our lives is not possessions or pleasure or power or prestige, nor is it any person in our lives, except the God of Jesus Christ. Fasting and almsgiving are important, but my own view is that prayer should be the most important spiritual practice that we focus on, especially in Lent. By the worship of God, in our private prayer and in the liturgy, we place God in his proper place at the center of our lives.

Friends, as we start this Lent, we are all being tempted in some way or another, and we will continue to be throughout these forty days. The devil wants to distract us from using this time to deepen our dependence upon God. When those bad things come, remember the Rule of Three. By the penitential practices of fasting, almsgiving, and prayer, we can arm ourselves against temptation and resist it when it comes. Just as Jesus did, so too he teaches us to do, for he is also present in those moments of temptation, always giving us the strength we need to fight off the devil. May the graces of this Eucharist assist us in striving well in this Lent to rely upon God, to trust in his love, and to worship him alone.

A Syllabus for Heaven

I am happy to be here celebrating Mass with you today, and it feels great to be back at a university parish. There was a time in my life several years ago when I was basically always on a college campus: I was pastor at St. Thomas Aquinas parish at the U of A in Fayetteville, and during those four years, I was taking graduate classes during the summers at the Catholic University of America in Washington, DC. I remember those years with a lot of fondness, and so I feel at home in coming back today to a university parish.

The second semester is now well underway, and if memory serves, it’s around this point in the calendar when the newness of the schedule is wearing off, the excitement about particular classes is staring to fade, and reality is beginning to sink in about the work that lies ahead. It is also around this time that professors, perhaps after hearing students gripe something unexpected on the first quiz or test, utter that famous phrase: “Well… did you look at the syllabus?”

Ah, yes, the syllabus – that document that professors make a big deal about, but which often goes overlooked by students. Who has time to read those things anyway? But it is true that they contain a lot of important information: what the course will teach, what the professor expects of the students, and especially what will be covered on the final exam.

In our Gospel today, we hear Matthew’s account of the Beatitudes. Ah, yes – the Beatitudes, those pithy sayings of Jesus that every Christian knows by heart but which often go overlooked in practice. Who has time to understand what they really mean anyway? And yet, they are important, or else Jesus would not have begun his Sermon on the Mount with them. They are so important that I think we might say they are something like the syllabus of Christian life. The Beatitudes tell us what this course of following Jesus will teach us, what he as our Teacher expects of us his disciples (the word means “students”), and most importantly, what he will judge us on at the close of our lives.

Let’s take each of those three things in turn. First, the Beatitudes show us what we will learn by following Jesus. To be a disciple of the Lord means to allow ourselves to be taught. And not just taught new information, as if knowing things were all it takes to be a Christian, but instead a whole new way of being. The tired, old ways of the world, in which we grasp and claw to claim whatever we can for ourselves, in competition with everyone else and even with God for what we think we are owed, in order to try to create just a bit of peace or security before our short lives are over – that approach no longer serves. Instead, we are taught to hope for something greater: a share in the kingdom of heaven – and by the gift of grace, we are made able to share in it even now, albeit in a limited way. The Beatitudes remind us that there is a reality beyond the here and now, but that we can begin to live for it right here and now.

Sermon on the Mount (1437) by Fra Angelico

They also tell us what Jesus expects of us. If we are going to live for the higher reality of the kingdom to come, then we need to see ourselves as fundamentally oriented toward something different than what the world offers. That’s why to be a Christian means to be a countersign to the world, and even to how our fallen natures sometimes incline us to be. So that we are not confused about exactly how, the Beatitudes spell it out for us: to seek to be poor, rather than rich; to be meek, instead of proud; to be merciful, not grudging or vengeful; to be clean of heart, unpolluted with the corruption of worldly passions; to pursue peace, in place of what divides. And doing all of this, we will encounter resistance, even persecution and slander. The Beatitudes tell us as much. But rather than be sorrowful or lose hope when such things happen, Jesus tells us to rejoice, in spite of our sufferings, *because* of our sufferings, for they are signs that we are on the right path in following him.

Finally, the Beatitudes describe the coming reality of the kingdom of God. And so, it is fair to say, I think, that we have in them a little preview – call it a study guide – of what Jesus will look at when we stand before him at the close of our lives. In the personal judgment that happens at our deaths, and again at the final judgment at the end of all things, we believe that the Lord will evaluate our lives and see whether we have truly learned what he taught us and whether we have put it, by his grace, into practice. For any student, the thought of any final exam probably brings at least a little trepidation, but for the Christian disciple, this is a good thing because it means we can remember to attend to what we need to do now in order to reach the kingdom to come. The Beatitudes in this way make for a great examination of conscience, one to continuously come back to, and one to pray with, so that we may ask Jesus the Good Teacher to instruct us anew.

Friends, I hope this coming semester and all the semesters you have here on campus are good ones. Remember that the Lord calls us to follow him in university life as much as anywhere else. In the ups and downs of our Christian discipleship, let it not be said that we don’t know what the Lord wants from us. Just as students have a syllabus, so too we have the Beatitudes: to guide us, to give us hope when we are discouraged, to challenge us when we become too comfortable, to pray with and ponder now so that we will be ready for that final evaluation when we meet the Lord face to face.

May the graces of this Eucharist help us live out the Beatitudes here and now, and by them be ready for the kingdom to come.

Verbum Domini

As you know, a few weeks ago the Church mourned the death of Pope Benedict XVI, who was Bishop of Rome from 2005 until 2013. Some of that time span also happened to be when I lived in Rome studying theology, and perhaps partly for that reason, I have always had a special affinity for Benedict XVI. Not that I didn't love and appreciate St. John Paul II before him, or Pope Francis now, but there was something about the thought of Benedict that always resonated with me.

One of the big events that happened soon after I got to Rome in 2008 was the Synod on the Word of God – a meeting of bishops from around the world to discuss how Catholics should approach the Bible. The other seminarians and I, as students of theology, were delighted that it was Pope Benedict who had called such a meeting, and we read with great interest his reflection on Scripture that followed that synod. In Verbum Domini, or “The Word of the Lord,” he reiterated a theme that had long been part of his theology, from his early days as a seminary professor all the way through his papacy and even beyond: that in Sacred Scripture we encounter the living Word of God.

The 20th century saw a lot of innovations in the study of Scripture, many of which were good. We learned more about how the texts of the Bible were composed, about their different literary forms, and about the historical and cultural backgrounds of their authors and their audiences. For all the positives of this new knowledge, one of the disadvantages was that many people – even many Christians – began to see the Bible as just another human text. It lost, for them, its sacredness and its value as a guide for our lives. Pope Benedict, throughout his career, resisted this impulse. While appreciating the new insights that modern scholarship had given us, he also reminded Christians that the Biblical texts were written from the vantage point of faith. Their human authors wanted to communicate to us in their writings something essential about God and our relationship with him. Even more importantly, God himself also speaks in Scripture: through the inspired words of the human author, we hear God’s word – what he wants to communicate to us for our salvation.

Today, we celebrate the Sunday of the Word of God, a chance to reflect upon the value of Sacred Scripture for our faith. It was Pope Francis who called on the Church to do this each year on the Third Sunday of Ordinary Time, but I’m sure it’s an endeavor that his predecessor Benedict agreed with. In the Bible, God speaks to us – and his Word is as living and effective now as it was when it was first written down. In Scripture, he really has something to say to our lives, right here and now, if only we will open ourselves to his Word.

How do we do that? Allow me to share a few recommendations that might help you in reading the Bible.

• First, don’t be intimidated. It’s true that some parts of Scripture are hard to understand, but sometimes we can use that as an excuse to never even try. There can be a lot of spiritual fruit gained from just diving in, especially in those books that are more straightforward like the Gospels or the Acts of the Apostles or the Psalms. Even if you don’t understand every word, your faith will be deepened and expanded in important ways.

• Second, if you find something challenging or confusing, consult what the Church teaches about it. We believe that the Scriptures, the written Word of God, has been entrusted to the community of faith to be interpreted and safeguarded, so it is in and through what our Church teaches that we understand what Scripture really means. One of the best resources for this is the Catechism, the compendium of the teachings of our faith, but there are other great Catholic resources out there, too – books, study courses, podcasts, apps, and more. They can help you to break open Scripture and understand it in accord with our Catholic faith.

• Third, don’t forget that the most important way we encounter Scripture is here, in the liturgy. Pope Benedict, in that document I mentioned earlier, Verbum Domini, said that “the liturgy is the privileged place for the proclamation, the hearing, and the celebration of the word of God.” Each time we come to Mass, we encounter God’s living Word, and specifically those parts of it that the Church has given us to reflect upon and be nourished by, both in the readings and in the prayers of the Mass. Try to read the readings for Mass at least a couple times during the week before Sunday comes around. See what jumps out at you, what intrigues you, what connections you make with other things that you have heard in previous weeks, and I guarantee your experience at Mass will be the richer because of it.

Friends, in today’s Gospel, we hear the words of the Lord Jesus, calling his listeners to repentance and beginning to call the disciples to follow him. In the reading of our Bibles and the listening of Sacred Scripture in the liturgy, we also hear the “Verbum Domini,” the Word of the Lord speaking to us, inviting us to a more faithful discipleship. Let’s renew today our commitment to encountering the Lord in his written Word, and to letting that Word enliven our prayer and worship, especially here at Mass. May the Sacrament of the Lord’s Body and Blood that we will soon receive help us to hear his living Word and give us the grace to respond.

He Who Takes Away Sins

It is nice to be with you for Mass today. I especially am glad to be here to let your pastor return for a visit to his home country.

I often fill in for priests around the state, but during the week my full-time job since last summer has been working at the diocesan offices in Little Rock. One of the things I do there is work with our diocesan newspaper, Arkansas Catholic, as its theological consultant. Mostly that means I provide information or give an interview on various topics, but this past week, I had the chance to write a short reflection for an upcoming issue. It was about the legacy of St. Francis de Sales, and if you don’t know that name, I won’t go into too much detail here; you can read the article in the paper next week. Suffice to say, he was a wise pastor, a patient teacher, and a compassionate confessor – everything you want in a priest.

Reading about the life of St. Francis de Sales was inspiring, but it also made me very much aware of my own flaws and shortcomings as a priest. It’s hard to measure up to a literal saint, but reflecting on his life I can see more clearly how I *should* be. Perhaps you’ve experienced something similar in your own life – a friend that you wish you could be more like, or a coworker who can easily do all the things you can’t do, or even someone in your family who possesses the very gifts and characteristics that you most desire.

When it comes to the ways that we would like to improve, we might tend to think most often about those qualities that relate to our day to day. But we should also think about the spiritual dimension of our lives as well – about our identities as Christian believers and Christian witnesses in the world. In our psalm today, the psalmist says, “Here am I, Lord; I come to do your will.” When God formed us in the womb, he created each of us with a purpose, with a particular plan to discover and fulfill in our lives. And by virtue of our baptism, that purpose finds its deepest meaning in the person of Jesus Christ and in the family of faith which is the mystical Body of Christ, which we call the Church.

This past Monday we celebrated the Feast of the Baptism of the Lord – a feast that reminds us of these things, and that we normally celebrate on a Sunday. This year, it got bumped to a Monday for reasons that relate to the calendar that I won’t elaborate. But while we didn’t celebrate that feast day together this year, our liturgy today is still connected to those themes. We are reminded in these early days of Ordinary Time of a few important things: first, that each of our lives has been changed through the sacramental encounter we have with Jesus, beginning with our baptism; second, that through our encounter with Christ, we have been made holy and we are called to further holiness through a relationship with God and his Church; and third, that as part of that relationship, something is asked of each of us. Like the prophet Isaiah discovered in our first reading, the Lord has charged us to carry out his will, to be not only his servants but his beloved children, entrusted with helping bring his light to others.

And perhaps, as we begin a new year and a new season in the Church, we need to first honestly admit that often we forget these things and fall short of that higher purpose God has given us. We need to confess that we give into sinful temptations and tendencies, and we don’t always form ourselves and our families to follow the teachings of the Lord and of his Church, and we don’t give the best example to others of what it means to live a life of authentic faith. It is good to own up to our flaws and shortcomings as Christians, not for the purpose of feeling down and depressed, but instead to see how the Lord invites us to begin again.

Bartolomé Esteban Murillo, Saint John the Baptist Pointing to Christ (c. 1655)

In today’s Gospel, we are reminded again of the way in which Jesus comes to encounter us. When John the Baptist saw him in the desert, he said “Behold the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world.” John the Baptist was a pretty holy guy – Jesus says elsewhere that, of those naturally born, no one was greater – but perhaps John was thinking in that moment, “Here comes Jesus, the One who takes away all my sins and failings, all the ways that I have failed to follow God’s will and not answered his call.” That’s the way that Jesus always first encounters us – to make us aware of our sins and shortcomings, and then to take them away, so that we can begin again, so that we can start anew.

Maybe this homily has brought to mind some of the ways that you want to start anew, just like I did when I was reading about St. Francis de Sales. But whether it’s in our family, or in our work, in our responsibilities, or our vocations, or the daily challenges and struggles that arise, we can be tempted to perfectionism – to think that it isn’t even worth trying unless we’re sure we won’t make a mistake. Pope Francis recently said, “Don't be afraid to make mistakes. We do not have to wait until we are perfect and have come a long way following Jesus to witness to him; no, our proclamation begins today, there where we live.” In other words, what’s important is that we make a new effort today, and with the Lord’s help another one tomorrow, and then each day onward until we find that we have, despite our sins and failings, accomplished the plan of God for our lives, just like St. John the Baptist, and St. Francis de Sales, and all of the saints who have gone before us in faith.

Friends, perhaps each of us can take the words of the psalmist as a point of reflection for today. Perhaps we can also say, “Here am I, Lord; I come to do your will.” Let’s reflect upon where we need to encounter Jesus, to come before him and to let him come to us. In just a few moments, we will behold him, not as John the Baptist did but instead under sacramental signs. Together we can ask him to take away not just the sin of the world but our sins, and so help us to have the courage to begin anew today in striving for holiness. May the grace of this Sacrament help each of us to do all that the Lord asks of us.