November 25, 2007
Posted in Homilies
at 9:00 am
Nov 25th, 2007
Christ is a King? That man, that pound of bloodied flesh, crowned with thorns and hanging on the Cross between two criminals? He is a King? Of what kingdom?
In the words of the preface from today’s Mass, we call it “a kingdom of truth and life, a kingdom of holiness and grace, a kingdom of justice, love and peace.” It is within us, in our souls, it is among us on earth, though small like a mustard seed, hidden like yeast, and it will come in glory at the end of time. The kingdom is ultimately Christ himself (Catechism #2816).
The kingdom enters us, and we enter the kingdom. In the Eucharist, the kingdom enters us, into our souls, through Holy Communion, and inspires us with love for others, with the desire to go out and build the kingdom on earth. And it is by following the example of Christ our crucified King that we enter the kingdom and save our lives . . . by losing our lives.
The kingdom enters our souls through Holy Communion, and at that moment of the Mass we must be attentive to our individual souls. For this reason, just before receiving Communion, the words of the liturgy change from “we”(“we give you thanks and praise”) to “I” : “Lord, I am not worthy to receive you, but only say the words and I shall be healed.” “Lord, may your kingdom come into my soul. Come, live and reign in me.”
However, when we receive Holy Communion worthily and meaningfully, it also leads us to love others, to work for social justice, for development and peace, for the coming of God’s kingdom upon earth. As Pope Benedict writes in his encyclical God is Love, “union with Christ is also union with all those to whom he gives himself . . . Communion draws me out of myself toward him” and towards others (#14). “The love of Christ impels us” (2 Cor 5:14) to share his love with the world.
At least twice a year in each parish we hear an appeal to help build God’s kingdom on earth by supporting the work of development and peace: in the fall, an educational campaign, and in the spring, a financial appeal. I ask you to listen attentively to Mark Lalonde’s words after Holy Communion today.
Christ the King came to establish a kingdom of truth and justice, love and peace. What kind of king is he crucified between two criminals? He is a King who saves our lives by losing his own. The criminal on his left blasphemed Jesus saying, “Are you not the Messiah? Save yourself and us!” In answer to the second part of that statement, “save us!” Jesus very well could have looked over at him and said, “what do you think I’m doing? I’m dying for you. I’m losing my life to save yours.”
But Jesus would never have saved himself because he had just spent his whole life teaching, “whoever saves his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life . . . will save it” (Lk 9:24). Jesus’ entire life, culminating with his death on the Cross, is an example for us to enter the kingdom and save our lives by losing our lives.
I recently read a book called Liturgy and Personality by Dietrich Von Hildebrand, whom Pope Pius XII called the 20th century doctor of the Church.
He explains how living the liturgy, which is the public worship of God, primarily in the Eucharist, transforms our personality. By forgetting and losing ourselves in the worship of God, in contemplation of his beauty, in singing, “Glory to God” our heavenly king, in offering this sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving, we find ourselves and save our lives.
We are oh so miserable in our self-centeredness, in all our useless worries, our restless thoughts, our irrational insecurities, our interminable self-analysis – for what? It never gives us any of the peace or joy of God’s kingdom. Instead, let us lose our lives in order to save them, following the example of Christ our King, who, while dying on the Cross, said to his Father, “Into your hands I commend my spirit” (Lk 23:46). Let us do the same by living the Eucharist and giving everything to God our loving Father.
Consider the good thief’s participation in the first Mass. (We usually refer to the Last Supper as the “first Mass,” which is true, but the first Mass is fulfilled in the sacrifice of the Cross. As the beloved disciple was reclining next to Jesus during the Last Supper, so the good thief was hanging next to Jesus during the sacrifice of the Cross.
The good thief believed that he would be saved if he lost his life in union with Jesus. “Remember me when you come into your kingdom” (Lk 23:42). What faith, to see a King under the appearance of a pound of bloodied flesh crowned with thorns! And what a reward for faith! “Today you will be with me in Paradise” (Lk 23:43).
Living the liturgy and the Mass can transform our personalities. When I think back to the debilitating shyness I suffered for most of my life, I firmly believe that my personality was transformed by the liturgy, by participating in the Eucharist every day over many years. I slowly began to forget and lose myself in order to be saved and find the true self created in God’s image . . . it’s still a work in progress . . . I’m a somewhat more normal person, but these things take time . . . we have to be patient.
And when I think back to what inspired to go on mission trips to El Salvador six years in a row, I know it was not any natural love or goodness in my heart. I firmly believe it was the Holy Communion I received every day over many years, receiving the kingdom of God, Christ himself into my soul. The love of Christ impelled me to go out and share his love with our poor brothers and sisters of this world.
So let us work for “development and peace,” for the coming of God’s kingdom on earth, and let us long for the coming of the kingdom at the end of time, and within us in the Holy Communion we receive, in which Christ says to us, “if you are willing to lose your life, you will save it. If you are willing to give me everything, then today you will be with me in Paradise, for I will come to you today hidden in the host, with all the joys of my Father’s kingdom.”
I will close with these words printed at the top of our bulletin under the theme of this pastoral year: “Together with Mary we live the Eucharist”: “Eucharistic Heart of Jesus, may your kingdom come through the Immaculate Heart of Mary.”
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November 18, 2007
Posted in Homilies
at 9:00 am
Thirty-third Sunday, Year C, Nov. 18th, 2007
Today I want to talk about your funeral. After all, it is the month of November, of the “dying” of creation, the month of All Saints and Holy Souls. We should not be afraid to talk about death and dying, for as St. Paul writes, “life is Christ and death is gain” (Phil 1:21); furthermore, in the Gospel today Jesus speaks about the end of the world, which for most of us will come when we die and leave this world to go the house of our heavenly Father. So I would like to spend some time talking about funerals, and the importance of a TRADITIONAL CATHOLIC FUNERAL.
But first, since this topic is a little heavy, I will begin with a small joke that directly relates to the homily. A Buddhist monk, a priest and a Rabbi were asked what they would like people to say about them at their funeral. The Buddhist monk said, “that he, like Buddha, attained enlightenment.” The priest said, “that he, like Christ, gave his life for his people.” The Rabbi replied, “at my funeral, I would like people to say, “Look! He’s still breathing!”
What is the point of this joke? When you are dead, you are not going to care about what people say. During your funeral, your soul will be either in heaven, hell or purgatory. If your soul is in purgatory, your funeral will be of some concern to you, but will only care about one aspect – the Mass, the offering of Christ applied to your soul. And of course you will benefit from all the people praying at your funeral Mass, not delivering a boring recital of your golfing or fishing exploits in a mind-numbing eulogy. Details about your casket, the wake, the flowers, or your burial will not matter to you, but they are very important to the living. Therefore, in planning your funeral do not think selfishly about yourself, but think about those you are leaving behind, and how much they will need to say goodbye to you through a TRADITIONAL CATHOLIC FUNERAL, which has three basic parts:
1) a wake the day before the funeral with a body in a casket
2) a funeral Mass with a body in a casket, a Mass with biblical readings and religious hymns about the Resurrection and eternal life
3) a burial in a cemetery where your loved ones may come to visit your mortal remains.
Before going further, I want to be very clear about one thing:
my remarks are not at all a criticism of those who have followed the wishes of the deceased person who may not have wanted a traditional Catholic funeral. I understand that out of love for the person who has died, we want to respect his or her last wishes. Instead, I am speaking directly to each one of you, who will one day have your own funeral, to persuade you to have a TRADITIONAL CATHOLIC FUNERAL.
Why? Because a traditional Catholic funeral best meets our human needs. First of all, the wake. There are people who say, “I don’t like wakes. They’re so depressing. I don’t want a wake when I die!” No, they’re not depressing. They are a necessary part of the grieving process in which family and friends gather to pray, to pay their respects, to reminisce, tell stories, to laugh and to cry. There’s less time for this at the funeral. The wake is a necessary part of the grieving process, which we must not attempt to skip or avoid. If you try to push down grief over here, it will pop up somewhere else as depression, anger or something else.
Second, a Mass with a body in a casket. The Catholic Church permits cremation, but if you are absolutely adamant about being cremated, then you really should wait until AFTER the funeral. In a TRADITIONAL CATHOLIC FUNERAL, we honour a person’s BODY not their ASHES. We believe in the Resurrection of the BODY. The human BODY is a temple of the Holy Spirit, not the ASHES. That’s why in the funeral liturgy we honour the BODY with holy water and incense. I personally will never ever use holy water or incense to honour ashes.
Finally, your body or ashes should be buried in a cemetery (in the ground or in a mausoleum) not kept in an urn on the mantle piece or scattered on Lake Ontario. Why not? Because in the first instance, the grieving person does not have “closure” (as they say), has not yet fully said “goodbye” as we do when we place someone in the ground. In the second instance, the grieving person has no physical place to visit, nowhere to place flowers, nowhere to remember the deceased person more intensely. Yes, of course, we can talk to our beloved dead at any time and place, but as human beings with physical BODIES, we need a physical place to go and visit our dead.
I have chose to speak to you today about a traditional Catholic funeral because it is a very serious pastoral issue in today’s Church. More and more people who do not practice their faith are trying to invent their own kind of funerals with decidedly unpleasant consequences. I can think of two reasons for the loss of the traditional Catholic funeral:
1) lack of trust in tradition in general
2) the influence of the culture of death
Many traditions in our culture have been “thrown down,”“torn down.” Jesus used these words in today’s Gospel speaking of the destruction of the Jewish temple: “everything you see here will be thrown down.” He could have also been speaking about Western Christian civilization. We have been living through an “insurrection” or “revolution” against traditional Christian and Catholic values. What has happened to the institution of marriage and family in our time? Torn down. (Although there are some very beautiful flowers sprouting up amidst the ruins. We see that in our own parish). What has happened to many of the traditional rites and rituals of the Catholic Church? Torn down.
Tuesday night, at our catechesis on the Eucharist as the Memorial of the death and Resurrection of Christ, I spoke about some of the effects of the changes in 1969 to the 1600 year- old tradition of the Roman rite of the Mass. (For the young people here, 1969 was the year that the new liturgical books were introduced, with the change from Latin to English, the priest and people facing each other instead of facing God, etc . . . )
As Pope Benedict has remarked, never before in the liturgical history of the Church had there been such a sudden and radical break with tradition. For centuries, everyone had assumed that the Mass could not be changed; then suddenly, it changed completely almost overnight. This break with the past weakened our reverence for tradition in the liturgy, and some would argue, our respect for tradition in general.
Some parishes to this day give the impression that we can create our own Mass. It is no wonder that some Catholics will come to a parish looking to create their own wedding liturgy or their own funeral liturgy with readings and music that have nothing to do with Christian and Catholic values or traditions. In short, I believe that the disintegration of the traditional Catholic funeral is a symptom of the breakdown of tradition in general in our culture.
Another reason for this loss of the traditional Catholic funeral is the culture of death. A traditional Catholic funeral helps us to face death and affirm life by proclaiming the Resurrection of the dead and eternal life. In our culture of death, we try to avoid suffering, death and grief as the greatest of all evils, but we end up in denying life. When people refuse a traditional Catholic funeral, it is sometimes (but not always) a sign that they are trying to avoid grief, which is impossible! That’s like trying to avoid being human! (You try to push down grief over here, and it will pop up somewhere else) We must trust in the wisdom of tradition, in this case, the wisdom of a traditional Catholic funeral that will help us deal with our grief, to cope with the pain of loss, to heal, to grow in faith, to long for heaven, and so on.
By the way, I haven’t made a will yet. The CD program is sitting in my desk in the Rectory. So just in case, let it be known that I want a TRADITIONAL CATHOLIC FUNERAL, (then I want my ashes sent into outer space so I can be closer to God . . . just joking).
A time of insurrection and revolution is also a time to testify. As our Lord says in today’s Gospel, “this will give you an opportunity to testify.” When our traditions are being undermined and attacked, it is time to testify to their enduring value. The irreplaceability of a traditional Catholic funeral. The importance of the sacrament of marriage, of children, of family. In the midst of this culture of death, we testify to the relevance of our Catholic traditions – the sacraments and sacramentals, and every single one of our Catholic rite and rituals that are gifts of God, pillars of truth, conduits of the Holy Spirit, well-springs of life, brilliant lights that shine in our world today, most especially in the Eucharist.
“Together with Mary we live the Eucharist.” That’s the theme of this pastoral year, as proposed by our Archbishop. With Mary’s faith and devotion, let us listen to every word of her Son who is made present for us today through the ritual of the Mass which the Lord himself, through tradition, has passed down to us.
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November 11, 2007
Posted in Homilies
at 9:00 am
Homily for the Thirty-Second Sunday of Ordinary Time
November 11, 2007
It seems that the more Jesus outwitted the people who wanted to trap Him, the harder they tried to come up with something that would finally do the trick. And in today’s Gospel, the Sadducees think they have found it. Using a question that they may have adapted from the story of Sarah & Tobias in the book of Tobit, they challenge Jesus to come up with a suitable answer. Now, we need to understand a few things about the Sadducees. They were mostly made up of the Temple priests and their families. Wealthy and influential, they cooperated with the Romans in order to maintain their status. Unlike the Pharisees, they did not believe in life after death. They believed in following the Law because of it’s temporal implications, not for the effects on their prospects for eternity. Perhaps that is why they were so intent on enjoying this life, and found Jesus’ teachings threatening.
The Sadducees only accepted the five books of Moses as their authority. And, it was in reference to this authority that they framed their question. Of course, they weren’t asking out of any genuine search for the truth. Like some people do in our day, they attempted to play games with Scripture in order to advance their personal agenda. They didn’t believe in the resurrection, so why else would they ask this? We can almost detect a certain attitude in the question, as if they are already thinking that they have won, that they have Jesus in a corner.
Jesus’ answer is probably the last thing they expected. Completely counter to their disbelief in life after death, He indicates that there is an afterlife, and that it will be totally different from what we now know. Jesus does not chastise them, but rather He teaches them, even showing them how the Mosaic scriptures that they rely on can be used to support the existence of life in the next world. What that life will be is not within our ability to understand now, but we know that we will eventually experience it.
So we see that in Jesus’ time, there were various ideas of what happens to us when we die. Even among the Jews, there was disagreement over our ultimate existence. In our modern world, we know that there are still conflicting concepts of this. A couple of weeks ago, the Dalai Lama was here in Ottawa. Some people, himself included, believe that he is the 13th reincarnation of the original Dalai Lama, making him the 14th. This is not just a matter of succession, like the Pope being the successor to Peter. No, the idea is that he is actually the same person, come back to life. We find that the idea of reincarnation has a certain popularity these days. In some ways, it relieves us of being completely responsible for our actions. Hey, if we don’t get it right this time around, we’ll figure it out the next time. And it appeals to our culture’s intrigue with the exotic, that feeling that the eastern mysticism might have something that our ordinary Christianity is missing. But, is there really anything missing? Jesus tells us of those who have passed away that “they cannot die anymore, because they are like angels and are children of God, being children of the resurrection”. We die only once and although we are given many chances to repent and reform in this life, it is this one life that we are judged on. In Maccabees, the second brother tells his torturers “the King of the world will raise us up to live again forever”. We are all unique individuals, comprised of body and soul. We are not just souls inhabiting our bodies for a period of time, and not just bodies animated by some cosmic energy giving us life. Our bodies and souls are integrated. They are not meant to be separated, and our soul is not meant to inhabit another body in a reincarnation. After death, our souls wait for reunion with glorified bodies, granted everlasting, incorruptible life through the power of Christ’s resurrection, raised up to live forever.
This promise of eternal life gives us hope, a hope that transforms us, even now. This hope goes beyond dreams or speculation, beyond wishes, longing, or fear. It is our secure knowledge of what awaits us. It is not an abstract theological notion, it is the motivating force of our Christian life. Presumption or despair, fate or karma, lack any power to connect us with our eternal salvation. Not having hope can lead to a life in which the only meaning is what can be experienced now, what feels good or furthers our earthly happiness. But our faith, our hope, means much more than that. It also should not lead us to an escapism that doesn’t care about our present life. It is hope in our own resurrection, our eternal union with God, that draws us into a life of love for Him, and for others. “He is God not of the dead, but of the living, for to Him all are alive.” We are expected to take care of those who need our help in this life, to help them feel God’s presence, to be God’s love to them. Our hope for everlasting life with God is the reason for staying the course, continuing to live our lives accordance with His will. As the Catechism (1023) explains it, “those who die in God’s grace and friendship, and are perfectly purified, live forever with Christ”. Our primary motivation for being in a state of grace at the hour of death, should not be fear of Hell, but love of God and the desire to spend eternity with Him.
In a few minutes, we will recite the Creed. We begin by saying “I believe”, and the final lines are “…in the resurrection of the body, and life everlasting, Amen.” As we say these words, let us remember the truth and the hope that is embodied in them, and contemplate the wonder of what it will mean for us to one day be forever in God’s presence.
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November 4, 2007
Posted in Homilies
at 9:00 am
Thirty-first Sunday, Year C, November 4th, 2007
What is one of the first things you ask when you meet someone? “What do you do?” Right? My cousins from Nova Scotia, who now live in North Carolina where I was visiting last week, told me that one of the first questions that people down there ask you is not, “what do you do?” but “where do you go? What Church do you go to?”
(Southern accent) And lemme tell ya from drivin’ the highways o’ the South, there are a lotta Churches down there. People aren’t afrayd to say that they beleeve in Jeezuz. They ain’t so sophisticated and intellectual as we politically correct Canadians who think we don’ need Gawd and can make up our own commandments.
“What you do” or “What Church you go to?” (Well, personally I go to the Catholic Church, ‘cause that’s like the one true Church founded by Jeezuz) All joking aside, I have great respect for the people down there, because of they have more faith than we do, plain and simple.
What’s more important: what do you do or what Church you go to and what you believe? Doesn’t the Bible say something about being made just and holy by faith in Christ rather than human works?
There is a whole conversion involved in this movement from “what do you do?” to “what do you believe?” Zaccheus in today’s Gospel passed through such a conversion. “He was a chief tax collector and he was rich” (Lk 19:2). Zaccheus was the kind of man that was very concerned about his money, his possessions, and what he did.
He had heard about Jesus, that he was passing through Jericho, and Zaccheus“was trying to see who Jesus was” (Lk 19:3), almost as if he knew that the mere sight of this man would somehow change him. Interestingly, Jesus once said this to Blessed Dina Belanger: “if (priests) were truly holy, their mere sight, no matter where – at Church, on the street or elsewhere – would evoke the thought of me; they would draw souls to me; in meeting them, people would think, ‘it’s another Christ passing by.’” (Autobiographie p. 312)
Zaccheus saw Jesus, thought of God and repented! The same is meant to happen when people see a priest! Then why doesn’t it happen? . . . There are two reasons: 1) because we priests need to pray more, and 2) we need you to pray for us. That’s just a little aside to ask for your prayers.
So Zaccheus went up the sycamore tree a rich man but a lost soul, and he came down the sycamore tree a new man, promising Jesus to give half his money to the poor. Jesus announced, “Today salvation has come to this house, because Zacchaeus too is a son of Abraham.” (Lk 19:9). When Jesus says, “salvation has come to this house, he is referring to Zaccheus’ whole family – to his wife and children. One man’s conversion can lead to the transformation of his marriage and his entire family.
One of my cousins is going through the terrible agony of the break-up of his marriage. He wants to work at it, but she doesn’t. They have a beautiful and intelligent 8 year old daughter, who puts on a brave face, but of course she cannot understand how the two people she loves most, Mommy and Daddy, don’t seem to love each other . . . or at least Mommy no longer loves Daddy . . . it is very painful, but I do see how God is working in his life.
He used to be more concerned about what he did, but now he has started going back to Church after about a 15 year absence, and he is planning to have his daughter baptized. Wonderful! But now he feels guilty, and accuses himself of only turning to God and the Church, after his marriage has broken up. But I re-assure him, saying, “Don’t worry about it! Why do you think I turned to God and the Catholic Church? Because I failed. I tried, for about 10 years or so, to find happiness without God and apart from God. And I failed miserably. Thank God! That was the medicine I needed to heal my soul. And then I also heard about this guy named Jesus, that he was passing by in the local Catholic Church, and I went to see who Jesus was. (Thank you Jesus for your mercy to me a sinner). So I encourage my cousin. Yes, he is losing his wife and his family. But he is finding God, and in this way, I trust that salvation will come to his house.
I believe that Zaccheus also failed in some way. Yes, he was a chief tax collector and he was rich. But I don’t think he was happy. Something was missing in his life. Jesus himself testifies about Zaccheus that he was a lost soul (“for the Son of Man came to seek and save the lost”).
But Zaccheus had hope! He had heard about Jesus, and was trying to see who Jesus was. All conversions contain elements of both failure and hope – human failure and hope in God’s mercy. Failure of any kind can humble us and help us recognize our human misery and nothingness, as in the words of the first reading: “the whole world before you, O Lord, is like a speck that tips the scales, and like a drop of morning dew that falls on the ground” (Wisdom 11:22)
Lest we become too discouraged, however, we must also hope in God’s infinite mercy, as the first reading continues, “You are merciful to all, for you can do all things, and you overlook people’s sins, so that they may repent” (Wisdom 11:23).
I’m sure in Jericho there was a local synagogue where devout Jews would gather each Sabbath to give God thanks and praise, and to pray for their needs and for others – to pray for the conversion of sinners. Only in heaven would Zaccheus know if someone specific had prayed and sacrificed for him, to help obtain for him, by the grace of God, the gift of conversion.
There are many Zaccheus in our own families, in our town, in our society – people who are so caught up in what they do that they have not yet woken up to who they are and what they believe, and to their need for God and the Church. They need our prayers. So please continue to pray for me and my brother priests, for the conversion of sinners, and for all married couples and families.
Many months ago, I had asked Gwenn Berard Beaupre to give a witness talk about marriage, divorce, annulment. We picked this weekend for the simple reason that it is one of the rare weekends where nothing else is going on. So I ask you to listen attentively to her talk after communion.
Two thousand years ago Jesus passed by a town called Jericho but only one person was lucky enough to have the Son of God stay at his house. Thanks to the Eucharistic Presence of Christ, each person can welcome Jesus into our homes. As it is written in the original Latin of the Mass (inaccurately translated in the current English Mass): “Lord, I am not worthy to receive you under my roof (into my home) but only say the word and I shall be healed, and salvation will come to me and my family.
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