THE  CROSS: 

CHECK  IT  OUT 

INTRODUCTION

The title of my homily for this feast of Holy Cross is, “The Cross: Check It Out.”

We have this enormous cross here inside St. John Neumann Church, Annapolis, Maryland. I understand there was some controversy when it was planted in this church: some were for it and some were against it. 

The Cross: Check it Out.

Thought: it’s here. Sit under it and see what it does for you. Better: sit under it and listen to what Jesus says to you.

If a sermon is boring – or doesn’t grab you – sit here under the tree of this cross and see what Christ hanging on the cross means to you.

If life is boring – or going wrong for you – drop into this church – or any church and sit under the tree of the cross – and hear Jesus being with you.

SITTING UNDER THE TREE

Does anyone sit under trees anymore?

Does anyone just sit there and meditate – think – lean – grow.

When we were kids we used to go to a great place called, “Bliss Park.”

It had this one big gray barked tree 2/3 up the hill. It was up there on the left as you looked up the hill and just right if you got it for your family on a Sunday afternoon. A blanket or two would be laid on under just under this tree. We would talk. We’d lay down and nap. We kids would roll down the hill in the warm weather. We’d eat neat picnic food. We’d wander to the top of the hill and then walk to this great spot that overlooked the New York Harbor. There was the Statue of Liberty. You could see the skyscrapers of Manhattan – but there was no World Trade Center yet – nor Verrazano Bridge.

When was the last time you sat or laid down under a tree.

Is it true that Isaac Newton sat there under an apple tree and when he saw one fall to the ground he wondered, why didn’t it fall up? “Eureka!” He realized the pull of this body we’re on has a greater pull than all those other bodies out there in space. He realized the reality of the Law of Gravity.

Is it true that the Buddha had had it. He tried the easy path and it got him nowhere. He tried the strict path and that got him nowhere either. So he sat there stubbornly under the Bodhi or Bo Tree till he had an answer. He sat and sat till he was enlightened. Surprise – he was. He came up with the Middle Way – the balanced way of Buddhism. And pilgrims to the major Buddhist shrines in India and Sri Lanka – will find Bodhi or Bo trees - a type of fig tree - to sit under.

When was the last time you sat or laid down under a tree?

In the 70’s I went to a Conference at the Cardinal Spellman Retreat House in Riverdale, New York, right on the Hudson River. It was given by the smartest and most read person I ever met: Tom Berry. 

Talk about long sermons. It took him years and years  of study to put his material together. Then it took him a whole weekend to present: “A New Creation Account.” It brought in all kinds of creation accounts from way, way back – as well as history, discoveries, as well as all the science up to the present day. I don’t know enough anthropology and physics and inner and outer space stuff, but I sat there amazed.

A priest whom I went with to this conference said, “Andy you’ll understand about 1% of what he’s talking about."

He was right. 

However, what I remember was Tom Berry’s opening comment.

Looking out through the clear glass sliding doors that were the wall on one side of the big conference room was a big grass lawn. If one looked further down the hill, one saw the Hudson River. 

Pausing --- standing there at the speaker’s podium – Tom Berry said, “There’s a big old oak tree at the bottom of that green lawn there. It’s been there for hundreds of years. If we all went down there and sat silently under that tree for this weekend – we’d get a lot more enlightened than we’d get sitting up here and talking.”

I saw in The New York Times years later that – that old tree died. 

And Tom Berry died as well June 1, 2009. 

He was called a geologian.

It’s not by accident that the Old Creation story in the Book of Genesis begins by talking about two trees: the tree of life in the middle of the garden and the tree of good and evil as well.

Take and eat from the tree of life. Don’t take. Don’t eat of the tree of good and evil.

It’s not by accident that the New Creation account by Jesus has the tree of the cross. It’s the tree of life and it’s the tree of good and evil.

 TODAY’S FEAST

To understand today’s feast of the Holy Cross it’s important to pull these stories together. To understand the Cross read today’s readings again. To understand the Cross sit under it.

Sit under the cross and look up and see Jesus – and what humans did to him – cursing – spitting and crucifying him – after dragging and pushing him up that hill to die.

Under that cross were men yelling at him and throwing dice to gets his robe.

Under that cross were Mary, a few other women and John his beloved disciple.

Under that Cross we can look up at Jesus and get enlightenment. Answer evil with goodness and love. Put all in the Father’s hands – because all of life is out of our hands. Turn over and over again when others hurt us and are evil towards us – Jesus central message of love: Father forgive them because they don’t know what to do.

Under that cross we can hear today’s first reading – that the crowd was being bit by snakes – and so Moses grabbed a snake – nailed it to a pole and said, “This is what’s killing you – stay clear of them biting and poisoning you.”

That symbol became the symbol of the medical profession. Stay clear of this and this and this – all those things that are poisoning you.

That symbol became the symbol of Christians – stay clear of all those things that are killing you. Nail to the cross anger, yelling, envy, pride, and then hear from the cross: this is what’s killing you.

Under the cross you’ll get today’s second reading – that this is God – in the ultimate emptying of his Godness – to tell us how much God became us – to bring us to God. We weren’t getting that – so he suffered the ultimate emptiness dying on the cross.

Under the cross we’ll get the message of today’s gospel – that Jesus so loved the world that he died for us – that God so loved the world that he sent his son to us – that we might be saved.

CONCLUSION

How to conclude this?

Hope this is not slick or too cute.

The title of my homily is not: The Cross: don’t chuck it out.

The title or my homily is: The Cross: Check It Out.

THE CROSS 

FROM ANOTHER VIEWPOINT 

Poem for Today - September 14, 2014

CHRIST AFTER CRUCIFIXION

After they took me down I heard the winds

in a long wail skim the palm trees

and the steps fade.

The wounds

and the cross they nailed me to for the whole afternoon

did not kill me, though. And I listened: the wailing

travelled across the field between me and the city

like the rope that pulls on the ship

while it sinks to the depths. The lamentation was

like a string of light between the morning

 and the darkness in the bleak winter sky.

And then the city drowsed upon its affairs.

When mulberry and orange trees bloom,

When the village of Jaykur extends to the limits of the imagination—

when it flourishes with grass, its fragrance sings

and the suns suckle it with their light.

When even the darkness of the night turns green

the warmth touches my heart, and my blood runs in its soil.

My heart is a sun when the sun throbs light;

my heart is the earth, brings forth wheat and flowers and pure water;

My heart is the water, my heart is a stalk of wheat,

its death is resurrection: it lives in him who eats of it

in the dough which is shaped into loaves

and swells like a small breast, like the breast of life.

I died by fire: I burnt the darkness of my clay,

but the god was untouched.

I was a beginning: and in the beginning were the poor.

I died that the bread might be eaten in my name,

that they might plant me in season.

How many lives will I live? In every pit

I have grown into a future, a seed,

a generation, in every heart that has

a drop, or droplet of my blood.

When I returned and Judas saw me

his secret—he turned yellow.

He was darkened by me like a shadow, the statue of a dispirited idea

that would, he feared, reveal death in the moisture of his eyes ...

(His eyes are of rock;

with them he covers his grave from the people)

Afraid of its warmth, of never realizing it, he had told all.

`—You! or has my shadow blanched, been scattered with light?

You proceed from the world of death, but death comes once!

So said our fathers, so they taught us; can it be false?'

This he thought when he saw me, and this his glance said.

A running step, steps.

The grave will collapse under these steps.

Have they come? Who but they?

A step—another.

I place the rock on my chest.

Didn't they crucify me yesterday? Here I am in my grave.

Let them come; I am in my grave. Who knows

that I am ... who knows?

And Judas' friends, who will believe what they claim?

A step ... a step.

Here I am now naked in my dark grave.

Yesterday I was furled like doubt, like a bud;

the flowers of blood dripped under my snowy shrouds.

I was like the shadow between night and day

until I exploded my very being in a shower of treasures,

stripped it like fruits.

When I cut my pocket into swaddling clothes,

and my sleeve into a blanket

when I warmed the bones of the children one day with my flesh—

when I undressed my own wound to bandage the wounds of others,

the wall fell between God and myself.

The soldiers surprised even my wounds and the throbs of my heart:

surprised all that was not death, though in a cemetery.

They surprised me as a fruitful palm tree is surprised

by a flock of hungry birds in a deserted village.

The eyes of guns block my path.

Levelled, they plot with their fire my crucifixion—

with iron and fire: but the light of the skies,

remembrance and love are the eyes of my people.

They carry the burden for me, bedew my cross, so that how small

is that death—my death—and how big!

After they nailed me, and I turned my eyes to the city

I could barely distinguish field, wall, or cemetery.

Like aa flourishing forest, there extended

As far as the eye could see, in every domain a cross  and a sad mother

At the childbirth of the city!

[Summer 1957]

Badr Shakin al-Sayyab (1926-1964)

Pages 140-143 - in

When the Words Burn,

An Anthology of Modern

Arabic Poetry: 1945-1987,

translated by John Mikhail Asfour

ANNAPOLIS

Poem for Today - September 13, 2014

CHESAPEAKE

I

Nature most calm is often a crisis.

I remember a bay day,

creaseless, ruffleless,

land out of sight out of mind,

when the aimlessness

of my eyes, hands, dreams, work, art

rose up in my throat and smote me,

and I cried for wind. . . .

Wind high,

bay gray and white,

the avenging angel's

enormous

wings over us:

it rained a spray of

dross cold; sails grew; boat heeled;

lungs filled with danger;

our bodies blessed and bent

to servitude, you a slave

to the tiller, I

slave to your prescience.

Lord, Lord give us clearance.

II

Lost souls haunt rivers.

In a light wind,

by moon,

they can keep you as half-wakeful

as the boat that sways always

on its anchor

back and forth,

and your light dreams

bring you up short on your body;

you rise and cry out,

"Where am I?"

The ghosts recede to shore.

Next morning, old stumps

abandoned by pioneers

are covered by

large silent birds.

This bay is not rhetorical:

Modestly

it receives its rivers,

except at Annapolis

where Severn, South, Magothy

swirl and pull off

a small naval battle.

Otherwise, patiently

receiving all tributes of waters,

it slumbers and waits

for the storms to ride across it-stretches,

for the wind to call out the changes

 that set the nun buoys nodding

and all the bells and gongs

to dire scolding.

A bay is an infold,

a withholding

between prosaic land

and cannibal ocean.

At bay, at bay!

How many a day's journey

across the whims of water

to find headway!

Lighthouse and land ho.

It's moving that counts.

© Gerta Kennedy,
The New Yorker

 Book Of Poems,

pages 116-117

Picture on Top:
"Sunrise on Spa Creek -
Annapolis, Maryland, 1993" -
pages, 118-119,
in Bringing Back The Bay,
The Chesapeake in
 the Photographs
of Marion E. Warren,
and the Voices of
 Its Peoples,
 with Mame Warren

Picture on Bottom,

"Fog on Spa Creek 1992"
page 181 -in Warren Book.

WAKE UP!

Poem For Today - September 12, 2014

QUATRAIN

I became water
     and saw myself
          a mirage
became an ocean
     saw myself a speck
          of foam
gained Awareness
     saw that all is but
          forgetfulness
woke up
     and found myself
          asleep.

(c) Binavi Bvadakhshani, 

page 95 in The Drunken

Universe, An Anthology

of Persian Sufi Poetry

SEPTEMBER  11

Poem for Today - September 11, 2014

WILL IT BE HEARD

If it falls, will it be heard?

A panorama falls
Everyone was there
          It was heard
The sirens heard it
The ambulances heard it
The police cars and fire trucks heard it
The TV channels broadcasting around the world heard it
It was heard far away in Afghanistan
It was heard in Beverly Hills
Even Moscow heard it
          And they often hear only what they want to hear
It was heard in the South Bronx where I was born
And it was heard in Los Angeles where my children were born
I know for a fact it was heard in Las Vegas where my grandchildren were born because
My daughter called me at dawn to let me know she heard it

I am afraid to sleep tonight because last night I slept like a baby and when I awoke, it was a nightmare

It had fallen
Steel by steel
Stone by stone
Person by person
It had fallen to broken skeletal hulk
Like Rome
Like Holy Roman Empire
Like Nero.

© Larry Jaffe

DIEGO RIVERA

Poem for Today - Sept. 10, 2014

I PAINT WHAT I SEE

(A BALLAD OF ARTISTIC INTEGRITY)

“What do you paint, when you paint on a wall?”

Said John D.'s grandson Nelson.

“Do you paint just anything there at all?

“Will there be any doves, or a tree in fall?

“Or a hunting scene, like an English hall?”

“I paint what I see,” said Rivera.

“What are the colors you use when you paint?”

Said John D.'s grandson Nelson.

“Do you use any red in the beard of a saint?

“If you do, is it terribly red, or faint?

“Do you use any blue? Is it Prussian?”

“I paint what I paint,” said Rivera.

“Whose is that head that I see on my wall?”

Said John D.'s grandson Nelson.

“Is it anyone's head whom we know, at all?

“A Rensselaer, or a Saltonstall?

“Is it Franklin D? Is it Mordaunt Hall?

“Or is it the head of a Russian?”

“I paint what I think,” said Rivera.

“I paint what I paint, I paint what I see,

“I paint what I think,” said Rivera,

“And the thing that is dearest in life to me

“In a bourgeois hall is Integrity;

“However . . .

“I'll take out a couple of people drinkin'

“And put in a picture of Abraham Lincoln;

“I could even give you McCormick's reaper

“And still not make my art much cheaper.

“But the head of Lenin has got to stay

“Or my friends will give me the bird today,

“The bird, the bird, forever.”

“It's not good taste in a man like me,”

Said John D.'s grandson Nelson,

“To question an artist's integrity

“Or mention a practical thing like a fee,

“But I know what I like to a large degree,

“Though art I hate to hamper;

“For twenty-one thousand conservative bucks

“You painted a radical. I say shucks,

“I never could rent the offices

“The capitalistic offices.

“For this, as you know, is a public hall

“And people want doves, or a tree in fall,

“And though your art I dislike to hamper,

“I owe a little to God and Gramper,

“And after all,

“It's my wall

“We'll see if it is,” said Rivera.

© E. B. WHITE

CONTEXT  IS  ALL

INTRODUCTION

The title of my homily for this 23 Tuesday in Ordinary Time is, “Context Is All!”

That’s a phrase the Canadian writer, Margaret Atwood, became known for. It’s a  comment she makes all through her book, The Handmaid’s Tale.

“Context is all.”

ST. PETER CLAVER

Today is the feast of St. Peter Claver [1581-1654]  – a Jesuit priest who worked for 44 years in Cartagena – now Colombia – one of the key ports for slaves coming from Africa.

As I read his life – lots of things hit me. What would it be like to be living there in the first half of the 1600’s?   I’m aware that writers in our time criticize missionaries and church and their presence in the colonies – what they did and what they didn’t do.  Why didn’t they do more? Why didn’t they protest more about slavery and how native Americans were treated.

Then I stepped back and said, “Context!” Then I said, “Context is Everything.”  Then I remembered Margaret Atwood’s comment: “Context is all”

For example: St. Peter Claver baptized more than 300,000 slaves – and rather quickly after their arrival.

Today we would not do that – but context is all. In Europe whole tribes and groups were baptized and made Christians – when their king or leader became Christian. And the king didn’t go through an RCIA program.

As I read Peter Claver’s story – I was amazed. Type his name into the Google Search Box – and sail on.

When news of another slave ship - 1000 future slaves were arrived at the port in Cartagena each month,  Peter Claver would be down there first. He would row out in a canoe to the boat with a whole team of catechists.  One of his team, a man named  Calepino spoke 12 African languages. They would bring food, fresh fruit, wine for wounds, water. They washed and attended to cuts and sores and would take care of the dead. They feed those who made it in what were called “coffin ships”  to the Americas..

They would wash and baptize – they would feed and greet. Today we would do some of these things and not do some of these – but what I’m saying here is, “Context is all.”

Slave owners hated him – and gave him a hard time.  The rich of Cartagena didn’t like Father Claver’s Negroes in church with them.

Context is all. Thoughts in my mind  changed when I read the following words from Peter Claver, “We must speak to them with our hands by giving, before we try to speak to them with our lips.”

Kindness – caring – giving food – a welcome - smiling – love -  is the same in every language.

So that’s the context  of my comments today. That’s why I came up with this short message that I’m pushing today.

Context is all.

TODAY’S GOSPEL: CONTEXT IS ALL

It’s also a key to keep in mind when reading the scriptures.

Today’s gospel begins with Jesus going to the mountains to pray – to spend the night in prayer.

Then we hear him calling out those he chose to be his apostles by name.

I wonder why did Jesus call Peter who would deny him – and Judas who would betray him?

What is the back story of each one of them?

Why did people reach out to Jesus back then – and why do they do so today?

What was Jesus’ goal? Was it to feed and to heal – more than to teach and preach?

What is the purpose of Church?

What is the Christian calling?

What is the goal of parish?

What is Jesus calling us to be and to do today?

Why do we do what we do and why?

Context should give us pause.

As we heard in today’s gospel Jesus knew the importance of pause – especially the pause to pray.

It’s important to escape – to grasp where we are and where we want to go next.

We need to see our present context and to see our next calling.

We need to stop!

We need to see who’s in the boats around us.

Context gets us to talk and to listen.

Context gets us to say, “I don’t know why you said that or why you did that. Can we talk?”

So much of life is talking before listening.

So much of life is taking things out of context.

So much of life is being self-centered – our mind being within only our boundaries – so our all is rather small.

Too often we are slaves to our own context.

Too often we’re sailing along stuck in the dark – at the bottom of our boat – as we pass each other like ships in the night – as the old saying goes.

MOVEMENT

Christianity is all about movement – moving out of where we are – out of our context into a new context.

It’s called conversion. It’s called change.

In today’s first reading from 1^st Corinthians 6: 1-11 we were placed in the context of a Christian Community in the city of Corinth in around 54 A.D. We hear details about what is going on. We’re getting context.  We hear St. Paul challenging his listeners to see what they are doing. Talk about lawsuits. It sounds like it was an everyday threat of Christian against Christian in that city. He said you’re not in the kingdom of God if you are unjust, if you cheat, if you deceive, fornicate, prostitute, drink too much, ruin people’s reputation. 

The context of the Christian community in Corinth seemed like it needed a lot of changes – that they needed to see life in a new context.

CONCLUSION

The title of my homily is, Context Is All.

The first step is to see our present situation – our present context – and then the next step is to move into the Kingdom of God each day of our life.

God moved out of God – out of the context of God – when he became human. The Word became flesh and lived amongst us.

St. Peter Claver left a small place name Verdu in Spain – population about 2000 – probably from right near when Columbus came from – and look at how he changed his life and our world.

Well Peter moved from the farm to the school – to the Jesuits – to the priesthood – to America.

One of his self-descriptions was: I want to be a slave among slaves.

I sense his gift and his secret was to enter into the skin and the emotions and the feelings and the needs of these people who arrived in America – in horrible conditions – thinking they were going to be eaten or killed here.

He was to  be their experience of Jesus after 1615 in the city of Cartagena. Amen. 

FEELING THE EMPTY

Poem for Today - September 9, 2014

THE EMPTY HOUSE

Then, when the child was gone,
I was alone

In the house, suddenly grown huge.
Each noise

Explained itself away

As bird, or creaking board, or mouse,

Element or animal.

But mostly there was quiet as after battle

Where round the room still lay

The soldiers and the paintbox and the toys.
But when I went to tidy these away,
I felt my mind swerve:

My body was the house,

And everything he’d touched, and exposed nerve.

© Stephen Spender

The New Yorker Book

of Poems, page 192

WHAT IS YOUR  

PICTURE OF MARY

INTRODUCTION

The title of my homily for this feast of the Birthday of Mary is, “What Is Your Picture of Mary?

Thousands and thousands and thousands of artists have pictured Mary.

We find her picture or statue in every Catholic Church as well as many, many Catholic homes and museums.

How many times have we been watching a movie – and on the wall is a picture of Mary.

What image of Mary hangs on the wall of your mind?

What is your favorite picture of Mary?

THE POPE AND A CARDINAL

I noticed in a letter to the editor in the latest issue of The Tablet, a British Catholic Weekly Magazine – the following letter.

“What a telling contrast between two photographs in your current issue (August 23).  The first, on page 9, shows Pope Francis, smiling tenderly, his hand on the shoulder of an elderly Korean woman in a wheelchair. She clasps his other hand in hers, smiling up at him. The second, on page 24, shows Cardinal Filoni allowing his hand to be kissed by an Iraqi refugee. The one a Prince of the Church; the other a pastor of his flock. The one, unwittingly, demonstrating what we need to get away from; the other, the direction we should be taking.” Signed Alastair Llewellyn-Smith

As you have heard, a picture tells or can tell a thousand words.

As you know photographs can tell us a lot about the photographer as well as the person who puts the picture in the paper or in front of us.

Sometimes when we see a picture of ourselves, we go, “Oooooo! Rip  that picture up.”

And sometimes we see a picture of ourselves – and we say, “Not bad.”

How do you picture yourself?  How do you want to be pictured?  Do you picture any picture you have of yourself as a death card picture?

If you like a pope or a president or a public figure, you like favorable pictures of him or her – and vice versa.

I’m sure someone can find a picture of someone kissing the Pope Francis’ ring or hand and they could contrast that picture with a doctor in Africa – with mask on – caring for Ebola victims – and say, “Hey Catholic Pope, wake up and serve the people – instead of them kissing up to you.”

So pictures can say so much in so many ways.

MARY

Back to Mary. Today we celebrate her birthday.

In January of 2000 I got to Nazareth. That day we got to see some old, old, old homes that go way back into Israeli History. I would picture Mary being born in a poor one room house – with screaming going on – when she was born – “It’s a girl.”

I wonder if anyone did what so many people do at the birth of a new born baby: “I wonder what will become of this child.”

For girls – not that much.

For poor boys – not that much.

But God had other plans.

I picture Mary as Our Mother of Perpetual Help – especially because of her presence as the underneath support of Jesus and the Early Church. In the O.L.P.H. picture, I like that Mary is holding Jesus. The word “holding” – as in holding up another, or holding up a group, or a family.

I like Pope Francis favorite image of Mary. In 1986 – as a visitor from Argentina to Augsburg, Germany – he spotted an oil painting on a wood panel. It was an image of Mary untying knots. The painting was done by Johnann George Schmidtner.

The backstory of the painting is a common experience: being tied up in knots.

The  painting was commissioned by the nephew of a Bavarian aristocrat named Wolfgang Langenmantel. His marriage to his wife Sophia was about to split apart. It had become tied in knots. Well, they went to a Jesuit priest named Father Jacob Rem. Father Jacob prayed to Mary over their wedding ribbon that its knots become untangled. It did.

CONCLUSION

We’ve all untied knots in string, rosary beads, what have you.

Paul Vallely write what I consider the best biography of “Pope Francis – “Untying the Knots” – and that he had to do in Argentina and now as pope in Rome. Amen.

MARY, BRINGING

THE DESIRE

CALLED JESUS

TO US.... 

Poem for Today - September 8, 2014

JESU, JOY OF MAN'S DESIRING 

(CHORALE FROM CANTATA NO. 147, BY J. S. BACH, 

ARRANGED FOR PIANO BY NIYRA HESS)

Ivory in her black, and all intent

Upon the mirror of her instrument,

Doubling her beauty to the eye and ear,

My Muse arranged this in a distant year.

I thought my longing then could not abide

The discipline to place me at her side

Whose love and art were joined without defect,

Luxurious touch and sway of intellect.

Kore and lady, Myra, downward glancing

Over the hand that sings to the hand dancing,

Breathe and be present now the shades grow still.

Sweet air, be figured at your mistress' will.

As he of Brandenburg hummed in his heart,

The tenor and the alto, part by part,

Mounted in joy amid the tranquil choir

To dwell but tenderly on man's desire.

Softly that note fell, for the baby burning

Under the wintry sign of his sojourning,

The westward star, lay upon Eden's breast

Where husbandman and hunter seek to rest.

So voices woke from every falling voice,

Bidding the Gentile and the Jew rejoice,

With all that generations may conceive,

In Miriam, who is the grace of Eve.

Had she not borne the seed of the Lord God

To ripen in her splendid belly's pod?

And who but sages of the fragrant East

Dared his epiphany, adorned the feast?

And how but in the Cyprian's tongue went round

The tidings of great joy upon that ground

And peaceful glory promised in the air?

Holy became the rose our bodies bear.

So ran Kapellmeister's hymn unending,

So dreamed the maiden on his word attending,

So, as I cherished her in my degree,

The page of ancient music fell to me.

Now life has turned and all seems far and late,

I find this luminous, and meditate

To praise again, though East and West are wild,

The girl, the singing, and the Christmas child.

© Robert Fitzgerald,

The New Yorker Book

Of Poems, pages 351-352