ONE NIGHT
HE HEARD SCREAMS

INTRODUCTION

The title of my homily is, “One Night He Heard Screams.”

Last night as I was preparing this homily I read something that grabbed me.

TODAY’S READINGS

But before I get to the grab, a little gab on today’s readings.

The readings for today got me into the question of anger and revenge – holding onto hurts and thinking we’re right and therefore sometimes better than others – feelings we feel from time to time.

I read about 6 commentaries on today’s readings – to get some background sounds – different takes by different folks on what the readings are getting at. Tough topic today. Good readings for today. I think today's readings are more manageable compared to last Sunday’s readings – especially last Sunday’s gospel – which had a splattering of themes from the Sermon the Mount.

Today’s readings talk about anger and grudges – and what true holiness and true wisdom are – the inside stuff – the inside sounds.

The first reading from Leviticus has a very strong warning: “Cherish no grudge!” Let’s be honest: we might not cherish our grudges – but we hold onto some grudges for life.

Question: what are my 3 top grudge memories? Are they from 3 different people or the same person? Are they alive or dead? Are they family members or outsiders? Or are they angers and grudges I hold against myself – sometimes called resentments and regrets?

The second reading from 1st Corinthians deals with thinking we’re wise, we’re right, without the hesitation: “Hey maybe I have this all wrong.” It also deals with an issue that hits many church communities – putting one person up on a pedestal and then putting other persons down.

Today’s gospel gets right into the anger issue.

I ask some people, “What is your weapon of choice?” When I ask that, they look at me strangely. So I say, “You know? Words, silence, withdrawal, sneaky sabotage or what have you? What is your weapon of choice?”

We’ve all heard the phrase that Jesus quotes in today’s gospel: “the eye for an eye and the tooth for the tooth” theory. That law – the Lex Talionis – actually cut down on violence – because sometimes when one person was killed their family or village would wipe out a whole village or family – in retaliation.

Jesus goes radical in today’s gospel. He urges his followers to turn the other cheek, to go the extra mile, and if someone wants to steal your wallet – give him your rings and things as well. He says, “Of course, we all like and love those neighbors who are easy and good to us. My call is to love your enemies and those you can’t stand or understand.”

Now that’s radical. Jesus is saying: that’s holiness, that’s love, that’s being perfect, that’s what our Father wants. That will bring peace to our world. He’s not telling us to be stupid –to go out and get mugged by walking down wrong streets at the wrong time of the night – but he is telling us how to end violence.

Hello! Take a look at the big cross up here. How many times has Christ looked at me from the cross and said, “Father forgive him because he doesn’t know what he is doing”?

ONE NIGHT HE HEARD SCREAMS

The title of my homily is, “One Night He Heard Screams.”

Last night in preparing this homily I read something in a book entitled, Violence Unveiled. I take it off my shelf whenever the gospels get into the issue of violence. The book is by Gil Bailie – a speaker I once heard in Chicago. He relies heavily on the work of Rene Girard. Gil Bailie said he was reading the autobiography of Whittaker Chambers and in it there is mention of a conversation Whittaker Chambers had with the daughter of a German diplomat who said her father was once extremely pro-Communist and pro-Soviet. Then he became disillusioned with the Stalin regime because he said one night in Moscow, he heard screams. (page 35)

That was all it took for his change – that was all it took for his conversion: screams – screams in the night!

THE BOSTON STRANGLER

That comment about the screams grabbed me – and as I thought about that – I understood why.

Now that usually doesn’t happen to me too quickly. Who knows why some line or scene in a movie, some comment someone said to us in college, some thing that happened to us in 1994, grabbed us?

It triggered for me the memory of a Johnny Carson show I was watching a long time ago. I think it was F. Lee Bailey, the lawyer, who was being interviewed. Johnny Carson asked him about big trials he was in on – and he immediately started talking about the trial of the Boston Strangler – Albert De Salvo – who was accused of being a horrible crazy murderer of women.

F. Lee Bailey said something like this: “If you heard what they did to this guy when he was a kid, you would not be as harsh on him as many were.”

For some reason that simple comment grabbed me and it has influenced me ever since to give those I hear labeled “horrible” – or “crazy” – a so called “second chance”.

I’d be interested in reading books on what made Stalin or Hitler tick.

I don’t know what the screams were in the Boston Strangler’s mind and heart and brain.

It’s the same message in the Native American saying, “Don’t criticize someone till you have walked a mile in their moccasins.”

I fail, but I try not to criticize anyone because I have not walked a mile in their sins. As priests, however, I’ve heard a lot of people tell me their sins and their screams.

DANGEROUS DRIVERS AND CRAZY CRAZIES

I tend to drive within the local speed limits. However, sometimes I’m in a rush because I get called or caught at the wrong time and I still have to get out here to St. John Neumann for the 8 AM or 12:10 P.M. weekday Mass. So I leave late. Then I find myself driving a bit quicker. It’s when this happens that I notice red lights feel longer and other drivers seem slower. I laugh – because that puts me into the bodies of those crazy drivers who seem to come shooting up behind me and then around me and seem so dangerous. I don’t know if they got trapped by someone else and are now late for work or what have you. I’m not in their skin. Maybe they are always late and they have to work on that. Maybe they always drive dangerously. I don’t know. But I say to myself, “I don’t know who they are and what’s going on with them – the way they drive or what have you! I'm not them.”

I also have seen drivers get cut off and they then go on a crazy pursuit of that crazy driver and they become dangerous and crazy themselves – beeping – giving the other the brights as well as screams and certain gestures.

It’s then I say to Jesus, “Is this what you’re getting at? My anger at another can ruin me – and others – so let it go. Go the extra mile. Give the extra smile. It’s good for the soul. It also avoids accidents."

We’re at work. This co-worker walks into the room and at least every other day says to those around us, “Hi Mary. Hi Jim. Hi Betty” but they never ever say “Hello” to us. They ignore us. We just feel the friction in the room when this person does this to us. Now we can get angry at this. We can talk about this person behind their back to get others on our side. We can vent. We can resent. But what does our anger do to our well being? That's a question to reflect upon.

Then we realize this is the stuff Jesus is getting us into. This is my turn to be nailed to a cross. This is the stuff to come to Jesus in the night with our screams – and we trust that the Jesus who screamed in the night in the garden will hear our screams – unlike the disciples who slept when Jesus was going through his agony in the garden.

We don’t have to go it alone. Everyone has screams in the night. We need to talk to each other. We need to talk to someone other than ourselves. “Help! I need someone,” as the Beatles sang.

CRIES IN THE NIGHT

I like to write – but I don’t have enough time – and as priest I know that people are more important than print. I got 5 books published – but the only one I really liked was entitled, “Cries …. But Silent.” It’s out of print so I’m not pushing it. It was my attempt in poetic form to articulate the cries I’ve heard from people – their screams in the night.

And I’ve heard a lot of cries – and not just from people in church – but from here and there as well as from myself and priests.

I remember a priest I lived with. He always seemed to have a locked jaw and a cemented in place face. He’s dead now – but we talked from time to time – but not enough. Without him knowing it, I wrote this poem called, “Lid!”

LID

A nervous violence
flowed within him,
below his locked mouth,
his tight jaw.
You knew it was there.
You could hear its noise
from time to time,
like a car going over
a loose manhole cover
in the middle of the night.

Here’s another poem entitled, "Salad Dressing".

SALAD DRESSING

Married
to you
for seven long years
I began
to notice
that you had begun to pick.

It took me 2 hours
to prepare supper,
yet you said I forgot
your favorite salad dressing,
and for the rest of the meal,
and the rest of the year,
I began to pick up signals
that love had moved
out of the house
and began staying
away from home
later and later
into the night.

CONCLUSION

I’ve often said that the whole church building itself is a crying room.

Have you ever had the thought that there are millions of phone messages and words flying through this air right here – right now? There are also dozens of radio songs and talk shows etc. going on right now – flowing through this space. If we had a radio or phone on right now, we’d hear some of those sounds.

There are also many thoughts, distractions, gripes and grudges flying around this church right now. Before Mass someone says, "Would you please turn off your cell phones and pagers." These inner sounds and screams are not that easy to switch off. Well, there are also many screams going on in this church right now - better in the minds of all of us here. “Hurry up! End your sermon! I got the message. You’re beating it to death. End now!”

St. Paul in today’s second reading says we are all temples – called to be holy places.

Now the message: if we could hear each other’s screams, we would all have a much greater sympathy and empathy and understanding of each other.

And we might begin to talk and listen to each other a lot more – now that’s Holy Communion. Now that’s the kind of Communion Jesus wants us to have with him and each other – each day. Amen.