SPY WEDNESDAY

INTRODUCTION

Today is the so called, “Spy Wednesday”. It’s the most  "backgroundish day" — the most “didn’t-make-it” day — the least featured of the name days in Holy Week. We know all about Palm Sunday, Holy Thursday, Good Friday, Holy Saturday and then Easter. They made it. “Spy Wednesday” didn’t.

Why not? It's the day  Judas is featured. However, when it comes down to it,  Judas is someone we know very little about. Yet he's also someone about whom a lot has been written. I found that out when I went looking for quotes and comments about him. I came up with some  interesting ones and I’ll put a few of them in this homily.

Judas, we hardly know you. Who are you? Why did you do what you did?

SCRIPTURES

The gospels get into his motivation and his story. Yet, do they really know the man and what made him tick?

In the Acts of the Apostles there is the detail about Judas’ death that is very messy - and rarely mentioned. It says, "As you know, he bought a field with the money he was paid for his crime." That seems like a very quick transaction. Then the Acts of the Apostles adds,   “He fell headlong and burst open, and all his entrails poured out” [Acts 1: 18] Is that TMI - too much information - and in a homily? I wonder if that story  about the field is a mix up or misunderstanding coming out the story bouncing off his being buried in a potter’s field [Cf. Matthew 27: 7]. Did someone using poetic license make up the bursting apart story as well as him wanting to buy a field with the money he got for betraying Jesus?

It seems that money was his big motivation.

SPIES AND BETRAYERS

Down through the years Judas is listed with the great spies and betrayers. Spies and traitors down through history have always been disliked people. There’s Brutus who betrayed Caesar. There’s Quisling, the Norwegian politician who was a traitor and collaborated with the Nazi invaders. There’s Benedict Arnold who betrayed his side to the British in the Revolutionary War. In our times in our country there have been traitors like Robert Hanssen, Aldrich Ames, John Walker Jr., Jonathan Pollard and others. What were their motives - other than money?

Judas received 30 pieces of silver for betraying Jesus.

DANTE

“Dante sets him [Judas] in the lowest of all hells, a hell of cold and ice, a hell designed to show who were not hot sinners swept away by angry passions, but cold, calculating, deliberate offenders against the love of God.” (Cf. Barclay, Mark, p. 328)

SHAKESPEARE—RICHARD III

Shakespeare has Richard the Third saying, “So Judas did to Christ: but he, in twelve, / Found truth in all but one; I, in twelve thousand, none. / God save the king! Will no man say, amen?” (Cf. Bartlett’s Familiar Quotations, p. 195: 10)

GRAHAM GREEN

Yet if there is any character whom we don’t know, it’s Judas. Everyone thinks they know him, but do they?

Graham Green writes in The End of the Affair [1925] , “If we had not been taught how to interpret the story of the Passion, would we have been able to say from their actions alone whether it was the jealous Judas or the cowardly Peter who loved Christ?”

OURSELVES

We don’t know Judas, yet we continue to stereotype him.

John Le Carre 1963 novel had the title, The Spy Who Came In from the Cold. Why not dub Judas with that title and ask him in prayer, “What happened Judas? What happened? Why did you do it?” Then listen. Answers might give us some deep insights into yourself and others .

Or maybe forget about Judas and only go into ourselves.

Today’s gospel has what I think is the worst line in scripture, -- the horrible words, “Better for him if he had never been born.” Meaning: “woe to that man by whom the Son of Man is betrayed.” Judas!

Instead of looking at Judas, let’s look at ourselves. Have we ever had that feeling, “I wish I was never born”? We might have that feeling when we have betrayed another or have been betrayed. Or we made a horrible mistake - that broke trust. We want to sink into the ground from which we came.

Betrayal is that kind of a sin: betraying or being betrayed.

SOME MORE QUOTES

In a poem, Emily Dickinson said that the soul can be a friend or a spy. Listen to her adjectives. It can be an imperial friend or the most agonizing Spy.

                “The Soul unto itself
                  Is an imperial friend—
                  Or the most agonizing Spy—
                  An Enemy—could send.”

Francis Thompson in The Hound of Heaven wrote,

              “But with unhurrying chase,
               And unperturbed pace,
               Deliberate speed, majestic instancy,
               They beat—and a Voice beat
               More instant than the Feet—
`             All things betray thee—who betrayest Me.’”

Isaac Bashevis Singer “When you betray somebody else, you also betray yourself.”

CONCLUSION: THE WRONG TREE

Well, when we feel that, it’s not time for the Judas Tree, it’s time for the Jesus Tree—the Cross.

Judas killed the one person he needed—the one person who could forgive him—the one person who called him and gave him a calling. Jesus is the one who said to him,  “You have a reason for being born.”

So if you feel crummy, betrayed, or having betrayed another, start again. Don’t kill yourself. Turn to Jesus.

Let me end there. Let’s begin there. Go to Jesus with a kiss.

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Drawing on top by Brendan Monroe - from The New York Times

 GOD HAS THE KEY 

AND  YOU THINK 

YOU HAVE THE LOCK!

April  4,  2012

Quote for the Day

"God enters by a private door into every individual."

Ralph Waldo Emerson [1803-1882]

Photo: a side street in Mykonos, Greece

BETRAYAL 
AND  
DENIAL

INTRODUCTION

The title of my homily for today is “Betrayal and Denial”. I’d like to reflect a little bit on those two issues: Betrayal and Denial. They are two issues that we sometimes feed on.

They are sitting there, or better, they are dwelling there in our heart - perhaps in the bottom back of our deep freeze. And when we are down or when someone “does it again” - past betrayals and past denials pop up. We take them out of the deep freeze. We thaw them. We let them simmer and then we begin to nibble on them in our hurt.

Some people overeat to compensate for their anger. Some people try to stuff themselves, to plug the hole that leads to their heart, where past betrayals and denials linger and want to come to the surface.

So this morning a brief reflection on “Betrayal and Denial”.

MAJOR ISSUES OF OUR TIMES

They are two major issues that we have all heard lots about in our time. We have seen and heard so much about individuals and communities denying, denying, denying. We have all seen so many betrayals in government, marriages, and in the priesthood and in religious life. So betrayal and denial are two realities we are quite familiar with.


TODAY’S GOSPEL

Today’s gospel is Holy Week material. It’s contains heavy duty heart stuff.

Besides Jesus, today’s gospel has three main characters: Judas, Peter and the Beloved Disciple (not absolutely sure who he is). Now we would all love to be the Beloved Disciple, reclining right there next to Jesus bosom (as in Abraham’s bosom), but the reality is: we are more likely to be Judas as well as Peter. The reality is: where charity and love should reign, often we find experience betrayal and denial.


Today’s gospel begins with Jesus sitting there with his disciples and he is growing deeply troubled. His heart is a washing machine stirring around big issues, especially, these issues of betrayal and denial - two of the major issues of our time and all time.


THE HUMAN HEART

The human heart contains both and a lot more. Isn’t that the message of Jesus? The human heart contains love and it contains sin. And let him or her who doesn’t have sin in their heart start throwing stones and then they will discover they have sin in their heart.

Jesus said go down deep into the garden of the human heart and you’ll find rotten apples and they can ruin the whole barrel - especially if we deny they are there.

So today’s gospel contains warning signals to us. I could be Judas. I could be Peter. Neither role is outside my acting ability.

As we grow from childhood to adolescence to adulthood, somewhere along the line we discover evil. It’s out there. Someone betrays us. Someone hurts us. Some abuses us. Someone hurts another. We are shocked. There is evil in the garden.

And as we grow we soon discover that we too can be evil. We too can be cruel. We can be Peter. We can be Judas.

Problems arise when we deny that inner reality and start to make others - the different or the foreigners or people of some other nationality or color to be the problem - or women as the one who cause rapes or what have you.

In today’s gospel Judas makes the move and we read, Satan moved into his heart. And then the dark innuendo, “It was night.”

Satan is not too far from the tree called me. And he slithers around the tree or hangs in its branches. And that tree is not out there. It’s planted in here, in my heart. And the tree is the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. And we have eaten from both - and we have been graced by good fruit and poisoned by bad fruit.

And the question is: do we accept or deny that reality?

We’ve all had this experience of someone grinding us down. Have we ever admitted doing the same to others?

HOWE’S AND MOON’S EXAMPLES

In their book, The Choicemaker, Sheila Moon and Elizabeth Howe  have great stuff on this issue. Let me cite two examples:

The first example that Moon and Howe  mention is that of a birthright Quaker who was an upholder of pacifism and the doing of good works. In his rigidity, he forced two of his children into revolt and anti-social violence, because he, the father, had never faced his own inner darkness. (p. 84)

The second example is that of a character they call Mr. J. “Let us take a look at Mr. J. On Tuesday he awakens tired, irritable, closed off from his family, and spends the day trying to escape himself by being egocentric, unaware, and inadequate. He doesn’t see what the situation requires from him. He makes erroneous evaluations of himself and of others. He does things that are consciously or unconsciously hurtful, even cruel, both to himself and others. Failures multiply until at last, exhausted, he falls into bed only to lie awake for the endless hours it takes for him to see what he has done. On Wednesday Mr. J. tries to approach everything with more openness and flexibility. His evaluations are more genuine and sensitive, and he manages to engage in many more dialogues than monologues. In short, by trying to avoid his evil he comes to grief, and by recognizing it and assimilating it he acts more creatively and also is more richly fulfilled. As Jesus said, “Whosoever shall see to wall himself in shall be destroyed, and whosoever shall let the walls fall shall find life.” (pp. 89 - 90)

CONCLUSION

So today I’m suggesting that we zero in on our own heart. We need to sit in our own garden. We need to sit under our own tree. We need to inspect and look at your own fruit. And like Newton maybe an apple will fall on your head and we’ll wake up to look at it. Maybe it will be a good apple - maybe it will be a bad apple. We have both in our tree. Next, look around in the grass below the tree called “ME” or stand up and look at the apples on our tree. We’ll find two apples that are two of the biggest issues in our times: betrayal and denial.

When we look at our denials and especially our betrayals, we might want a rope to hang ourselves on that tree. Relax. We don’t have to be Judas. Be Peter. He learned all about forgiveness - three times - probably 70 times 7 times after that. My message would be that there is sin inside our heart, but if we have a choice between Peter or Judas, betrayal or denial, choose denial and not betrayal. Be Peter and not Judas.

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Painting on top: The Taking of  Christ by Michelangelo Caravaggio [1602]

BEYOND  JUST  SEEING 

April 3,  2012

Quote For Today

"I am always humbled
by the ingenuity
of the Lord,
who can make
a red barn 
cast a blue shadow."

E. B. White [1899-1985]

THE ELEVATOR RIDE

Life - it’s like an elevator ride.


You get on. Sometimes you go up and sometimes you go down.


Sometimes you end up on the wrong floor. You weren’t thinking or someone misunderstood you and pushed the wrong button.


Life - it’s like an elevator ride.


Some long for the good old days - when there was someone standing there in an uniform ready to serve you - someone to ask with a smile, “What floor!” To push the buttons … To say, “Please step back!” To say, “Ground floor” or “Fifth floor” when they bring you to your floor - and then to say as you exited the elevator, “Have a great day!”


Life - it’s like an elevator ride.


Sometimes you’re all alone.


Sometimes someone says, “Hello!”


Sometimes someone pushes the button for you.


Sometimes there is someone who loves to start a conversation or make a comment.


Sometimes everyone is so - so quiet.


Sometimes you recognize your neighbors.


Life - it’s like an elevator ride.


Sometimes you get stuck. Sometimes it’s stuck.


Sometimes you have to wait.


Sometimes it’s crowded.


Life - it’s like an elevator ride.


Some people leave such a sweet scented perfume - even when they are long gone.


Some people leave a sour odor - and there are no windows to air them out of your life.


Some people - you’ll hardly or never know, they were there.


Life - it’s like an elevator ride.


Some people take the stairs - whenever possible.


Some people make odd comments about those who take the elevator - but the day might come - when they are in a wheel chair - or their legs are failing - and they too will take the elevator. Then they’ll know.


Some people bring you up; some people bring you down.


Life - it’s like an elevator ride.

© Andy Costello, Reflections, 2012

[This is an image that hit me when I read today’s gospel - for Monday in Holy Week - John 12:1-11. Jesus was invited to a dinner at the house of Lazarus, Martha and Mary - and “Mary took a liter of costly perfumed oil made from genuine aromatic nard and anointed the feet of Jesus and dried them with her hair; the house was filled with the fragrance of the oil.” Open up your Bible. Read John 12: 3. Put your nose to the words. Your nose will still grab the scent.]

HOME   SWEET  HOME  PLEASE!

April  2,  2012

Quote for Today

"Better be kind at home
than burn incense
in a far place."

Chinese Proverb
Picture  "A Path for Gods"  by Ole Jensen - found on line.

HE SEEMED 

SO ELSEWHERE

[This is a Palm Sunday Reflection for 2012.]


I stood on the side - on the edge of the crowd that day - wondering what was going on.

I looked at Jesus’ face - better his eyes - as he came up the road that day. He seemed so elsewhere.

Sitting on a donkey: what was that all about? Crowds waiving palms - praising him: what was that all about? He seemed so elsewhere.

Where was his mind? What was he thinking? What was he wondering about? What were those standing there that day thinking?

I know I’ve been there - at a meal - and I was a hundred miles away. I was chewing lamb, but in my thoughts - I was chewing on something else - planning something else - wanting to be elsewhere.

As the crowd along the road waved palms and shouted, “Hosanna!” I could spot a few of his enemies - tight faced - angry - planning something else.

I watched him all that week - a week that was to be different from all other weeks.

Weeks and months before this week, I heard him say - he had to get to Jerusalem. So I knew he was in Jerusalem long before he got to Jerusalem that day.

I knew he knew - this was to be his destiny - so here he was - but he seemed to be so elsewhere.

Life can often be what we didn’t plan it to be. We know what we want till we get what we want. And then we realize it wasn’t what we wanted.

That Thursday evening, I was close to the end of the table for that supper. I watched his hands. They were tapping the table at times. I watched him eyeing the bread - wincing as he broke it. I saw him tasting the wine slowly - and his face seemed to be sensing - that he knew he was about to be crushed.

I heard him say, “This is my body….” with the bread. “This is my blood ….” with the wine. I heard him say, “This is the beginning of a New Passover, a New Exodus, a New Covenant, a New Life.”

I knew this was his last supper with us. I just knew that when I saw Judas slip out into the night. Something was wrong with Judas. He also could be so elsewhere.

At that meal I listened carefully. Jesus told us about loving one another. After he the shepherd would be slaughtered like the Lamb for the Passover Supper - we would be scattered. What was that all about? He was passing over too many steps that we hadn’t taken yet. After he's gone, he reminded us to remain together like branches on the vine - because separated we’d have no life within us. He told us to produce much fruit and in the meanwhile - to wash feet. He kept on talking about his Father - coming from and going back to him - sending a Spirit to us. None of us are scribes. Yet I wished there was someone who was taking this down.

I saw Jesus’ face tighten as he too went out into the night.

We followed him - bundled up together - in fear and in the dark.

He didn’t ask me to join him in prayer. Once more it was just Peter, James and John. However, I was watching - watching John in particular. It seemed that he was sensing something that Peter wasn’t. James? I am not sure. John always seemed to be taking it all in - seeming to be so elsewhere - at times.

I could hear Jesus’ frustration with Peter - not staying awake - but sleeping - while he Jesus was deep in prayer, deep in worry, deep in scare - deep in fear.

Silence. Night. What’s next?

Then I heard the soldiers coming with torches - burning bright torches - probably to arrest Jesus. I saw Judas’ face in the light. I saw the kiss. Jesus looked right at Judas. Judas turned away. And as they dragged Jesus away, Judas’ face fell. He seemed so elsewhere.

I stayed on the edge. They rushed Jesus to places behind big doors - strong gates - big walls. I couldn’t get inside. But I heard that they were beating and making fun of Jesus inside - with no clue what they were doing.

That Friday I heard the crowd screaming for Barabbas - screaming for crucifixion - and I thought I spotted in the crowd some of those I saw last Sunday who were praising him. I guess people can be like that.

I watched him being forced to carry his own cross on the way to Calvary. I think he caught my eye once - but I looked elsewhere. I didn’t know what to do.

I stayed at the edge of the crowd at Calvary. I saw some of his blood squirt from his hands when they nailed him to the cross - right onto the skin of a small boy who carried the bucket of nails and the hammer to Calvary. That was ironic because some cried, “His blood be upon us and upon our children.”

I heard him cry from the cross, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”

God seemed so elsewhere - so it seems - sometimes.

Jesus hung there for what seemed like hours.

Jesus seemed so elsewhere when he died.

I kept saying to myself, “Now what? Now what? Is there a next or do we all go back home - to all the elsewhere’s we’ve been thinking about the past three years - to all these elsewhere’s we all left behind?