SURPRISE! GOD IS 

A GOD OF SURPRISES!

INTRODUCTION

The title of my homily for this 4th Sunday of Advent, B, is, “Surprise! God Is A God of Surprises!”

Life would be very boring - if there were no surprises.

Life would be very boring - if we wrote the script - and that’s the way our life went.

Life would be very boring - if we could see around the corner, if we could see tomorrow and next year - and the rest of our lives.

Life could also be very nerve wracking, dangerous, depressive, if we knew how our marriages, jobs, our family, our future were going to happen.

Surprise!

God is a God of surprises.

Life is the surprises.

That’s why we put wrapping on the gift!

Question: How well do we do with surprises?

Question: How well do we do - when things don’t go our way?

Same question but phrased slightly different: What do I do when I want what I want and I don’t get what I want or get?

IF WE WERE GOD

If we were God, how would we create the world, the universe, life, death, change, that is, if we could create things any way we wanted things to be?

After all - we are made in the image and likeness of God and we are called to magnify the Lord.

Could we come up with a better plan than the present plan?

Would we make anything different from the way things are happening now?

How would we plan today? Would we plan it differently than what’s going to happen today? Who’s going to win today’s games? What happens if someone else was also God and they planned the other team to beat our team?

I remember thinking something like that while we just about to begin a high school basketball game. We were standing in a circle praying. I looked up from the prayerful head bowed down look and noticed the other team was also praying - and I thought, “God how does this work?”

If we were God, would there be life on other planets - besides earth? Maybe there is, but as of now, we don’t know if there is.

Would people get cancer, heart problems? Would there be deaths at 15 or 5 or 35 or 95?

Does God zap people? Does God know what our choices are going to be? Do our choices get God to change His plans? How does all this work?

If we were the Creator, would we have come up dinosaurs and Dalmatians? How come the dinosaurs disappeared and the Dalmatians still run through our fields? How about hippos and horses, mosquitoes and monkeys? Why did God create what God created?

Does God laugh at anything he created?

Was God in on how Danny De Vito, Lady Gaga and George Clooney look?

Does God laugh only at us humans?

We’ve all have heard the words: “Want to make God laugh, tell God your plans?”

We’ve all heard John Lennon’s words, “Life is what happens when you’re making other plans.”

We’ve all heard the Portuguese proverb: “God writes straight with crooked lines.”

We’ve all heard Garth Brooks song, “Unanswered prayers” - how he goes  to a hometown football game with his wife and how he meets his old flame - and he reflects on how he prayed to God every night that this high school sweetheart would be the one he’d spend his life with - and as he turns to his wife he sings, “Thank God for unanswered prayers.”

People think and have thought about this stuff “all through the years.”

If we were God, would we have picked Israel for the country to come up with One God? Would we have picked Mary? If we were God, say God the Father, would we have sent our Son at the time in history Jesus was sent? Some guy named, William Norman Ewer (1885-1976) wrote “How odd of God to choose the Jews.”

Was it odd that God chose the Jews?

Whom would we choose, if we were to choose some group to start the plan called “Salvation History”? The Navahos, the Eskimos, the people on the island of Crete?

Whom would we choose to be the Mother of his Son - if that’s the way we were going to do this?

PEACE

Do those who trust in God have more inner peace than those who want life to work differently than it’s working now?

What does it take for someone to be at peace with God - with oneself - with others?

What are the implications of our having freedom and free will?

TODAY’S READINGS

In today’s first reading references are made to David being chosen to lead Israel by God and God had expectations of David. It’s payback time. It’s calling in favors time. God is expecting David to build a temple. David is living in a nice big house made of cedar and the ark of the covenant is living in a tent. God is saying, “What’s wrong with this picture? Hello!” [Cf. 2 Samuel 7:1-5, 8b-12, 14a, 16]

As we know from the First Book of Samuel, Chapter 16, God tells Samuel to go to Jesse - who has lots of sons - to find the one whom God has chosen. Samuel sees 7 sons of Jesse - thinking surely the one the Lord wants is here. Nope. So he asks Jesse, “Do you have any other son?” I wonder if the 7 heard that question. Did one of them say, “Hey Jesse, are we chopped liver?” Jesse says to Samuel, “There is still one more, the youngest, he is out taking care of the sheep.” Samuel says, “Send for him. We won’t eat till he comes. The boy appears and God says, to Samuel, ‘Come, anoint him, for this is the one.”

Surprise! You never know whom God calls.

In today’s gospel God chooses Mary - a young maiden girl living in a small village far from the big cities. Surprise God chooses Mary. And like Eve - like us - she has the power of choice. She asks questions - then she makes the choice to choose to give us the fruit of the tree - the tree of life - the cross - Jesus. [Cf. Luke 1:26-38]

And we are given the choice every day to choose Christ: “Take and eat!”

In today’s second reading from Romans 16 Paul tells us about surprise. He calls it mystery. He calls it “secret”. Then Paul talks about listening - the call to listen - to listen for revealings, manifestations - from God. That’s the basic meaning of the word “obedience”. It’s to listen. It’s to hear the Word of the Lord in scripture. It’s to embrace Jesus - the word made flesh - who dwelt amongst us. [Cf. Romans 16: 25-27]

Mary - whenever an artist paints today’s gospel - pictures Mary listening - listening for annunciations.

Prayer is annunciation - but too often - our mouth is mouthing prayers - and we don’t hear.

Jesus calls that babbling - babbling prayer - be careful of that. [Cf. Matthew 6: 7]

As they say, we have two ears and one mouth - but that is applied more to everyday conversations. Jesus - watching people praying in his time - warned us and the Pharisees about babbling prayer.

CONCLUSION: CHRISTMAS

Christmas is a time for deep prayer.

Christmas is a time for deep pondering prayer.

Did you notice that verb - ponder - in today's gospel?

Christmas is a time for great listening prayer.

When the Christmas Stable is set up, watch the stable. Listen to the Christmas story. The shepherds are out there in the fields - caring for the sheep - and like David they are called to come to the meet the Lord - in a stable. Look at the animals, they are listening. Watch the Magi - they are searching and come in from the cold into the stable.

Listen to the songs, “Silent night, holy night!” “O come all you faithful….”

Christmas is a time to change your tent into a temple for the Lord.

In the meanwhile, laugh, because Christ comes to this world in a stable, which is filled with you know what - as a baby and welcomes us.

Surprise.

God is a God of Surprises.

Surprise! God came as a baby.

Who of us would have thunked up that one? Amen.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++



Painting: 1898 Annunciation by Henry Ossawa Turner [1959-1947]

AGGRESSION

December  18,  2011

Quote for the Day

"One day in an English class a boy was asked, 'What parts of speech are "my" and "mine"?'

"Quickly he replied, 'Agressive pronouns'."

Ruth Rosenberry

GRANDPARENTS

December  17,  2011

Quote for Today

"One of the most influential handclasps is that of a grandchild around the finger of a grandparent."

Herald, Azusa, California

WHAT’S THE BOTTOM LINE?

INTRODUCTION

The title of my homily for this Friday in the 3rd Week of Advent is, “What’s The Bottom Line?”

One of the habits in Jewish religious tradition was to ask a Rabbi to present the bottom line - to sum up the whole of Judaism in one word or one sentence or with one basic message. “What’s the bottom line?”

One added thing was to keep their answer short - so sometimes a Rabbi was asked to do this while standing on one foot. How about that for homilies?

As you’ve heard in various homilies there were 613 commandments revealed to Moses. I have not done it myself, but if you comb through the Pentateuch - the first 5 books of the Bible - that’s how many laws you find.

365 were negative commands: thou shall nots - some say it’s 365 so there can be a law for every day of the year.

And there were 248 positive commandments: some say that corresponds to 248 parts of the body. I don’t understand how that works. I have 10 fingers and toes - 2 eyes, one nose, etc..

Now, all those 615 laws didn’t have the same importance - so over and over again people asked in various ways, “What’s the Bottom Line?”

ANSWERS

Rabbis answered that question in various ways. Let me give a few.

Some rabbis said David summed up the 613 laws with the following 11 principles. I found this in a Jewish book. I couldn’t figure out if these 11 principles were gleaned from the Psalms.

               1) Walk uprightly.
               2) Work with righteousness.
               3) Speak the truth from your heart.
               4) Practice no deceit with your tongue.
               5) Don’t do evil to your neighbor.
               6) Don’t do anything that your neighbor can reproach you for.
               7) Don’t be a vile person.
               8) Honor the person who fears the law.
               9) Don’t be like those who swear they are not hurting themselves, but won’t change.
             10) Don’t lend money to others out of usury.
             11) Don’t take a reward against someone who is innocent.

Some went through Isaiah and said he summed up the 613 with 6 principles:

               1) Walk in righteousness.
               2) Speak peacefully.
               3) Don’t make money by making fraudulent deals.
               4) Don’t take bribes when they are waved at you.
               5) Put your hands to your ears when people talk about people.
               6) Shut your eyes when you start to see evil.

Some said Micah the prophet summed up the 613 with 3 principles: Do justly, love mercy and walk modestly with your God

Others summed up Isaiah in a different way than above, so upon further examination Isaiah has 2 commandments. We heard them in the first sentence of today’s first reading:

               1) Keep justice;
               2) do righteousness.

Habbakkuk summed it up the whole 613 laws with 1 principle: The righteous shall live by faith.

CONCLUSION

How do you sum up life? What do you think life is all about? What would be your bottom line?

We know Jesus was asked that question several times and in Matthew 22: 34-40 he sums it all up with two quotes from the Old Testament. He quotes part of the Shema from Deuteronomy 6:5 - which every Jewish service begins with - and then something from Leviticus 19:18. He says that the Greatest commandment is, “You must love the Lord your God with your whole heart, and your whole soul, and your whole mind.” Then he says that the second commandment is like it: “You must love your neighbor as yourself.”

That’s his bottom line. And when we see Jesus’ life we know he practiced what he preached.

So the title, the theme, the point of my homily today is to ask, “What’s your bottom line?”

Speak up! Try answering that standing on one foot or in 25 words or less or what have you.

JUNG   ON  MARRIAGE

December 16, 2011 Quote for Today


The following is a letter of C. G. Jung to a Mister N.

1 November 1951

Dear Herr N.,


I am sorry to be late with my answer. I was away on holiday and your letter was lying around for some time.


You have experienced in your marriage what is an almost universal fact - that individuals are different from one another. Basically, each remains for the other an unfathomable enigma. There is never complete concord. If you have committed a mistake at all, it consisted in your having striven too hard to understand your wife completely and not reckoning with the fact that in the end people don't want to know what secrets are slumbering in their souls.  If you struggle too much to penetrate into another person, you find that you have thrust him into a defensive position, and resistances develop because, through your efforts to penetrate and understand, he feels forced to examine those things in himself which he doesn't want to examine.  Everybody has his dark side which -  so long as all goes well - he had better not know about.  This is no fault of yours.  It is a universal human truth which is nevertheless true, even though there are plenty of people who will assure you that they'd be only too glad to know everything about themselves.  It is as good as certain that your wife had many thoughts and feelings which made her uneasy and which she wanted to hide even from herself.  That is simply human. It is also the reason why so many elderly people withdraw into their own solitude where they won't be disturbed.  And it is always about things they would rather not be too clearly conscious of.  Certainly you are not responsible for the existence of these psychic contents..   If nevertheless you are still tormented by guilty feelings,  then considere for once what sins you have not committed which you would have liked to commit.  This might perhaps cure you of your guilt feelings towards your wife.  With kind regards,


Yours sincerely,
C.G. Jung

C.G. Jung Letters.

I found this quoted letter on pages 175 and 176 of The Education of the Heart, edited by Thomas Moore, Readings and Sources for Care of the Soul, Soul Mates, and The Re-Enchantment of Everyday Life. Harper Perennial, 1996

SUFFERING - 

WHAT  IT  DOES  TO  US!

December  15,  2011

Quote for Today - the day the United States forces declared  in Bagdad an end to their operations in Iraq.


"Imagine two generals, each having to decide whether or not to commit a division of ten thousand men to battle.


To one the division is but a thing, a unit of personnel, an instrument of strategy and nothing more.


To the other it is these things, but he is also aware of each and every one of the ten thousand lives and the lives of the families of each of the ten thousand.


For whom is the decision easier?


It is easier for the general who has blunted his awareness precisely because he cannot tolerate the pain of a more nearly complete awareness.


It may be tempting to say, 'Ah, but a spiritually evolved man would never become a general in the first place.' 


But the same issue is involved in being a corporate president, a physician, a teacher, a parent.


Decisions affecting the lives of others must always be made.  


The best decision-makers are those who are willing to suffer the most over their decisions but still retain the ability to be decisive. 


One measure - and perhaps the best measure - of a person's greatness is the capacity for suffering.


Yet the great are also joyful.


This, then, is the paradox.


Buddhists tend to ignore the Buddha's suffering and Christians forget Christ's joy.


Buddha and Christ were not different men.


The suffering of Christ letting go on the cross and the joy of Buddha letting go under the bo tree are one."

M. Scott Peck, The Road Less Traveled, pages 75-76.

The above quote was one paragraph. I broke  it down by sentences  - because I and others don't read something that is long - like a long paragraph.

Painting on top: 1887 Civil War Battle Scene by William Trego [1858-1909]

IN THE DARK

INTRODUCTION

The title of my homily is, “In The Dark.”

Sometimes we are in the dark; sometimes we feel like we’re in the dark.

Life is both light and darkness. No kidding!

We’ve seen the Chinese philosophy symbol of the ying-yang black and white circles - complementary opposites - each having the opposite within - both sides part of the whole. If it’s daylight here, it’s night darkness there - changing over and over again as the earth revolves around the sun.

Light needs dark and dark needs light. We appreciate Caravaggio and Rembrandt's paintings - many of which have light in faces - and light that glows especially because there are shadows and dark areas in the rooms the characters are featured in.

The Calling of Saint Matthew [1599-1600] Caravaggio [1571-1610]

The Night Watch [1640-1642] by Rembrandt [1606-1669]

The title of my homily is, “In The Dark.”

Hopefully, a homily sheds some light. I’m not so sure about this one - because this topic has a lot of stuff in it which - I’m very much in the dark about.

Perhaps that’s the reason I find myself repeating over and over again what the Talmud says, ‘”Teach thy tongue to say, ‘I do not know.’”

TODAY’S READINGS

We heard in today’s first reading: “I form the light, and create the darkness….” [Cf. Isaiah 45: 6-8, 18, 21-25]

Don’t we love the opening words of the Bible, “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. Now the earth was a formless void, there was darkness over the deep, and God’s spirit hovered over the water. God said, ‘Let there be light’, and there was light. God called light ‘day’ and darkness he called ‘night’. Evening came and morning came: the first day.” [Genesis 1: 1-5]

“Let’s start at the very beginning, a very good place to begin….”

Sometimes we see - we have answers - and sometimes we feel like we’re in the dark and so we go to Jesus with questions - as we heard John the Baptist do in today’s gospel. [Cf. Luke 7: 18-23]

THE FEAST OF ST. JOHN OF THE CROSS

Today - December 14 - is the feast of St. John of the Cross - and one of his major themes is the dark - as in the Dark Night of the Soul.

In this homily, let me present a few fragments of what I hear Saint John of the Cross saying - especially his ideas about darkness.

It’s not original with him - it’s a theme that we find in Christian Spirituality - down through the years.

If we pray, hopefully we pray, “Let there be light!”

But sometimes the light doesn’t go on at our command!

So if we pray, we know about the darkness of God in prayer.

“Where are you, God? Where are you? I feel like you’re keeping me in the dark.”

I pray and my prayer is filled with distractions. I pray and I feel like I’m talking to myself. I pray - but it seems like mumblings - or whistling in the dark - and I’m the only one in a dark alley - or a dark valley - or in a dark night - or in a very dark universe.

If you know about all this, you know the Psalms. They are filled with screams and yells to God - they are the history of people down through the years praying to know where God is - especially when the valley we’re traveling though is dark - and we’re wondering and wandering like lost sheep without a Good Shepherd.

Having conducted lots and lots of retreats for 14 years in two different retreat houses - also having taught Spirituality for 9 years to men who were hoping to become Redemptorists - 9 classes - each of which took a year and a day - as a Novice Master - one task was to teach others how to pray - so I know about this theme of Darkness when it comes to prayer.

So once more, , “Teach thy tongue to say, ‘I do not know.’”

The beginner of prayer - if he or she is just saying prayers - doesn’t come to the Night - the Darkness - issue right away.

At first - all is bright - light - “honeymoonish” - the stuff of beginning - excitement - as in marriage - as in any new job - as in having a new car - the first week at college, moving into a new home - or what have you.

As Blaise Pascal put it, “Things are always at their best in the beginning.”

Then time takes away the newness…. and the newness becomes oldness. The light of day hits noon - and the so called, “Noonday Devil” starts walking with us on the long journey.

An as we continue the shadows of afternoon move into the dark of evening and night.

In time dryness - boredom - emptiness - aloneness - arrives.

It’s night.

The beginner feels at first the Dark Night of the Senses - then the middler feels the Dark Night of the Soul.

The Dark Night of the Senses has to do with the Spiritual that hits us through our 5 senses. The Dark Night of the Soul - now that’s the down deep inner Black of God - the Black Hole of God - whom some atheists - don’t realize they are at black door of God - and miss his knock (Oops that’s an ear metaphor - hearing - something that goes with the Dark Night of the Senses).

Flashes of light appear from time to time - moments of consolation arrive at times - insights - inner lights go on - but from what I learned from 51 years of Religious life - and prayer - most of the life of prayer is darkness.

Sorry - if you don’t know that yet.

Beginners - as in marriage need consolation. They need rich rewarding experiences of light. Then when they are long on the journey - they get to know and experience that they don’t know what’s around the corner. Then they discover that walking in the dark - is how God operates - that God is so often a Night God.

In the meanwhile we have statues and stained glass windows - candles and music - spoken prayers - but in time, the honeymoon is over and we enter the life of faith.

In due time we understand the words of St. Paul in 2 Corinthians 2: 5, “We walk by faith and not by sight.”

In due time we can understand and learn why the Muslims didn’t want images in their mosques. It’s the same reason we have iconoclasts - those who break and destroy religious images - or their use in veneration. It’s the same reason the Jewish people were opposed  to the use of God’s name - and proclaimed the first two commandments:

“I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage. You shall have no other gods before Me.”

“You shall not make for yourself a carved image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth; you shall not bow down to them nor serve them. For I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and fourth generations of those who hate Me, but showing mercy to thousands, to those who love Me and keep My Commandments.”

Make an object a God - and you’ll always have iconoclasts. Luther thought that statements by preachers like Johann Tetzel about Indulgences went too far - as if we humans could dictate how God is. Raising money to renovate Saint Peter’s in Rome with statements about what you’ll get for your money was too much for some Reformers.

Make the Bible more than it is - and you’ll also have iconoclasts.

Don't we get angry or frustrated or what have you, when someone says what we think or who we are - and we know they are totally in the dark about us?

Life is tricky. Relationshiop are tricky. People are tricky.
Religion is also tricky stuff - because religion is not about stuff - as it's about relationships.

Spiritual teachers - like John of the Cross - teach that when you think you have God - you probably don’t - and when you feel like you’re in the Dark - you might very well be in God.

Hey we don’t see all the stars up there - in the light - only in the night. They are always there, but we don’t always see them. We can be blinded by the light.

So keep praying. Keep walking by faith - and every once and a while the light goes on - and when we get to heaven - who knows what we’ll see?

The scriptures say there will no longer be any night. We’ll see.

CONCLUSION

This sermon is a first draft and I’m dabbling in the dark a bit - but on purpose. I like the night for praying more than the day - always have - but others are just the opposite.

Moreover in spirituality, there is not only the so called “kataphatic” “with images” - “the via positiva” approach to mysticism and prayer - but there is also the “apophatic” - without images - “the via negativa” - to empty oneself of images - and in doing so one can also move into God.

Eastern mysticism - and Oriental mysticism - and meditation techniques have a voice here - along with Neo-Platonist writers like Pseudo-Dionysius - who stressed emptying oneself to meet God.

Let me close with two quotes of John of the cross:

“Desolation is a file, and the endurance of darkness is preparation for great light.”

“If someone wishes to be sure of the road he treads on, he must close his eyes and walk in the dark.”