BUT WHAT ABOUT ME?

INTRODUCTION

The title of my homily for this Trinity Sunday - Year C -  is, “But What About Me?”

Today we celebrate the feast of the Holy Trinity. But what to say about the Trinity?

When I hear today’s Psalm 8, I can picture the moon and the stars. I can picture the birds of the air and the fishes of the sea – especially seeing those whales that were trapped in the Sacramento river in California – and the efforts to get them out to the ocean. But when I hear the word, “Trinity” – what do I picture?

Should I go the way of the poet, Scott Cairns, who wrote the following when it comes to the Trinity: “when addressing Second Person Quite / Singular – if Triply so – the less one says the better”?

Yet the less we say about God, the more God screams, “But what about Me?”

RELATIONSHIPS

To get glimpses of God, instead of a triangle or a shamrock, I would say, “Think of the me!” Better: “Think of the we!” Best: “Think of relationships.” I have found reflections on the human need for relationships one of the best ways of getting closer to God. Reflect on one’s relationships – one’s connections – with one another.

When all is going well – when we are connecting well with spouse, parents, kids, family members, friends, co-workers, neighbors, we are feeling good, better, best.

In fact, when our relationships are going well, we often don’t notice them. But when we do, when our relationships are going well, we are experiencing God in a wonderful way. The Kingdom of God is on our face – because it’s in our soul. It shows up in our step and our smile.

The Christian theology about God is that God is relationship. God is a Trinity of Persons. God is 3 persons in one God. Isn’t that interesting? Would anyone have ever come up with that understanding of God – unless Christ revealed it?

Judaism’s great message and teaching is that God is one.

Christianity’s great message is that there are 3 persons in this one God. This is total mystery. God is one, but God is not alone.

The Christian church went through centuries of heresies and struggles, councils and creeds, to formulate as best as they could this mystery. We are only in the 2nd Millennium. We have no idea how long this story will continue, how it will develop, or how many millenniums there are to come.

Based on our history, we can assume there will be great minds to come – men and women who will give us new insights into God. Using scripture and tradition, we simply say, Christian theology states that God created all of this – and in God’s good time, the Word became flesh and lived amongst us.

Somehow, Jesus is both God and human – one person – with two natures.

And those of us who follow Jesus try to relate to him and by relating to him we move further and further into the mystery of God – into a deeper relationship with God: Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

In Christ, with Christ, through Christ, all this happen.

That’s our belief. It’s deep. It’s heavy. It’s mysterious. It’s something that calls for our faith and acceptance. Doubts and “I don’t get it” are normal aspects of the faith journey.

It also means living by faith. It means many dark nights of the soul – epiphany moments now and then – and the call to more and more trust in the love of a three person God for us.

MADE IN THE IMAGE AND LIKENESS OF GOD

The Book of Genesis says we are made in the image and likeness of God. And the Christian message, the Christian call, is to build relationships: to build community, family, church, to get along with one another, to share daily bread with each other – to be concerned with those who are being neglected or hurt and to bring them into the human network.

The Christian message is to talk with each other, eat with other, enjoy each other, work with each other, pray with each other, play with each other.

Ponder today’s first reading – where the author of one of the sayings in the Book of Proverbs pictures God planning, dreaming, imagining, drawing, creating, playing – building this vast and wonderful universe we experience every day.

Then when we do the same in union with God and in union with each other, we are being one with God and with each other – in relationship.

TWO MOVEMENTS

In relationships we experience many moments and many movements. Here are two:

The first is like this: [Two hands going forward.] It’s like being in a car with someone – driving along seeing and talking about all that is in front of us as seen through the front windshield of a car.

Relationships often work this way. A couple can be married and have this type of relationship for years. [Two hands going forward.] This can happen especially when the focus is: Kids, Kids, Kids.

The second movement is like this: [Two hands face to face.] It’s like turning off the motor and facing each other. Or going into a restaurant and seeing each other face to face – eye ball to eye ball.

We do this second movement, especially when we feel there is a disconnect with another. Often it’s then that we say, “But what about me?” “But what about us?” “But what about God.”

BUT WHAT ABOUT ME?

The title of my homily is, “But What About Me?”

In our ongoing everyday interactions with each other, at work, at meetings, in marriages, in families – haven’t we all had a disconnect – a feeling of not being understood, in a relationship with another?

A disconnect is like a stop sign or a red light. We stop.

Sometimes it’s like a crash. It really stops us.

And we sit there feeling, “Uh!” We say, “Now what?”

We didn’t explain ourselves like we would have liked to have said it.

He doesn’t know what I’m saying.

She doesn’t know what I’m feeling – what I’m going through.

We tried – heavens know we tried – and it feels like hell at times – when others don’t grasp our content – our feelings – our desires – our wants. This can lead to a Black Hole in our soul. This can lead to tears. This can lead to loneliness. This can lead to wanting to hide – to leave – to run – to disappear.

Down deep we’re asking, “But what about me? Does anyone have a clue that I’m here, that I’m hurting, I’m needy, that I want to be heard.”

The “But what about me” question can be found in so many issues: money issues, running the house issues, sexuality issues, raising kids issues, use of time issues, family meals issues, work issues, watching too much television or using the computer issues, alcohol issues, etc. etc. etc. issues.

This is the stuff to talk about in relationships. This is the stuff of intimacy. This is the stuff of thoughts in the prison cell called “loneliness”.

This is the stuff of [Hand gesture: face to face] and the other doesn’t get what we’re trying to say – and afterwards we feel we are the only one in the car, the only one at the table, the only one in the relationship.

We think: Am I the only one that goes through these moments?

We wonder: Am I the only one who has these feelings?

I think these moments can give us a great chance to discover not only ourselves and the other or others we’re not connecting with, but also God.

Is God constantly saying, “But what about me?”

Listening to people as a priest, I often hear people asking that question in so many words. “But what about me?”

PRAYER

Is prayer sitting down with God face to face [Gesture] and saying, “Okay God, what about you? What do you want to say to me today?” And then we listen – not just in the Eucharistic chapel at St. Mary’s – or not just when we are driving along alone in our car – but anywhere and everywhere we pray.

Prayer is listening to God. Coming to church each Sabbath is telling God, I know you’re in my life. I want you in my life. Thank you for being in my life.

Is prayer sitting down with God face to face and saying, “But what about me?” When it seems that nobody really gets what I’m thinking or feeling, say to God in prayer: “Please understand me.”

And then we try to tell God what we’re trying to talk to ourselves about.

Prayer sometimes is the feeling that God knows I exist.

Prayer all the time is the feeling that God exists.

And once we know God is right there in the center of my life – right there in the center of my feelings of being misunderstood by another or others, we get a glimpse of what Christ must have felt big time big.

His disciples had no clue who he was.

He felt at times God his Father had abandoned him. Then the crowd turned on him.

Today people are not crucifying Christ – as much as neglecting him.

Yet Christ keeps asking, “But what about me?”

CONCLUSION

Once we spend more time in this kind of communion with Christ – once we grasp more and more of his pain, his question, “But what about me?” and we find out more about him, we then know more about ourselves – and surprise, we begin to really hear the reality of others – getting glimpses of who they are, their joyful, sorrowful, glorious and light bearing mysteries. Amen.