GOD?
ONION OR GOLF BALL?
INTRODUCTION
The title of my homily is, “God? Onion or Golf Ball?
This Sunday - the Sunday after Pentecost - we celebrate the
feast of the Trinity.
This feast about God - God as a Holy Trinity of 3 Persons -
is a challenge each year - not just to
the preacher - but to all of us to take some time - to unpeel - U N P E E L
- [Spell
out] - our notions - our take - our understanding - our relationship with
God - especially as the Most Holy Trinity.
That verb “to unpeel” leads me to think of an orange, then an
apple, then an onion, then a golf ball - then a person - all of which we can
unpeel - all of which we can look underneath - all of which can lead us to
mystery - to wonder - to surprise - but also to “uh oh!”
UNPEEL
I always liked the quote, “Life is like an onion. You peel
off a layer at a time - and sometimes you cry.”
I always - also - don’t
like that quote because - when it comes to an onion - it’s a bummer - because one discovers nothing
in the center - in the inside - yet one cried - yet one tried.
I try to get inside another - or a situation - or a worry -
and I find nothing inside. Bummer!
Those moments remind me of those moments when I get stuck in traffic on an interstate. It’s
bumper to bumper to bumper forever. I’m wondering how much longer and what the
heck is causing this problem? Finally traffic starts flowing again and I never
did find out what caused the backup and the problem in the first place. Bummer.
I like it when I see - along the side of the road - some
broken red glass - or tire skid marks or a red flare still burning. Obviously, I hope nobody was hurt - but at
least I knew a crash caused the delay.
I like a peach because it has a pit inside - or an apple
with a core - or an orange with some pits. But that onion - you peel off a
layer at a time - you cry - and when you get to that last layer, there is
nothing in the inside. It doesn’t have a center. It’s the pits when there are
no pits - when there is an, “I don’t know! I just don’t know.”
Sometimes that happens to people with God. Jean Paul Sartre,
the French Existentialist, once said, “For several years more, I maintained
public relations with the Almighty. But privately, I ceased to associate with
him.”
Let me repeat that - because that can be the autobiography of a
lot of people when it comes to God - including us priests: “For several years more, I maintained public
relations with the Almighty. But privately, I ceased to associate with him.”
As priest with some family members - it’s a bummer when someone
in the family - has no interest in God - in the inside and in the center of
their life.
As priest I preached the Graduation Mass for our High School
kids on Thursday. I tried to slip God into the inside of my words - into the
inside of our students lives. I tried to trigger that moment in their future - when
the whole enterprise falls apart - and they are sitting there in the dark like
the people in and around Moore, Oklahoma - where everything has been unpeeled by
a twisting tornado. Some 24 people have been killed - including 9 kids - and we wonder, “Where is God in all
this?” We want more and there is so much less.
Also when I think of unpeeling - and the underneath - and the unknown inside, I remember
something we used to love to do as kids: to find an old golf ball - on a lawn
- with it’s cover starting to uncover. Then we would peel with great effort that hard
outside cover off it.
That was tricky. I remember putting an old golf ball into
the heavy metal vise grip thing my father had in our basement at his work bench.
I’d twist that iron handle so that the two iron sides with teeth would grab
that golf ball - so it wouldn’t and couldn’t escape. Then I would jam the front
of a screwdriver under the covering. Then with a hammer I would drive that
screwdriver tip into the golf ball - in under the unraveling cover. Once the cover was off I could more easily unpeel
it.
I don’t know what golf balls are made of now - but when we
were kids they had that fascinating rubber band like stuff just under the cover. It would take
forever to get that off. Finally - underneath the rubber bands - after all that unpeeling -
there was this neat hard rubber tiny pith ball.
They were great to have - much better than glass marbles. I
loved to have one in my pocket in a boring grammar school class room. With my
thumb and finger I would flick the ball up my desk to try to get it into the
inkwell hole. The desks no longer had
ink bottles in them. When I scored - it would go “blup blup” as it fell onto
the shelf underneath the desk top. The nun up front would be startled - owl or eagle like -
trying to figure out, “Uh oh! What that was?” On went my fake nonchalant face -
knowing that tiny ball was safe - out of sight - in the underneath space of my desk.
That rubber ball bounced fabulously in the play ground -
high and hard to figure out where it was going to land. It was a unique toy for
the few of us boys who knew how and where to get them.
An old golf ball looked useless - but that center ball always
seemed so fresh - so bouncy - that is, if you could unpeel and get to it.
QUESTIONS
What, who is God to me: onion or golf ball?
Question: Am I still trying to get to know, to love, to
discover, to find, God - underneath it all?
ANSWERS
I assume that those of us who come to church are the still
searchers.
I assume from time to time all of us have come up with our
metaphors - our images - our takes - our experiences - our moments - when we
met God in the central as well as surprise moments in our lives.
I picture couples standing there - being toasted by their
family and friends - as they celebrate a 25th or 50th
wedding anniversary.
I picture parents at graduations - feeling - especially
feeling - but realizing - it was all worth it.
My grandnephew Sean graduated from the Naval Academy
on Friday and the moment for one of my nieces - was when she stood back and saw
his grandfather hugging his grandson - after the graduation. Everyone knew how
much it meant to Joe. I knew it meant so much for Sean’s parents.
The moment for me - that brought tears to my eyes - even though it was cold and
rainy - was when different group and pockets of people - spread throughout the stands - heard their kids name called and they erupted
with cheers and joy.
Life is to spot those moments. Sometimes we cry.
Life is to unpeel those moments - and see what’s
inside.
Life is to feel those moments and discover the bouncing,
bouncing life that is inside our life.
Life is to discover that God - Father - Son - and -
Holy Spirit are here - and there - and everywhere.
BUMMERS
Of course the bummer is when we peel and peel and don’t find
anything.
It’s a bummer of a marriage when the other has become a
couch potato or a lump - or a grouch - or a disaster - and after the unpeeling
of the clothes and the unpeeling of the years - someone discovers that there is
nothing inside the other - and in the meanwhile there are children - there is
family. Now that’s an, “Uh oh!”
It’s a bummer of a life - when you give it all for your
children or for your parents and nobody seems to give a rats tail for what you
consider important: caring for each other.
GOOD NEWS IN TODAY’S READINGS
There is Good News in the readings for today’s Mass.
The good news is when one unpeels life and discovers the
heights and depths of Jesus Christ - sometimes in the tears and the afflictions
as today’s second reading from Romans puts it. [Cf. Romans 5: 1-5]
Paul in this reading says that in the midst of afflictions one can discover God
- one can discover the Holy Spirit - one can discover endurance - and character
- and proven character - along with
proven hope - one can develop a strong cover - like that of the outside of a
golf ball - and in my heart, in my center, I have the love of God which has been poured
into our hearts by the Holy Spirit.
The Good News is when one unpeels life - one can also
discover God in the beauty of creation - in the mountains and the hills, in the
fountains and springs of water, in the earth and in the fields, in the heavens
in the deep. God can be found in play and delight - in all the joys of life
within our sight - seeing God the Craftsman - as today’s first reading from
Proverbs 8: 22-31 puts it - in all that
God has made - and created.
Are we missing seeing what we could be seeing outside of us - because
are we blind in the center of our inside?
My brother Billy is long dead - but I am very grateful for his
teaching us about the value of going to
art museums. If we were coming down to see him and his family in Bowie and then
Laurel, Maryland,
the week before he would skip lunch from his job in Washington, D.C. He would then go to the National Gallery or
the Hirshorn Museum and memorize the names of all the
paintings he could grasp. Then when we arrived, he would suggest that we and the kids go to DC to see paintings. As we were browsing he would say, “That painting over there
looks like a Renoir.” Then he would add, “It’s name is probably….”
Sure enough he was right every time. His daughters, knowing
he loved to do this, would try to move all of us in a different direction to
throw him off.
I enjoyed him doing this - plus seeing the paintings, but
what I really learned by going to art museums - was what happened to me when we went outside. I realized: everything
was art. Everything was works of art and sculpture: people, cars, hot dog
wagons, trees, flowers, blades of grass, dogs, the sky. God the artist was everywhere. We humans, we
artists - had also been working everywhere to make this a beautiful world to live
in.
CONCLUSION
Today is the feast of the Most Holy Trinity.
Well, somewhere along the line I heard someone preaching and saying, “We are
made in the image and likeness of God and it’s only when we are in wonderful
and loving relationships with each other - that we are imaging God the Trinity.”
“Oh,” I said, upon hearing that, “People living and working
together are a much better image of the Trinity than the shamrock - 3 leaves - one plant. We can be one - in our relationships with one
another - whether we are 2, 3, 4, 5, 100. That’s when we mirror God and what it’s
all about.”
And sure enough, if we unpeel any person, isn’t it when we
are in love - when we are working together as family, as friends, that we feel
the presence of God in our center.
It’s then we are bouncing like that bouncing rubber ball in
the center of the golf ball - if they
still make them that way - well if they don’t - well that’s still how we are
made. Amen.
