ISN’T  HE  THE  CARPENTER?

INTRODUCTION

The title of my homily for this 14 Sunday in Ordinary Time [B] is, “Isn’t He The Carpenter?”

That’s a question in today’s gospel. It’s worded a tiny bit differently in the text we used today: “Is he not the carpenter?” I prefer the conversational sound of, “Isn’t he the carpenter?”

The scene in today’s gospel is one we all know: coming back home. So Jesus comes back home. Don’t we all from time to time?

While there, the Sabbath day arrives. So Jesus goes to the local synagogue and begins to teach.  I assume his mother was with him. Was Joseph still alive? Here was a native son! The village was watching.

Surprise - he’s an outstanding teacher. They are amazed and astonished.

Then they do something that happens many times. They don’t accept him. They reject him. After all when he was here, he was just a carpenter.

Was the reason for the rejection jealousy?  Or was it the content of his talk?  Was the down deep reason: they didn’t want to change the changes inside themselves that Jesus called to be changed? Dying to self is difficult. 

So they try to put him down with the comment, “Is he not the carpenter, the son of Mary, and the brother of James and Joses and Judas and Simon? And are not his sisters here with us?”

Literalists like to use that to say Jesus wasn’t an only child. They won’t accept this was common village language in the Mediterranean Basin. Hey brothers and sisters, we’re all brothers and sisters.

And Jesus knowing the Jewish history of prophets like Ezekiel whom we heard in today’s first reading, said, “A prophet is not without honor, except in his native place and among his own kin and in his own house.”

So once more he leaves his home town of Nazareth and heads elsewhere.

WHAT WAS IT LIKE?

What was it like for you when you came home the first time - like after that first semester in college or the military or what or where have you?

What was it like for you to come home for the first time - after your marriage - or with kids?  How did your mom and dad and family accept your style - your way of raising your children?

What was it like for you when your kids came home for the first time or some significant time - after they left home?

What was it like to meet old classmates, old friends, if you ever attended a class reunion?

What was it like to go back home again?

THOMAS WOLFE

Reflecting on this I remembered the classic book by Thomas Wolfe about all this.  He had a few books published before he died at the age of 37 in Baltimore at Johns Hopkins  - never recovering from an operation to save him from miliary tuberculosis of the brain.  

After Wolfe’s death, Edward Aswell of Harper and Row edited and pulled together a 700 page plus autobiographical novel - of something Thomas Wolfe was working on and the book was published as, “You Can’t Go Home Again.”

In it he talks about an imaginary small home town and the main character comes home and finds it suffocating.

As I thought about all this, that’s one more classic I have to put on my “To Be Read Bucket List” before I kick the bucket.

ISN’T HE THE CARPENTER?

The title of my homily is, “Isn’t He the Carpenter?”

What Jesus does is walk into people’s lives.

On the Sabbath he walks into the synagogue of our minds and challenges us in the gospel readings.

Do we do what the folks in his home town in today’s gospel do?  “Great stuff Jesus, but we've heard it all before. We’re Christians. We’re used to you, Jesus." And so we walk  away without him or vice versa.

Or are we like those folks in the other towns who accepted him and whose lives have changed?

That’s the great life choice that is at the heart of the gospels. It’s the key message of this homily. The Gospel of John in it’s prologue puts it very clearly.

“He was in the world,

and the world came to be through him.
He came to what was his own,

but his own people did not accept him.

But to those who did accept him.
But to those who did accept him

he gave power 
to become children of God,

to those who believe in his name….” [John 1:10-12]

Jesus is a carpenter.  That’s what hit me when I read today’s gospel. I thought the text said, “Isn’t he Joseph’s son?” Nope - that’s in another take on this story [Cf. Matthew 13:55].  Mark says Jesus was a carpenter.

CONSTRUCTION - DECONSTRUCTION - RECONSTRUCTION

I was talking to someone the other day and he used the words deconstruction and reconstruction - abut his life.

I’ve often noticed the phrase “deconstruction” when reading philosophers like Jacques Derrida. I get a bit of what he’s saying - and then again at other times - I don’t get what he’s talking about. [1]

So when I read that word carpenter in today’s gospel, I thought that maybe deconstruction  is  very, very simple.

We build our house - our lives - with how to do life - learning  from our families, our education, our church, our friendships, our decisions.

Then we hit a stage where some of us say, “Something’s wrong!” or “Something’s missing. I’m dissatisfied.” 

Sometimes this happens dramatically from a broken relationship, a divorce, alcoholism, the loss of a job, a death, what have you. We admit: our house, our life is a disaster.

Second stage: deconstruction. We have to knock it all down or get a bulldozer and then remove all the debris. We stand there and look  the structure and skeleton - the content and the stuff of our life.

Third stage: reconstruction.

Here is where Jesus shows up on our street as a carpenter and says, “Need any help! I’m Jesus the carpenter!”

BACK TO THOMAS WOLFE

I could end here, but as I was looking at some quotes from Thomas Wolfe’s book, You Can’t Go Home Again, I thought two of them might be relevant here.

The first step is to go back home in your mind and look at your home - look at your life - look at where you have come from and where you are right now.

It might be like the feeling these folks out west in Colorado and elsewhere have when they come home to their house. It’s destroyed and burnt to the ground. Talk about destruction. What next?

Thomas Wolfe in his book, You Can’t Go Home Again,  asks the question this way. He asks the question about what changes and what doesn’t change in one’s life.

Yes some things can be burnt or destroyed or fall apart - but there are some things that don’t change.


That would be another key question to ponder this week: what changes in life and what remains in life?

This was triggered when I found a very well written passage that begins on page 40 of the Signet Edition of Thomas Wolfe's, You Can't Go Home Again (1940). It goes like this: “Some things will never change. Some things will always be the same. Lean down your ear upon the earth and listen.

“The voice of forest water in the night, a woman's laughter in the dark, the clean, hard rattle of raked gravel, the cricketing stitch of midday in hot meadows, the delicate web of children's voices in bright air--these things will never change.

“The glitter of sunlight on roughened water, the glory of the stars, the innocence of morning, the smell of the sea in harbors, the feathery blur and smoky buddings of young boughs, and something there that comes and goes and never can be captured, the thorn of spring, the sharp and tongueless cry--these things will always be the same.

“All things belonging to the earth will never change--the leaf, the blade, the flower, the wind that cries and sleeps and wakes again, the trees whose stiff arms clash and tremble in the dark, and the dust of lovers long since buried in the earth--all things proceeding from the earth to seasons, all things that lapse and change and come again upon the earth--these things will always be the same, for they come up from the earth that never changes, they go back into the earth that lasts forever. Only the earth endures, but it endures forever.

“The tarantula, the adder, and the asp will also never change. Pain and death will always be the same. But under the pavements trembling like a pulse, under the buildings trembling like a cry, under the waste of time, under the hoof of the beast above the broken bones of cities, there will be something growing like a flower, something bursting from the earth again, forever deathless, faithful, coming into life again like April.”

CONCLUSION

Jesus Christ the Risen One is forever Rising - forever here. That is our belief. He was crucified - died - was buried - destroyed like a house in a fire or an earthquake or the World Trade Center Towers - but our belief, part of our life Credo is that he rose again.

We believe Jesus the Carpenter is here today. As Paul tells us in today’s second reading, “My grace is sufficient for you…”

As someone says in Thomas Wolfe’s book, You Can’t Go Home Again, “I have to see a thing a thousand times before I see it once.”

How many times do we have to come to Mass till we realize Jesus the Carpenter is right here, right now, ready to help us reconstruct and raise the rest of our lives. Amen.

Notes


[1]  Jacques Derrida, A Derrida Reader, edited by Peggy Kumaf, [New York: Columbia University Press, 1991].

HOME

Quote for Today  July 8,  2012


“But why had he always felt so strongly the magnetic pull of home, why had he thought so much about it and remembered it with such blazing accuracy, if it did not matter, and if this little town, and the immortal hills around it, was not the only home he had on earth? He did not know. All that he knew was that the years flow by like water, and that one day men come home again.”  




Thomas Wolfe, You Can’t Go Home Again 


Painting on top: Early Sunday Morning [1930] by Edward Hopper, Whitney Museum of American Art, New York.


Questions: 


Do you have a memory of the feelings and surprises you thought and felt when you went back home again after leaving that place many years ago? Ask another this question and see if they ask you your memories as well.


Did places feel so much smaller?


Compare the difference between someone who grew up in one place their whole early life with someone whose family moved a lot - because of being in the military or because of job shifts.

SPECIAL INTERESTS

Quote for Today   July 7,  2012


"Every American is a bouquet of special interests.  Some just smell better to particular noses."


A.M. Rosenthal, "On My Mind," The New York Times, December 15, 1992

Questions:


Do you agree with the comment by A. M. Rosenthal?


If someone asked you to list your special interests, would you, could you?


Is the term "special interests" a button for you?


Is the mention of The New York Times, a button for you?


One of my special interests is: "I can't wait till November 7th, 2012. It will be an end of the political wrangling for a while. I hope? How about you?


Would it be of special interests to some talk shows that the persons they want elected, not get elected, so they will have an opposition to keep them in business?

WHO ME?

INTRODUCTION

The title of my homily for this 13^th Friday in Ordinary Time is, “Who Me?”

WHO ME?

Isn’t that a question we feel from time to time?  We’re standing there and someone says something like, “It’s noisy around here!” Or they say, “Someone left the milk out?” Or, “Nobody seems to empty the dish washer.” We wonder if they are aiming their comments at us. That’s what I call a “Who me?” moment.

In other words, “Are you talking to me?”  “Are you blaming me?”  “Are you asking me?”

“Who me?”

Let me curve or push that question a little deeper.

Let me paint a few "Who me?" pictures - situations when someone feels a call to do something new - something different. 

Who me? 

The little girl sees her mom so much bigger than she is. In imitation, she puts on her mom’s high heel shoes? 

The little boy wants a dump truck, because he sees the big guys on the highway in big dump trucks.

We see a neighbor walking briskly every morning past our house as we stand there in our pajamas with a cup of coffee in one hand and a donut in the other and we’re looking out the front window. We think to ourselves, “I got to  get back into shape.” 

Or we see someone who prays and goes to church and we think, “I need to get back to church!” 

A widow told me recently that she knows two women who both lost their husbands. One mourned and seemed unable to snap out of the pain. The other mourned and got moving again. She found herself saying to herself, “I have a choice here: to crawl into the grave with Charlie and pull the grass over me or I have the choice to come back to life. Charlie would want me to wake up.” Then she said, “I made the to be alive again choice. Amen.”

Those are what I call, “Who me?” moments.

They are calls to change - to follow a new path - a new way of doing things. They are calls to get out of ruts and out onto the highway of doing life. “Who me?” moments are those calls - urges - that we feel are being aimed at ourselves.

CARAVAGGIO

When I read today’s gospel, The Calling of Saint Matthew, I thought of the painting by that name by the famous painter Caravaggio [1571-1610]

Last September and early October I was on a 2 week cruise to the Mediterranean. Nice. On September 30 we docked at Civitavecchia, Italy. Next came a bus to Rome. I was planning on simply going to our Redemptorist house there. Others had expensive tours to the Vatican or to this or that. I had done that years ago. I went down to line up for the bus. There I spotted two ladies from our group who were simply going to Rome by themselves to walk around and see what they saw. I switched my plans and went with them for the day. Good move. We had a good day. We didn’t see the Pope, but we saw St. Peter’s and lots of churches.

Now, why am I telling you this. Answer: I’m about to get to a “Who me?” moment.

When we were near the Piazza Navona fountains, we spotted a church and so we went in. It was the Church of San Luigi dei Francesi - St. Louis of France - the national French church in Rome. Surprise! It had three Caravaggio’s - 3 Caravaggio paintings - in it.

Then I saw this book: “The Bible of Caravaggio - Images from the Old and New Testament.” [Point to the book!] I think the cost was 10 Euros. It was kind of expensive and I’d have to carry it for the rest of our walking. Yet I could hear the book saying, “Buy me!” And I could hear myself saying, “Who me?”

I always think to myself at the moment of choice whether or not to buy a book. “Will I use it for a sermon some time?”

It’s that time to use that book. However, I’ve found myself looking at it from time to time - so I have got my 10 Euro worth from it.

When I read today’s gospel, The Calling of Saint Matthew, I said to myself: “That’s the painting on the cover of that Caravaggio book you bought in Rome last year.”  Sure enough. I went looking for this book and found it right there with my books on the Bible.

Here on the cover and then inside and then again is this same picture of The Call of Matthew. Of the 3 Caravaggio’s in that church, I like this one the best.

The painting is vintage Caravaggio - darkness and light.

In his day Caravaggio had followers and those who used his style.

When I read up about Caravaggio, I read that without him, Vermeer and Rembrandt would not have been the Vermeer and Rembrandt that we know.

Caravaggio lead a volatile life - fighting - killing a few people in duels - being condemned to death by one pope - being commissioned to do church paintings by various cardinals and churches - being hunted - and dying mysteriously at the age of 38.

As I read about him and read his life, I kept reading that he had a deep spirituality. Did all these scenes from the Bible challenge him one on one? And Caravaggio seemed to center in on people one to one when they were facing life threatening and life changing moments. For example, in his painting, Conversion On the Way To Damascus, Saul who becomes Paul is pictured not in a big group of people as most paintings of his conversion are portrayed, but the conversion takes place in a stable - just Saul, just one other person, and a horse. I kept wondering as I studied his paintings, what was he thinking as he painted this particular painting in this manner?

If you have time and you use a computer, type into Google or any search engine, "Caravaggio" and just look at his wonderful paintings.

He was commissioned to do many church paintings - and the authors of this book talk about his spirituality and his messages of light and darkness - the advent and arrival of God and grace into a person’s life. From what I read, the specialists think he was into giving strong spiritual messages. This painting certainly hits me.

I might be partial because I love light and darkness in photographs. I took lessons once. The photographer and his wife who took me on a field trip to learn how to take pictures said: “Photography is all about light and shadows and darkness. The best time for taking  pictures is an hour after sunrise and an hour before sunset - when the light is coming into your pictures from the side." That was Lesson # 1.

BACK TO “WHO ME?”

I stood there in that church of San Luigi dei Francesi for quite some time - studying especially the painting of The Calling of Saint Matthew -  knowing I was seeing history and a great painting.

In today’s gospel -Matthew 9:9-13 - he is at his custom’s post. In Caravaggio’s painting Mathew is in a room. This book says it’s a tavern. There are 4 men sitting at a table. There is one person with coins and there is a pair of dice sitting there. Jesus and Peter are standing there. Jesus points at Matthew and Matthew points to himself - as if to say, “Who me?”  In Luke 5:27 we have the same scene and same story, but Matthew is called Levi there.

It’s a moment of grace for Matthew. It’s a call from Christ to follow him into a new way of doing life. It’s a “Who me?” moment.

When I was pausing to study that painting in that church in Rome, I found myself thanking God for the calling to be a priest.

CONCLUSION

So for a homily message for today, I chose the “Who me?” message.

I see in both Caravaggio’s painting of The Calling of Saint Matthew and today’s gospel, “The Call Message.”

When we look at paintings, ask yourself, “Is there a ‘Who me?’ message in this painting. Is there a call for me to follow a new way of doing things.

I hear in Caravaggio’s paintings that God - Jesus - is calling us in all sorts of life scenes - not just in church.

I hear in the readings of Mass - calls to ask, “Is this reading pointed at me?”  Like today’s first reading from Amos, he talks about people who cheat on the scales. Of course most of us are not in the market place or at gas pumps, cheating on the scales or gauges. [Cf. Amos 8: 4-6, 9-12.]

Yet we might cheat ourselves. I love it in doctor’s offices when I notice people taking off all the weight they can when they get weighed. We are the weight we are. The scale is not us. If we are overweight or way too underweight, then why cheat ourselves of health? 

This is an aside: A funny thing happened to me at my last visit to our doctor. The nurse weighed me and said I lost weight. I hadn’t. My last exam was in the winter, so  I stepped on the scale still wearing my winter coat. When Doctor Lisa came into the examining room she looked at what the nurse wrote and she said, “You lost 7 pounds.” I answered, “Nope, the last time I was here was winter and I had on my heavy coat.” She said, “Oh.” Then she’s tapping my back and stops and says, “Nobody wears a 7 pound coat.”  I said, “Well I did and back then you said I put on weight.”

Who me?

I’m talking too long.

Who me?

Jesus is calling us every day in every way to live in a better light - to come out of the darkness and walk in the light.

Jesus comes up to us no matter who we are and where we are - tavern or tax office - toll booth or playing cards and he’s calling us.

He’s calling us out of darkness into his own wonderful light.


He's saying what he said to Matthew, "Come follow me!"


"Who me?"

LISTENING

Quote for Today - July 6, 2012


"It takes a little time for minds to turn face to face."




Christopher Morley, What Men Live By

A SENSE OF HUMOR

Quote for Today - July 5,  2012


"A sense of humor is the pole that adds balance to our steps as we walk the tightrope of life."


Anonymous




Questions:

Has anyone described you as having a sense of humor?


Of those you know who have a sense of humor, does the quote above ring true for them?


Do you see life as a tightrope walk?  Is that too tight a metaphor?  What is your metaphor for what life is?  Or do use a combination of metaphors - because you realize - life is an "it all depends" sort of an adventure?

AMOS 5:24

"THEN LET JUSTICE  

SURGE  LIKE WATER 

AND GOODNESS 

LIKE AN UNFAILING STREAM."

INTRODUCTION

The title of my homily for this Thirteenth Wednesday in Ordinary Time is, “Then Let Justice Surge Like Water and Goodness Like An Unfailing Stream.”

This is just one text - one verse - 5:24 - from the book of Amos.

BUMPER STICKER

I’ve never seen on a bumper sticker or a sign at a football game: “Amos 5:24.”

It wouldn’t be a bad text to base one’s life on - that I be a person of justice and goodness.

Most translations of English from the Hebrew use the word “justice,” but most don’t use “goodness” like our New American Bible does. Most translators use the word “righteousness” over “goodness”.

The Hebrew is just 6 words. The English translation is 12 words - twice as long.

I like the Hebrew word for “unfailing” - as in “unfailing stream”. It’s “ETHAN” or “ETAN”. Besides “unfailing,” it’s translated “endless” - “never failing” “ever flowing” “mighty”.

In a Biblical commentary I like the note about that word which I spotted last night while writing this homily. “…the seventh month, just before the early rain, was called ‘the month Ethanim [Cf. 1 Kings 8:2], that is, the month of the perennial streams, when they alone flowed. In the meaning ‘perennial,’ it would stand tacitly contrasted with ‘streams which fail or lie.’ True righteousness is not fitful, like an intermitting stream, vehement at one time, then disappearing, but continuous, unfailing.

WHAT SHOULD BE  EVER FLOWING IN EVERY PERSON?

Amos is calling all of us to be like a rolling river and like an ever flowing stream. Amos is calling each and every person to examine if justice and goodness are flowing out of us - like a river and a stream - or am I all dried up when it comes to justice and goodness.

I’ve seen dry river beds in Tucson and Phoenix as well as in the Salton Sea area or region of California - 100 miles east of San Diego.

I’ve seen the opposite - where there was lots of water. I lived on the Hudson River in upstate New York for 14 years of my life. I grew up in Brooklyn 3 blocks away from the Narrows - where the waters of the East River and the Hudson River meet and flow out to the sea. I lived for 7 years in Tobyhanna, Pennsylvania. Tobyhanna means dark river. It was only a stream in the Poconos. I lived on the Atlantic Ocean in Long Branch,New Jersey for 7 years. I also lived on Lak LaBelle in Oconomowoc, Wisconsin. Oconomowoc is the Native Americans or that area word meaning “where the waters meet.” As an aside, it was on July 4th evening, there that I discovered the beauty of mid-America. Everyone was at the park listening to a band concert - followed by fireworks. 

So I get the imagery of Amos. We get it as well. When the electricity is out - when the pumps ain’t pumping water - it’s then we appreciate water. We appreciate a cold water fountain and a good shower.

I’ve backpacked in the Rockies and in White Mountains of New Hampshire, so I know steams.

I’m sure you had similar experiences of water and flowing water in your lifetime. Please God, people who experience us, experience the flow of Justice and Goodness.

The opposite is desert dryness. The opposite is the horror story in today’s gospel - where 2 men are filled with demons - who cry out for release - and Jesus lets them roam and roar out of the men and into the pigs who run down the slope and jump into the Lake of Galilee.

CONCLUSION

There’s two prayers for us today. That we be to our families and coworkers  a delicious ongoing - ever flowing river and stream of delicious water and we not be filled with demons. Amen.