the dead look when trees are losing their leaves? How does God show up as a baby in the summer time? Does everyone down there look up at the night sky stars and wonder and ponder the Southern Cross?
The title of my homily is, “Easter: Dawning on Us.”
East - obviously - the direction of the sun rising.
East - where we first see the dawn - the morning light.
East? When was the last time we took the time to attend
the liturgy of the rising sun? At the beach? Out our bathroom window? When?
Easter? What has dawned on us about the meaning of this
faith belief?
CENTERPIECE
Easter: the
central feast of Christianity.
As St. Paul put it in First
Corinthians 15: if Christ did rise
from the dead, our preaching is useless. What are we doing here in church this
morning? Let’s head for the doors. If Christ did not rise from the dead, we’re
liars. We’re committing perjury. We’re saying something - that is, that there
is life after death - and it didn’t happen for Christ. If Christ did not rise
from the dead, we’re still stuck in our sins. “And what is more serious, all
who have died in Christ, have perished.”
In other words, if Christ did not rise from the dead, we
won’t either.
It’s like one of my favorite sayings - from Groucho Marx,
“If our parents didn’t have any kids, chances are, we won’t either.”
The human world anthem will be Peggy Lee’s song: “Is that all there is … and if
that is all there is, my friend, then let’s keep dancing.”
Easter. It’s the central belief in Christianity.
LOTS OF ROCKS
I read somewhere that one of the key moments in human
development was when pre-historic migrants moving across the hills somewhere
stopped to bury their dead. Before that the body would be tossed off a path and
folks kept moving on. Moving on. But for some person who died, the person was
buried under some rocks and a marker
marked the spot - so that it could be spotted when that family group came along
that path in the future.
I am reading right now an interesting book, A
History of Religion in 5 ½ Objects -
by S. Brent Plate. One of the 5 ½ objects is stones.
He gives example after example of the significance of
stones when it comes to spirituality. The little girl goes camping with her
family for the first time and has a great time. She picks up a stone that last
day and brings it home with her and keeps it on her bureau as a reminder of a
great time. Then she keeps it in her significant life stuff box as a memory.
Millions and millions of people have done that before and after. Gift shops at
the shore and T-Shirt stores with crab magnets in Annapolis have made their living on that
human quirk and quest. We want solid reminders of where we’ve been. Memories.
Stones - the solid - lasts.
Israel has its mountains and its Wailing Wall of hundreds
of huge stones - with the dome of the rock of Islam just above it. Islam has
its square stone quadrant in Mecca.
I have a piece of the Berlin Wall on a shelf in my room.
Christianity has its stone marble altars - but it also
had its stone that locked in the dead body of Christ - in his borrowed tomb and
in today’s gospel we hear the words that the stone has been rolled away and
Christ is not there.
Our graves are everywhere. Christ’s grave is nowhere.
Christ has died. Christ has risen. Christ will come again
and again and again - but he’s not locked in some stone tomb.
The stone has been rolled away.
Christ is in the bread and the wine. Christ is in his
followers. Christ is in his words. Christ is with Our Father and all those who
have gone before us in Christ. Christ is everywhere. Christ is all time: the
alpha and the omega.
Take and eat, this
is my body. Take and drink, this is my blood. Listen and hear my words. Close
your eyes and feel my Spirit.
The Spirit of God is in the wind and in the fire. The
risen Christ is everywhere.
Easter us, O Lord. Dawn upon us. Let your light shine
upon us and we shall be saved.
ST. ALPHONSUS
The priests in this parish are members of a religious
order called the Redemptorists. We’re around 6,000 members - all around the
world. We’re getting older here in our Baltimore Province. We are much younger
and growing in India and Vietnam, Poland and Brazil, Paraguay and Africa.
Our founder, St. Alphonsus de Liguori, 1696-1787, wrote
over 100 books - but he didn’t write a book on the Resurrection.
He wrote big time about the Suffering Jesus Christ being
the meaning of our faith - our hope - and our charity.
The other day I was talking to Father Mickey Martinez -
from Paraguay - a member of our Community here in Annapolis. He does much of the Latino, the Spanish, ministry
here in St. Mary’s. He mentioned that Good Friday has much more meaning for
Latinos than Easter Sunday. He added, “Just look around….” Then he added, “They
have a lot more struggle in their lives.”
That hit me.
St. Alphonsus wrote over and over again about the cross
and the struggles and the sufferings of Jesus Christ. He has a whole book on
the Passion and Death of Jesus Christ. He wrote a small booklet, The Stations
of the Cross, which is still used almost everywhere - especially during Lent.
Up till 1950 in the Catholic Church, Good Friday was the big moment in Lent.
Easter Sunday was celebrated. People dressed up. Flowers were central - but in
theology it was still the Suffering Christ of Good Friday.
In 1950 out came a book by a Redemptorist F.X. Durwell.
It was entitled, “Resurrection”. The horror of World War II was over.
The Catholic Church made a leap in its theology and the
meaning of Easter around that time. The
Easter Vigil became prominent . The RCIA became prominent - when thousands and thousands
of people on Holy Saturday evening became Catholic.
CONCLUSION
Becoming Catholic ….
The title of my homily is, “Easter Dawning on Us.”
Becoming Catholic….
We’re all still becoming Catholic. We’ll renew our
baptismal vows today - in a moment.
What has dawned on us - so far - about what it means to
be a Catholic?
If we are still having babies and raising them, Christ,
Christmas, still means a lot to us.
If we are having struggles, sickness, family problems,
Christ on the Cross, means a lot to us.
If - if - if -
what __________ fill in the blank what it takes to be going through, for Easter, for the Risen
Christ to mean a lot more to us.
Is the meaning of Easter - dawning on us - in a new way?
Has that stone been rolled back and the dead Christ risen
in a new way in our life?
Hopefully our answer is, “Oh yeah. Oh yeah!”
Saturday, March 26, 2016
March 26, 2016
PASSOVER MOON
Bright white light in a dark monstrance sky….
Jesus was in the garden - just two nights
ago or so. It was after
the Passover Meal.
Praying - he was hoping they would pray
with him - but no, they were sleeping.
Then came the arrest - because of Judas’
betrayal - money and a kiss. Jesus was
arrested - mocked - put on trial - dragged
and killed on a hill - on a cross that Friday
afternoon. He was buried in a borrowed
tomb. Then the Father pulls him out of
that stone tomb tabernacle - to rise, to
proclaim: hope,
peace, new life, resurrection
to those in locked upper rooms - brains in
stubborn skulls - minds that were Thomas
sure that there was no more. But there
was
more at Galilee’s shore - bread - full nets
of caught fish - breakfast with Jesus on
the beach of the future - still going -
2000
years later. Looking at the
Passover Moon,
does anyone have Thomas doubts that therewon’t be more - much, much, more - to come?
The title of my reflections for this Good Friday Mass tonight is, “Last Words.”
On the death bed of our cross - what will be our last
words?
On Good Friday - down through the years - it’s been a tradition - to reflect on one or
two or all of the traditional 7 Last Words of Jesus.
Actually they are seven sayings or statements of Jesus - like, “Father,
forgive them for they do not know what they are doing.” Or “Father, into your
hands I place my spirit.” Or “I thirst.” Or, the words which Jesus said to the Good Thief on the other cross, “Today you’ll be
with me in Paradise.”
Someone wasn’t under the cross with a tape recorder or a Cross
Ball Point pen jotting down these last words of Jesus.
But in time to help us, they were written down in Greek
in the Gospels - and we find three of them in Luke and three of them in John.
And the other statement, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” we find in
both Matthew and Mark.
What will be our last words? I would say that we can’t plan on what we’re
going to say when we’re dying. In books of quotes we find various death bed
words from famous people - and some are apocryphal like Lincoln saying to his
wife, “I told you - I didn’t want to go to - a damn play.”
I remember reading - that
Goethe’s last words were, “More light.”
This afternoon in writing this homily to get some light - I looked up on
Google, “Death Bed Words” and found some interesting comments.
One woman said, “My mom's last words to me were 'You have to learn the
difference between Chinese and Japanese people, because they don't like it when
you mix them up.' I wish I was joking. Those were my mom’s last words.”
Another lady said, “I was a health care aide on a geriatric ward - when
a woman - so old and frail - she looked dead already - motioned to me to come
to her. I put my ear next to her mouth and she quietly said, 'I just wanted to
say 'goodbye' to someone.' It broke my heart. She died a few days later….”
Another person said, “When I first started as a 911 dispatcher - I had a
call come in - and all that the person said was 'Tell them I'm sorry,' and hung
up….’ “I knew right away what we were going to find when we got there. It was
the worst feeling. I just felt so dirty that I was the last one to talk to this
guy, and no matter how fast we sent help it didn't matter - it was just too
late. So I guess he was confessing, but it just made me feel icky.”
“In nursing school a lady in her mid-40s came in after a car accident.” “She
needed surgery, and before she went in - she made me promise to tell her
husband that she had a child before she met him and put it up for adoption and
should her son ever come looking for her to let him know she was sorry and
loved him every day.” Then this nurse said, “She lived and I hope she got to
tell him that herself.”
Frank Sinatra died after saying, “I’m losing it.”
William Henry Seward, architect of the Alaska Purchase, was asked if he
had any final words. He replied, “Nothing, only ‘love one another.’”
Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, who wrote the Sherlock Holmes stories, died at
age 71 in his garden. He turned to his wife and said, “You are wonderful,” then
clutched his chest and died.
As he was dying, Alfred Hitchcock said, “One never knows the ending. One
has to die to know exactly what happens after death, although Catholics have
their hopes.”
Father Tizio would love this one. Former baseball player “Moe” Berg’s
last words: “How did the Mets do today?”
The night before my brother was to have major surgery in the Washington
Hospital Center on his brain cancer, I
talked to him on phone from New York and my last words to him were, “I love
you.” And his last words to me were, “I love you too.” I got down to D.C. the
next day - but he didn’t make it.
I have my last words with my mom on a tape recorder - 45 minutes’ worth
of wonderful words. I got the thought to get her story on tape. She was still
very healthy and still working - at the age of 82. So I set up a small tape recorder and asked her about her
life. After a while she got tired and said, “The moo is out of me.” She then said, “Next time we’ll get the rest of
the story.” She was killed in a hit and
run accident two weeks later - so that tape is very precious - very, very
precious. And I got the moo part of her
comment when years later we visited a family graveyard not too far from where
my mom was from in Galway, Ireland. To
get into the graveyard, they had like a turnstile to keep cows out. I was with
my two sisters and my brother-in-law. Wow was my sister Peggy the nun surprised
when she stepped in you know what. Evidently the cows had an Easy Pass Path in
some other way.
Nope what she said was not her last words. I got to hear a few of them
in a last chance conversation with her in Scranton, Pennsylvania before she
died.
The title of my reflection for tonight is, “Last words.”
Jesus had some wonderful words on the wooden death bed of the cross. The
one I like the best and have said 1,000 times is, “Father, forgive them for
they do not know what they are doing.”
I would like and love to add something my classmate Larry told me. He
had had a sort of fight or disagreement with his mom over something as he was
going back to Brazil where he was stationed - and he gets back and gets a call
a short time afterwards that his mom had died.
He flew back to Brooklyn but before going over to the funeral parlor he dropped
into church and had a great prayer talk with his mom - that was filled with
forgiveness - and then he was able to face her in the casket.
We Christians have Easter. We have our great faith gift that there is
life after this - and we only have metaphors and hopes what heaven is like -
but my hope and my faith tell me - we can all love one another for all eternity
and say the things we always wanted to say - the “I’m sorry’s” - the “I love
you’s” - the saying, “With you and God I am in paradise.”
And sad to say, God walked away that day - hoping someday I’ll show mercy, forgiveness and understanding to someone else as well as to myself and that will be the day I’ll hear God standing at my door once again knocking, knocking, knocking and this time I'll let God in.[1]
We see Jesus crowned with glory and honor because he suffered death, that through
God's gracious will he might taste death for the sake of all men. Indeed, it was
fitting that when bringing many sons to glory God, for whom and through whom
all things exist, should make their leader in the work of salvation perfect through
suffering.
REFLECTION
The word from this short reading from Hebrews that hit me
was the word, “Taste.”
Taste ---- T A S T E
---- Taste.
We just heard from
this New Testament reading called “Hebrews” that Jesus tasted death for the
sake of all.
People who have tasted death - know the taste. People who
have tasted death often change.
Today is Holy Thursday…. Tonight we celebrate the
Passover Meal - that meal that Jesus celebrated on the night before he died. It
was his Last Supper.
It was to be the Meal we Christians have celebrated
millions and millions and millions of times ever since in memory of him.
It’s called “The Mass”. The Mass is the Passover
Meal.
Taste and see the goodness of the Lord.
That night Jesus tasted bread. He took it - broke it -
and passed the broken bread out to his
disciples saying, “Taste, take and eat - this is my body.”
That night Jesus
tasted wine. He took it and passed it out to his disciples saying,
“Taste, take and drink - this is my
blood.”
Do this in memory of me.
That night Jesus tasted not just the future - but he also
tasted the past. Jesus was tasting memories. Jesus tasted the Pascal Lamb, the
bitter herbs, the bread, the wine.
Jesus tasted history in the Passover Meal which his
people had celebrated for centuries - in memory of the story - of their redemption, their salvation, in
becoming a people.
Jesus tasted the story of his people eating unleavened
bread in Egypt - they were in a rush - and then rushed to freedom from slavery
that night different from all other nights. It was their baptism - going
through the waters of their baptism - into freedom.
That night Jesus also tasted the future. Jesus tasted
fears about his apostles, his key followers - who would he called to do so much
in memory of him. He could taste and hear Peter’s denials. He could taste and fear
Judas’ betrayal. He could taste the tears in his eyes that these men would run
from him tonight in the Garden.
This Holy Thursday taste the past and taste the future.
Taste and chew on what Jesus was about: serving - washing
feet - going the extra mile - stopping on roads to feel who is tugging at the
edge of our sleeve - to hear who wants our time our skills and our love.
Taste Jesus’ total Holy Communion with his Father when he
could escape to be in prayer with his Father for at least an hour in the
mountains - or a garden - in the night -
in his inner room in secret.
Taste Jesus total Holy Communion with those who screamed
out for him for healing.
Taste interruptions.
Life is often about interruptions.
They cross us up every time.
Sometimes we have to eat quickly - do what we have to do
quickly - even if what we do is unleavened - not finished enough - not good
enough - and we feel like broken bread and quickly sipped wine.
It’s life 101.
Holy Thursday is here. It passes over us over and over
again - year after year - after year.
We get a good taste of it today - and every day we are at
Mass - and every time we wash feet - and
every time get out onto the street for another day of life.
This reflection was just a taste of one word - “TASTE” - from one small section of the New Testament
document called “Hebrews”. It gives us a
tiny taste of what the whole book is about - the Mass - the Eucharist - the mystery
and history of Passover Meal.
This reflection for Holy Thursday gave us a taste of some
of things Jesus was feeling that day - that Holy Week - that Horrible Week.
Jesus is telling us expect betrayals and denials - expect
people who can’t stay with us for an hour - expect night - expect rejections
and not being understood at times - expect the cross.
But above all expect Resurrection.
Expect Easter - expect forgiveness - expect full nets -
with fresh catches of fish. Expect new mornings with the taste of breakfast
with Jesus on our breath. Amen.
