JUST  SITTING, 

JUST  THINKING, 

JUST  PRAYING 

INTRODUCTION

The title of my homily for this Good Friday Service  is, “Just Sitting, Just Thinking, Just Praying.”

A little girl came into church one day - and saw all those people sitting there - and it was a very quiet moment in the Mass and she asked her grandmother, “What are all these people doing?”

And her grandmother answered, “Just sitting, just thinking, just praying.”

So the title of my homily is just that, “Just Sitting, Just Thinking, Just Praying.”

And if someone asks you, “Why do you go to church?” there’s a good answer. Simply say, “Just Sitting, Just Thinking, Just Praying.”

MOVIE - OH WHAT A LOVELY WAR

Around 1970 - during the Vietnam War - I went with a couple of guys to see the movie, “Oh What a Lovely War.”

Amazingly,  it was a musical. It was a shoot-em-up. It was a horror movie.

It contrasted what was going on back home in England during World War I to  what was happening in the trenches and the killing fields of Europe.

The war - dubbed “The War To End All Wars” - went on from 1914 to 1918.

We’re in the midst of its 100^th anniversary - right now - and not as much has been made of it - as should be made of it.

70 million military personnel were involved - 60 million European.

9 million combatants and then another 7 million civilians were killed.

The war ended in 1918 with the armistice.

The movie ended and something very unusual happened in that New York Theater that night. I heard after wards, it happened many times after the movie ended.

Nobody moved when the movie ended.  People were just sitting there. People were just thinking there. I don’t know how many people were praying there. Nobody was talking.

It felt like forever - till we all stood up - and quietly walked out of the theater into the night.

The final scene of the movie had 4 women dressed in white: a grandmother, two young women, and a young girl. They were sitting in this great big - enormous green hilly field. It was easy on the eyes and a welcome sight on the screen after two hours of seeing mud and water and rain and machine gun fire and bomb blasts and soldiers dying, dying, dying, just to get less than a hundred yards of dirt brown ground and holes.

And the little girl in white says to her grandmother in the presence of her mother and an aunt, “Granny, what did daddy do in the war.”

And the song that answers that little girl’s question has the refrain, “Oh,  we’ll never tell them, no we’ll never tell them ….”

And across the movie screen - across the big green field on the movie screen - comes a lone soldier - the war is over and he comes to a  place where there are 4 soldiers - laying there alive but not talking in the waving green grass - eyes closed or looking at the sky.

And the lone soldier plops himself down - without any words - on the grass - and then the 5 men fade and disappear  - and the field then has 5 white crosses and then the camera in this last scene in the movie - pans back the scene and the field now has  5 thousand - then 50 thousand at least - white crosses all lined up in perfect symmetry in this gigantic military cemetery.

It’s worth seeing this movie.

It’s worth seeing bits and pieces of this movie on You Tube snippets - especially that last scene - with all those crosses.

IT’S GOOD FRIDAY

Today we come to church to:  just sit, just think, just pray.

As priest I get to kiss the cross of Christ early on - up front - and personal.  Then all of you come up to kiss the cross as well.

I love to then sit back and watch.

I remember reading Karl Rahner - the famous German Jesuit theologian’s sermon - for  Good Friday. He thinks out loud about 10 or 15 people who kiss the cross and tells you what they might be thinking and praying about at that moment.

Tonight do the same. Watch each other. Think about each other. Pray for each other.

The big long gospel reading mentions 10 or 15 people whom we might  think about on Good Friday. Jesus the Nazarene entering a garden on the last night of his life - needing to find space and time to pray - but with his disciples and they bottom out and fall asleep. Then there is Judas and the Pharisees and the soldiers. What were they thinking? Then there was Peter who denies knowing Jesus. What did that do to him for the rest of his life? Did his failure make him a better first pope?  What about the chief priest? What was his take on the weak and easily manipulated Pontius Pilate?  What about Barabbas? Did he pinch himself when the crowd screamed for Jesus’ death and spared him that day? What about Mary and the Beloved Disciple under the cross.  What about those who heard Jesus say, “Father forgive them for they don’t know what they are doing?” What did Nicodemus and Joseph of Arimathea think - when they asked for Jesus body so they could bury him? Did their faith that day - die as well?

That’s a lot of people to think about - those at the time of Jesus, those who are with us in church tonight, those out there tonight in battle zones and in harm’s way in the killing fields or our world.

CONCLUSION

Picture a little girl coming into the back of this church tonight. Hear her seeing us here tonight and then thinking and saying, “What are you doing here in church tonight?  What  did you do in your life so far?”

And unlike the men in the movie, “Oh What a Lovely War,” talk to each other about life’s big questions - what you have seen so far in life - what you’re thinking about each day - and what you’re praying about. Amen.