QUESTION: NAME ONE PERSON
WHO INTRIGUES YOU?
INTRODUCTION
The title of my homily is: “Question: Name One Person Who
Intrigues You?”
By that I mean, one person whom you wonder about.
It could be a family member or a famous person or a
neighbor or a teacher you had or you heard about.
Name one person whom you wonder what makes them tick?
I used to ask folks on weekend retreat groups to name one person they would like to be like.
[“ENNNNNH!”] Silence. It didn’t work.
“ENNNNH!” That’s the wrong answer sound on
Steve Harvey’s Family Feud show.
[“ENNNNNH!”] I like that sound.
Upon thinking about that, I wondered, I figured, maybe
---- maybe nobody wants to be some other
person. We might like to have the
patience of a mother of 7 or we might want to have the house some rich person
who lives on the water has or they have a Mercedes we’d like - but most people
know the song, “I gotta be me!”
So when I asked that question - and didn’t receive
responses - I learned first of all, that most people don’t want to be someone
else. Then some people answered quite clearly: “I know whom I don’t want to be
like.”
Now that was an unexpected answer. Then as I thought
about that comment, I said to myself, “That’s been my experience.”
I know people I don’t want to be like. How about you?
HAVING LEARNED THAT
Having learned that much, I found myself trying to come
up with a new or a better question.
And my new question is the title of this homily: “Name
One Person Who Intrigues You?”
Right now I consider that a good question. Then again maybe
I’ll end up saying, “EEEEH!”
The number one topic of conversation is people. It’s not sports or the weather or
politics. It’s particular people.
I have a niece who says: “Every office or work place has
that one person who drives the rest of the folks nuts.”
To that I like the gospel text, “Is it I, Lord.”
Hope not.
Specialists tell us that dysfunctional people suck the energy out of the office or car or the
meeting or the family.
You’ve heard sayings like the following:
“There are two kinds of people: those who cause happiness
wherever they go and those who cause happiness whenever they go.”
There are two kinds of people who walk into the
room. One says, “Oh there you are!” and
one who says, “Here I am?” Frederic L. Collins said that.
Then there was Robert Benchely who said, “There are two
kinds of people in the world: those who believe there are two kinds of people
in the world and those who don’t.”
SO WHO INTRIGUES YOU?
I grew up in the shadow of my older brother and didn’t
figure that one out and get out from under him till my early 30’s
.
As priest - listening to a lot of people, I found out a lot
of people do or did that in growing up. It’s the comparison question.
I talked to my brother once about that and he said, “I
looked up to you.”
The youngest and the oldest, interesting.
It could be a writer like Flannery O’Connor or Louis L’Amour.
It could be a sports coach or sports figure. I remember a
time there that I was reading a lot of sports biographies and autobiographies:
for example, Don Shula, John Wooden, Howard Cosell, Vince Lombardi, Sandy Koufax.
I remember reading the autobiography of Sarah Palin and
Mother Teresa and also Mother Angelica - who had the great name of Rita Rizzo - from Canton, Ohio.
It could be any of those historical characters Doris Kearns
Goodwin or David McCullough wrote about.
I know a family friend who was waiting for the fifth and
last volume by Robert Caro on LBJ. It’s not finished yet. Unfortunately, Marty recently died, so even though Marty told
me he didn’t believe in resurrection, I
told Marty’s kids, “Now he knows LBJ in person.” Saying that is an act of faith - a belief in
resurrection.
I used to love to watch Brian Lamb’s C-Span TV program, Booknotes. For 16 years he interviewed various non-fiction writers
- often biographies. Often, by the end
of an hour TV interview, I would know a
lot about another person so much more than when I turned that program on. If you’re techy savy, I’m sure you can get
some of those programs on the internet.
Today’s gospel talks about Saint Thomas the apostle. Now
there’s an intriguing person. If you want to spend time in prayer and thinking
and inner talking with an apostle, pick Thomas. Thomas basically ends up saying he needed experience to
experience faith - to experience Christ - as the Risen One - the Risen Son.
I believe he’s put in the gospels to tell us: it’s okay to
have doubts. If you have doubts, you’re not the only one. If you have doubts,
doubting Thomas is your saint. If you have doubts, the thinker is your statue.
One of my favorite artists is Caravaggio. There is a good
biography of this intriguing dark character who does dark paintings by Helen
Langdon. When I walk into a roomful of paintings in an art museum - I stand at
the doorway for a moment and go and look at only 1 or 2 paintings - and stay
with them for a while. If I look at them all, I don’t see any of them. I like
Caravaggio’s painting of Doubting Thomas. I’ve looked at it dozens and dozens
of time - wondering what Caravaggio was thinking about Christ and faith and
life and forgiveness as he painted it.
I don’t know about you, but I liked what this Sunday was
called probably for over 1000 years, “Doubting Thomas Sunday.” In the last
century it started to get called, “Divine Mercy Sunday.” I still prefer, “Doubting Thomas Sunday.”
You can have doubts about my opinion. That’s what makes life interesting. There are
a lot of interesting people alive and dead.
CONCLUSION
So that’s the gist of this homily.
Walk into any library - or Barnes and Noble - or used book
sales - and go to the biography or autobiography section - and say, “Oh there
you are!”
Or sit on one of those seats or benches in the mall or look
around here at church and stop at one person and say, “I wonder who that person
is and what or who are they like.”
Hi.
