TESSIE’S  LOST  TEETH 

INTRODUCTION

In order to touch people, in order to touch their lives, you have to  try  to reach them where they are, or where they have been. You have to tell a story that is their story, so that they will say, “I’ve been there.” You have to connect with people through their experiences. 

TODAY'S GOSPEL: LUKE 15: 1-10

In today’s Gospel Jesus tries to reach us and touch us with 2 basic human experiences:

                    1) loosing something, searching frantically for it and then the joy we feel when we have finally found what we lost.    

                    2) being in a situation where we say, what's he or she doing here?

FIRST: LOOSING SOMETHING

Everyone has had the experience of loosing something: a wallet, a watch, car keys, a book, etc. We can all relate to the people in the American Express commercials - who discover their money has disappeared. Help! I’ve lost something.

So Jesus tells two stories: that of a man losing a sheep and a woman losing a coin. He wants to touch the garment of everyone in his audience.

SOME MODERN EXAMPLES

A priest I was stationed with told me about one of his nephews. The kid had very poor eyes. Once he and his buddies were swimming in a large public pool and his nephew lost one of his contact lenses. He shouted to his friends to try to help him find it. No luck. 

The guy who was in charge of the pool let this kid and his friends stay after closing time so they could do some more searching. Finally, someone came up with a way of dividing up the pool. Sure enough they found it. A contact lens in a pool. A needle in a haystack. A sheep in the hills. A coin in a dark house.

Mark Link in one of his Homilies gives this example for today's gospel story, “A teacher instructed his students to rewrite Jesus’ `Parable of the Lost Sheep’, putting it in a modern setting. One student wrote, “Suppose you have just finished typing a 100 page term paper. You discover one sheet is missing. What would you do?”

“You would forget about the ninety-nine sheets and go looking for the one lost sheet. When you find it, you are so happy that you take the other 99 sheets, throw them in the air, and yell, “Super! I found my lost sheet.” Well, that’s how God feels when you’ve come back to God and church again.”

When I was stationed at  Most Holy Redeemer  Church, Third Street, New York City, I had an unique experience. One Thursday morning I got a call from a woman named Tessie who worked at the school lunch program over at the  school.  Since I was in charge of Bingo, she asked me if anyone who had worked in the kitchen the night before had found her teeth. Evidently, she worked without here teeth at times. I said “no”, but I’d be right over. 

As I walked down 4^th street I noticed a garbage truck at the top of the block. I ran to the school and talked to Tessie fast. I found out that she was in the habit of wrapping her teeth in a napkin and keeping them on the counter while she worked. 

I said that they were probably scooped up and thrown out. I checked the garbage bags in the garbage pails. All were empty. 

Next I said, “Tessie, get your coat on and bring a few plastic garbage bags. We got outside and started searching.” 

The garbage men were still coming down the block. Wouldn’t you know? It started to rain. We started emptying out each full bag, into a clean bag and as we did, we searched through each napkin. We found interesting items: orange peels, apple cores, half eaten sandwiches, bingo papers, cigarette butts, and a few hundred other kinds of items, some unmentionable. 

We were in the third bag when the garbage men stopped in front of the school. 

One guy said, “Hi Tessie!” 

Another said, “Father, what you looking for?” 

I said: “You ain’t going to believe this one. Tessie here lost her teeth and we’re hoping to find them.” 

Someone said, “That’s a new one.” Another guy said,  “Ok, guys, let’s find them. And the first one who finds them gets a big kiss from Tessie - without her teeth in of course.” 

And so they joined in the search. 

In about the seventh of the eleven bags, there they were: Tessie’s false teeth. 

She rejoiced - giving everyone a big toothless kiss.

Well, that’s a kind of human experience we’ve all had. And notice. It’s communal. We need to tell others our story. Tessie probably tells the story till today. Here I am telling you, almost 50  years after it happened.

SECOND: WHAT’S HE DOING HERE

Now losing something is an experience we don’t mind sharing, but this second experience is the one we don’t like to mention.

Haven’t we also had the experience of saying under our breath, “What the heck is he or she doing here?” 

No nerds allowed. No weirdos allowed. No gays allowed. No people who are mistake makers allowed. No people who look like that allowed.

There is a tendency when we get religion to get our nose out of wack. We can become holier than thou. We can become pharisaical.

So there is a great advantage then in sin - in falling - because it brings us back to the first story. We’re the nerd, the one who is lost, the sinner, the one others say, “What’s he doing here?”

God will search high and low for us when we are lost sheep. God will search every garbage bag till he finds us lost teeth. Lost teeth. Uuuh. Yuck.

So the point that Jesus wanted the Pharisees to see, hear and feel,  is that they we are  sinners - lost sheep - lost coins.

And once we reflect deep down in ourselves, who we are, then the tendency is to stop looking down on others.

One good way to learn humility, is to be humbled - especially by our own mistakes - our own blunders.

We’re all lost sheep. we’re all lost teeth. Lost contact lenses. Lost pieces of a term paper or a section of our autobiography. Lost children on milk containers in garbage bags.

CONCLUSION

Now I would contend and conclude this sermon with this important point: we better learn and live both messages. 

STRUGGLE

Every time we see someone 

in a movie tied up, without 

knowing it, our fingers are 

moving to remove those ropes. 

Well, not every time, because 

sometimes we’re tied up or 

wrapped up in ourselves  and 

we’re not struggling with each other.

© Andy Costello, Reflections 2018

November 8, 2018 

Thought for today: 

“It is hard  to  think at the top.” 

Stringfellow  Barr  [1897-1982]

WISDOM OR  FOLLY?

INTRODUCTION

The title of my homily is, “Wisdom or Folly”?

Being wise or being foolish?

TODAY’S GOSPEL 

Last night I was checking out William Barclay’s Commentary on Luke 14: 25-33. That’s today’s gospel. I often find his comments helpful - very readable - and grabbing.

In this gospel text  Jesus talks about someone building a tower and not being able to finish it. The result is people  laugh at the builder. That triggered for Barclay  mention of a tower in Scotland - where this actually happened.

He tells the story about a guy named M’Caig who built a structure in a place called Oban.  It became known as M’Caig’s Folly.

I never heard about it - so I looked it up on the  Google search engine. There, I found, some interesting comments and some good pictures of the “Tower”.

There above the city of Oban in Scotland is this gigantic round - about 3 stories high - structure that looks like the coliseum in Rome.

It has no roof and its walls are too weak to be anything but a big round wall of stones - with openings as if for windows. It may be as big as a baseball infield.

This rich guy, John M’Caig,  built it - with his own plans. It was his way of giving his workers - stone mason work in the winter. He finished the façade - the walls - in about 5 years - just in time for his death. It doesn’t look like a tower. Perhaps he was going to put a tower in the center. It’s called, “M’Caig’s Tower”  - but it became known as “M’Caig’s Folly”.  

It never served as anything but a big round wall with niches. Some think he was going to have statues of himself and his family placed in the open spaces.

It has a great view of the harbor that leads out to the Atlantic.

In time, it turned out to become a unique tourist attraction - for those who would find such a building interesting. It certainly is an unexpected sight.

I checked out what tourists wrote after experiencing the sight/site.

One tourist said if you have 10 minutes - go for it.

Someone else said that it’s worth seeing if you want to take a nice walk up a hill - see a great view -  and besides that they have a neat chocolate factory nearby.

A POSSIBLE MESSAGE FROM TODAY’S READINGS

Today’s readings raises the question: “How do I do life?”  

Both readings ask us to be smart and have a clear plan for building our life.

In today’s gospel Jesus is saying to plan ahead - and be careful of family - as well as what might get in the way.  If you want to follow me in the plan of your life or the plan for your life, put first things first. Carry your cross. Don’t let family or anything else get in the way.

If you’re going to build a tower, be smart and plan ahead. Nobody wants to be called foolish. Nobody wants to have a folly named after them.

Last night in thinking about this I also looked in my many quote books some quote about all  this.

Neat, I found the following words from Ralph Waldo Emerson that go like this:

“One man’s justice is another’s injustice;  one man’s beauty another’s ugliness; one man’s wisdom another’s folly.”

I assume that Jesus wants each of us  to be wise and to look ahead and plan ahead - and choose wisely with our individual talents - what we want to do with our lives.  

Today’s first reading says we don’t want to spend our lives with a blurred vision - to live with fear and trembling - and to spend our times grumbling or questioning.

CONCLUSION

So that’s my homily - entitled, “Wisdom or Follow.”

Our move.

November 7, 2018

BLOWING  IN  THE  WIND 

 A child’s - crayon drawing -

skate boarded by me -

on a windy November

afternoon. I turned and

ran after it. I had to step

on it to stop it. Sorry kid!

Not having kids - not

having these precious

treasures - with a magnet -

I put it on my refrigerator door.

I can't wait till I make up

a dozen stories where

it comes from -  when

someone asks me, “Who gave

you that really neat drawing?

© Andy Costello, Reflections 2018

November 7, 2018 - 

Thought for today: 

“When the  good  people of Beauvais were building their cathedral, the cathedral of Amiens, was just completed. It excited the admiration of all France. 

"Well, the people of Beauvais, in their jealousy and determination to beat the people of Amiens, set to work to build a tower to their own cathedral as high as they possibly could. They built it so high that it tumbled down. They were never able to finish their cathedral at all.  It stands a wreck to this day. A tribute to their vain quest for glory.”  

Anonymous

I  GOTTA’S

INTRODUCTION

The title of my homily is, “I Gotta’s.”

An “I gotta” [SPELL IT OUT  “I  GOTTA”]  is one of those inner self-complaints or self-hopes  or self-calls to get something done or accomplished - to take care of unfinished business - to resolve a resolution.

“I gotta clean out the trunk of my car.”  “I gotta finish that book that is still sitting there and I paid $29.95 in Barnes and Noble for it .” “I gotta call my buddy Charlie. Haven’t talked to him in a year.” “I gotta pray more.”

A guy recently told me that he  realized he had a lot of unfinished business in his life. And thinking about his multi-inner- naggings, he said he chose one that he has been able to do.

He writes one specific letter - one a week -  to someone who had been part of his life. That’s 52 a year. It’s handwritten. It’s a few pages. And he’s been doing it for a few years now. And receivers  say, “Wow. Thank you.”

If someone did something like that as a result of this sermon, wow, that would be nice. But don’t tell me about doing one of your “I gottas” as a result of this homily till you do one of your “I gottas”  for at least 2 years. Then send me a letter about what you did and make my day.

TODAY’S GOSPEL

Today’s gospel could be entitled, “Excuses!  Excuses!”

As you know, Jesus was not inviting folks into a church. He’s inviting people into an attitude - into a state of the mind and heart - called, “The Kingdom.”

The Church is not the end - but a means to do and practice and live the Spirit of the Kingdom - Jesus’ dream and hope on how we live life for each other each day.

As you know very well, the church forgets this all the time - and the result is we get ourselves mixed up - thinking of self - being self-centered  rather than being other centered - our purpose for being in our world.

TODAY’S FIRST READING

Today’s first reading is one of those “Have to know texts” from the Bible.

You don’t have to read the whole Bible - but key Bible words ought to becoming us.

So for starters, it helps to know key texts - knowing, learning, chewing upon, digesting, praying, making them part of our being.

One every week is too much. Maybe 2 or 3 a year is more like it.

I learned this by accident from a Jesuit - Frank Miles -  whom I went to for Spiritual Direction for a few years. He said after a long life as a priest he owned about 75 texts. About 75 texts is me.

It’s been my experience that most Catholics - and most Christians  - have about 5 texts they own. Just ask folks, “What’s your favorite Bible text?” and most will give you one or two.”

If a person has to run to a Bible to tell you, their text, that’s a  nope. They have to know it up front and out front. However, they can look up chapter and verse afterwards. Besides that chapter and verse were  not put into the bible till after the year 1000.

So tell me five texts you own.

I would say I own Galatians 6:2: “Bear one another’s burdens and in this way you’ll fulfill the Law of Christ.”

I would say, “Luke 15!”  Those 3 stories in there. They are mine.

I would say, “Matthew 25: 31- 46” nags me all the time. I was hungry … thirsty …. needing clothing - sick - in prison and you did or did not help me. That  determines whether we’re in heaven or hell right now.

I have done lots of funerals so the last section the of the 23 Psalm is mine: “Only goodness and kindness shall follow me all the days of my life.” That’s why that text is read at almost every funeral because isn’t that a goal in life.

I own a bunch more, but for my 5^th text that I own, let me throw in today’s first reading. It’s called the Kenotic Text or the Emptying Text:  The secret of life is to do what Jesus did. Empty yourself of self - so others will be filled with Christ.

CONCLUSION

The title of my homily is, “I Gottas”.

So today do at least one of your “I gottas.”