A Revolution of Tenderness

Seeking to show mercy rather than vengeance or justice

02/26/2018

Luke 6:36-38 Jesus said to his disciples: "Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful. "Stop judging and you will not be judged. Stop condemning and you will not be condemned. Forgive and you will be forgiven. Give and gifts will be given to you; a good measure, packed together, shaken down, and overflowing, will be poured into your lap. For the measure with which you measure will in return be measured out to you."

How do you react when someone hurts you, which someone will sooner or later? For instance, when a coworker sabotages the project you have worked on for weeks, or a spouse cheats on you and divorces you, or a sibling belittles your best efforts, or you get pulled over for speeding while another car going much faster gets away? These injustices happen frequently, and most people react in one of three possible ways. They either seek vengeance, or they want justice, or they show mercy. Let me describe each one, and you try to see in which way you tend to respond to unfair treatment.

First, some want vengeance, which is retribution taken to an extreme or to excess. If a neighbor runs over your yard in their car, you destroy their car. If another girl wears a prettier dress to the prom, you try to catch her dress on fire. This first level of response is the “code of the mafia” where, if you kill one member of my family, I will kill your whole family.

The second level of response to unfair treatment is to seek justice, or as it said in the 18th century B.C. Code of Hammurabi, “an eye for an eye.” Now, that may sound extreme to us, but that rule, often called the “lex talionis” (the law of equal retribution), was intended to limit vengeance. Instead of people going to extremes to feel their wrong had been redressed (like the mafia does), the lex talionis required that the injured party take “only” an eye for an eye, and not any more than that. This second level of retribution required you to show equity or proportion in your response to a wrong.

The third level of reaction to unfairness (and this is the highest level) is to show mercy. That is, you do not seek vengeance, nor even very reasonable justice, but you go beyond both and respond with clemency, forgiveness, mercy. John Henry Newman gave a classic definition of a gentleman (and he argued this was the purpose of a university to form gentlemen) when he wrote: “It is almost a definition of a gentleman to say he is one who never inflicts pain” (The Idea of a University, Dis. VIII, Ch. 10). In other words, even though someone else has inflicted pain on you, you should not retaliate in like manner, rather, you should show mercy.

Jesus gives the ultimate motivation and ground for mercy saying in Luke 6:36: “Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful.” Mercy, therefore, is a God-like quality because it requires super human effort and super human humility. It is much easier and much more emotionally satisfying to stick it to someone who hurts you, or to give them what they deserve; they had it coming, after all! But if someone wants to call himself or herself a Christian, they must go beyond vengeance and even beyond justice and reach the height of holiness in human relationships, in a word, they must be merciful.

Examples abound where someone feels slighted and how they might be merciful. A very subtle form of vengeance is holding a grudge against someone who says or does something hurtful. We feel we are somehow punishing them by withholding our friendship and forgiveness, but we only hurt our own hearts. Vengeance and justice, instead of mercy, are only too common in divorce situations. One spouse feels deeply wronged and wants the ex-spouse to feel a similar pain, and it is especially tragic when children get caught in the crossfire. These feelings are found even in the church where one person or group feels they are treated poorly while another group gets special treatment. Mercy may also be a challenging virtue for modern Americans to grasp because we put such a high value on justice – which is a good thing in itself – that we almost feel like mercy is being “unjust.” Could this be one reason we still have the death penalty in our country: it is simply a matter of justice, an eye for an eye, a life for a life. That may be a matter of justice, but that is not a matter of mercy.

Pope Francis, on the other hand, is calling all Christians to a “revolution of tenderness” (Evangelii gaudium, 72), which is another name for mercy. We can either follow the code of the mafia, or we can choose the code of mercy.  We know which code Jesus followed, and so did his Father.

Praised be Jesus Christ!

Laugh or Cry

Facing death by peering through the eyes of faith

02/25/2018

Mark 9:2-10 Jesus took Peter, James, and John and led them up a high mountain apart by themselves. And he was transfigured before them, and his clothes became dazzling white, such as no fuller on earth could bleach them. Then Elijah appeared to them along with Moses, and they were conversing with Jesus. Then Peter said to Jesus in reply, "Rabbi, it is good that we are here! Let us make three tents: one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah." He hardly knew what to say, they were so terrified. Then a cloud came, casting a shadow over them; from the cloud came a voice, "This is my beloved Son. Listen to him." Suddenly, looking around, they no longer saw anyone but Jesus alone with them. As they were coming down from the mountain, he charged them not to relate what they had seen to anyone, except when the Son of Man had risen from the dead. So they kept the matter to themselves, questioning what rising from the dead meant.

The natural human response to the very sober subject of death is either to laugh or to cry. Death does not tolerate any reasonable reaction and so we try to brush it off lightly as if it were nothing, the butt of a joke, or we are overwhelmed by it and weep without hope. The Welsh poet, Dylan Thomas, urged his dying father: “Do not go gentle into that good night…rage, rage against the dying of the light.” We can easily imagine Dylan Thomas saying those words with tears welling up in his eyes. St. Augustine said that “this created universe unceasingly leans over toward the abyss of nothingness” (cf. The Spirit of Mediaeval Philosophy, 72). Augustine was trying to describe the frailty and finality of all creation as contingent, everything always borders on extinction. Have you ever stood on a high mountain cliff and peered over the edge and felt vertigo? The prospect of death produces a similar “spiritual vertigo” in anyone who peers into its dark depths. We fear we will fall into death’s cold embrace.

On the other hand, we may try to make light of death by attempting to laugh at it. Consider this joke. Lenny went on vacation for a month and asked Bobby to watch over his house. About a week later, Lenny called home and asked: “How’s my cat?” Bobby hesitated and sadly told Lenny that his cat had died. “What?!” Lenny cried. “You shouldn’t have broken the news to me like that! You should have done it slowly. The first time I called, you should have told me the cat was on the roof. The second time I called you should have told me there was no way to get her down. The third time I called, you should have told me that you tried to get her off the roof, but she fell down and died,” explained Lenny. Bobby apologized and went about his day. About a week later, Lenny called and casually asked, “How’s my grandma?” There was a long pause and then Bobby answered, “Well, she’s on the roof.” Sometimes we weep and sometimes we laugh when we face death, but the one thing we never do is treat it casually as if it were nothing. Death demands a dramatic response from us.

For people of faith, however, especially for us Christians, laughing and crying are not the only ways to deal with death. This unique Christian response to the specter of death was the underlying message of Jesus’ Transfiguration on Mount Tabor. Jesus invites his three closest apostles, Peter, James and John, to witness his glory atop a mountain. There, standing between Elijah and Moses – who, by the way, represented the Prophets and the Law, and therefore, those two embodied all of the Old Testament wisdom and holiness – standing between them, Jesus gives the apostles (as well as Moses and Elijah) a glimpse of his resurrected body after he would be raised from the dead.

But the apostles’ minds could not conceive “what rising from the dead meant.” Why? Well, because they had only learned what the Old Testament – that is, Moses and Elijah, the Law and the Prophets – had to teach about death, and that, by and large, was that death was simply the end of life (save for the exceptional cases of Enoch in Gn. 5:24 and Elijah in 2 Kgs. 2:11). About all the comfort the Old Testament could offer anyone who faced the death of a loved one was to say, “Well, your grandma is on the roof.” The Old Testament, sublime and holy as it was, did not have an answer for the riddle of death, and that was what Jesus was conversing about with Moses and Elijah; he was telling them something they did not know. The Transfiguration, therefore, was like a preview of the coming attraction of the Resurrection, a glimpse of the glory after death. And that allowed the apostles to look off the edge of Mount Tabor, and not feel any spiritual vertigo, because if they fell, they would be caught by the arms of Jesus, not the cold embrace of death. The newness of Christianity consists precisely in giving a definitive answer to the dilemma of death.

In this regard, let me say a word about the incredible value of Catholic schools. Everyone knows, of course, that in Catholic schools we can talk about God and pray to him, students wear uniforms and have tons of homework, and in some schools there are still nuns and sisters who teach us about faith in God and also instill a little fear of God. Or, maybe they instill a lot of fear of sister. But there is something else besides God and prayer that Catholic schools teach, and bear in mind this is something we find missing from other schools. Catholic schools give their students an answer to the great dilemma of death. In Catholic schools, where the light of faith shines through every crucifix in a classroom, every rosary left behind in a pew, every pair of hands folded in prayer, students do not fear to “lean unceasingly over the abyss of nothingness” because what peers back at them is the loving gaze of Jesus, whose eyes are still reflecting the light from the dazzling white robes he wore at the Transfiguration.

Catholic school students do not cry hopelessly and they do not laugh lightly in the face of death; but rather, armed with their formidable faith, they simply look at death and wink. In a sense, non-Catholic schools are limited like the wisdom of the Old Testament with regard to dealing with death: death is simply the end; there is nothing beyond the grave. The Transfiguration, on the other hand, points to precisely what is unique and indispensable about Catholic schools because it opens up unimaginable vistas far beyond the grave. I do not mean to criticize or cause controversy, but it is a fact that both the Old Testament and other schools can only teach students how to make the most of this life; whereas Catholic schools help students make the most of this life and the next.

Sooner or later the cold hand of death will touch all of our lives: the death of a father like for Dylan Thomas; the death of a cat or a grandmother like for Lenny; or when we contemplate our own death when we “lean unceasingly over the abyss of nothingness.” If you look at death through the eyes of faith, however, you will see not the end of life, but only the beginning.

Praised be Jesus Christ!

Word-Seeds

Planting the seeds of our words in hearts to bear much fruit

02/23/2018

Matthew 5:20-26 Jesus said to his disciples: "I tell you, unless your righteousness surpasses that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will not enter into the Kingdom of heaven. "You have heard that it was said to your ancestors, You shall not kill; and whoever kills will be liable to judgment. But I say to you, whoever is angry with his brother will be liable to judgment, and whoever says to his brother, Raqa, will be answerable to the Sanhedrin, and whoever says, 'You fool,' will be liable to fiery Gehenna. Therefore, if you bring your gift to the altar, and there recall that your brother has anything against you, leave your gift there at the altar, go first and be reconciled with your brother, and then come and offer your gift. Settle with your opponent quickly while on the way to court. Otherwise your opponent will hand you over to the judge, and the judge will hand you over to the guard, and you will be thrown into prison. Amen, I say to you, you will not be released until you have paid the last penny."

Seeds are fascinating little things. Sometimes they annoy us when we think we are eating seedless grapes, but other times they bless us abundantly when we plant them in the ground. What happens, for instance, when we put a small apple seed into the ground and water it regularly? A miracle happens: it slowly sprouts and eventually grows into a big tree apple tree that produces delicious fruit. One seed grows into an apple tree and produces apples that many people can enjoy. When you gaze at a ripe, red and shiny apple it is hard to imagine how that came from a little apple seed, but so it did.

Parents and teachers are also gardeners who plant seeds, but their seeds are not apple seeds but rather words of wisdom. They plant those word-seeds of wisdom in the soil of our hearts, and after a long time – after we grow up – those word-seeds produce the great fruit of goodness and love and wisdom in us. I sometimes reminisce over the past forty years of my life and I feel deep gratitude for my parents and teachers who planted those word-seeds in my heart and helped me to bear good fruit as a priest today. Sometimes I remember very specific words they said to me, and I try to live by them. I am pretty sure that I would not bear any good fruit today if those “spiritual gardeners” had not done their job so many years ago, patiently planting those word-seeds. Words, like seeds, seem small and powerless - gone in a breath - but they can produce tremendous fruit.

Jesus tells the people that not all word-seeds are good and produce good fruit, there are some word-seeds that are bad and produce rotten fruit. He says that calling someone a name like “Fool” is a bad word-seed. And when you plant that seed in someone’s heart it can hurt them very badly. Furthermore, we will be punished for planting those word-seeds in people’s hearts. He explains: “Whoever says, 'You fool,' will be liable to fiery Gehenna.” So, be careful what seeds you plant in people’s hearts.

Did you know that Jesus was also the “Word” of God? Indeed, God only speaks one Word, and that Word is his Son, Jesus Christ.  You might say that Jesus is the ultimate “Word-Seed” because after he died on the Cross, what did the people do with his body? They buried it in the ground, like a seed. And three days later a miracle happened, just like it does with all seeds, that is, the world beheld the Resurrection, the first sprouts of what would eventually grow into the great Tree of the Church, that spiritual Tree that would bear the innumerable fruit of billions and billions of Christians. You are and I are the fruit of the Word-Seed of Jesus being buried in the ground and producing fruit that will last forever. One small seed can produce great and beautiful fruit.

Try to think about every word you speak being like a tiny seed. And remember two things about these word-seeds. First, like Jesus taught, there are “good word-seeds” (like what your parents and teachers say to you), but there are also “bad word-seeds” (like when you call someone else a “fool”) that hurt others and which will be punished. Second, when we speak those word-seeds, they are planted in the soil of other people’s hearts and those seeds will bear fruit in them. So, be sure to speak and plant only good word-seeds that others really need to hear.

By the way, do you ever talk to yourself, especially when you think no one is around? When we speak word-seeds out of ear-shot of others, when we are our only audience, we are still planting those seeds into someone’s heart? Can you guess whose heart those word-seeds are planted in? We plant them in our own hearts, and those word-seeds we plant will bear fruit of one kind or another. Seeds are such small things, but they can make such a big difference.

Praised be Jesus Christ!

Mixed Motives

Doing the right thing motivated only by love

02/21/2018

Luke 11:29-32 While still more people gathered in the crowd, Jesus said to them, “This generation is an evil generation; it seeks a sign, but no sign will be given it, except the sign of Jonah.  Just as Jonah became a sign to the Ninevites, so will the Son of Man be to this generation. At the judgment the queen of the south will rise with the men of this generation and she will condemn them, because she came from the ends of the earth to hear the wisdom of Solomon, and there is something greater than Solomon here. At the judgment the men of Nineveh will arise with this generation and condemn it, because at the preaching of Jonah they repented, and there is something greater than Jonah here.”

Most people need motivation to do most things. And basically, we can say that motivation comes in two forms: as the carrot and as the stick. What is the carrot? That is positive motivation where you are rewarded for doing well. The reward of getting an “A” on a test motivates you to study hard, or maybe so you can show off later when your friends make a “B.” That is positive motivation. Dr. Hollenbeck offers you a free sonic drink or a free dress day and you are ready to go jump off a bridge into the Arkansas River. That is positive motivation, a reward for doing the right thing.

There is also a stick, which is negative motivation. You are punished with in-school suspension if you misbehave badly. Or, for even more serious infractions, you might be suspended from school (that is not a vacation!). God forbid that you are ever expelled all together, that would be like an “academic death penalty” to lose all the blessings of attending Trinity Junior High. That stick, the fear of punishment, motivates some of you to behave better.

You can see in the sanctuary of the chapel today Michaelangelo’s stunning depiction of the “Last Judgment” from the Sistine Chapel. I will bring this back again later and explain to you some intriguing details, like why one guy is holding his own skin and his own face is not on the skin, and why another figure has a snake wrapped around his body and biting him where the sun does not shine. Bear in mind the Sistine Chapel is arguably one of the holiest places in Christendom, save only the Holy Land itself. So, none of these details are meant to be a joke but rather they are deadly serious.

Are you aware of what is the most significant event that occurs in the Sistine Chapel? That small room, not much bigger than this Trinity Chapel (although the ceiling is much higher), is where the next pope is elected. When a pope dies all the cardinals of the Catholic Church gather in the Sistine Chapel to elect the next pope from among their own number. One of those cardinals will be the next pope. They carry their ballot with the name of whom they vote for to that altar sitting below the Last Judgment, and on that paper is written in Latin: “Eligio in Summum Pontificem,” in English, “I elect as Supreme Pontiff” (pontiff is another name for pope). But each Cardinal also utters this prayer: “Testor Christum Dominum qui me judicaturus est me eligere quem secundum Deum judice eligi debere et quod idem in accessu præstabo,” in English, “I call as my witness Christ the Lord who will be my judge, that my vote is given to the one who, before God, I think should be elected.” They place their ballot on a chalice while looking at the scene of the Last Judgment, where some lucky souls go to heaven, while others poor souls are cast into hell; heaven and hell are the ultimate carrot and stick. Maybe even cardinals need a little motivation to elect the right pope.

The Scriptures also speak about motivation. Jonah went to Nineveh and preached about the “stick” (the negative motivation of punishment), saying: “Forty days more and Nineveh will be destroyed.” And the motivation worked well because people changed their evil ways and straightened up. Jesus is frustrated with people wanting a carrot to motivate them to follow him, they want a “sign,” a miracle, some delicious carrot to become disciples. But our Lord says: “This generation is an evil generation, it seeks a sign, but no sign will be given it, except the sign of Jonah.” What was the sign of Jonah? Just as Jonah spent three days and three nights in the belly of the whale and then be saved, so Jesus would spend three days and nights in the tomb and then rise from the dead. Jesus death and resurrection would be their sign: his unflinching love for them. But unfortunately, that was not enough motivation for them to change. Most people need motivation to do most things, like a carrot or a stick.

Have you noticed, though, how some people do not need the motivation of a carrot or the stick to do some things? They only need love, like Jesus. Some people play basketball not for a carrot of victory or from fear of the stick of Coach Meares yelling at them, but because they love the game of basketball. Some students study hard not because of the carrot of a college scholarship or the stick of their friends doing better and making fun of them, but because they love learning. Some people cheer for their favorite sports team not because of the carrot of a national championship or the fear of another losing season but because they love their team. Some people go to Mass not for the carrot of hearing a certain priest preach, or out of a fear of the stick of committing a mortal sin by missing Mass, but because they love receiving Holy Communion. Some men become priests not because of the carrot of people’s respect and admiration or because of the stick of maybe not finding a girlfriend, but because they love God and his people. Most people need motivation to do most things, but some people need only love.

When you catch that distinction and that difference, you get a glimpse into why God does everything that he does: not for a reward and not to avoid punishment, but for pure love. And when we act like that as well, not worrying about the carrot or the stick, we become a little more like God.

Praised be Jesus Christ!

Friend of the Poor

Providing sensible succor to the needy

02/19/2018

Matthew 25:31-46 Jesus said to his disciples: "When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, he will sit upon his glorious throne, and all the nations will be assembled before him. And he will separate them one from another, as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. He will place the sheep on his right and the goats on his left. Then the king will say to those on his right, 'Come, you who are blessed by my Father. Inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, a stranger and you welcomed me, naked and you clothed me, ill and you cared for me, in prison and you visited me.' Then the righteous will answer him and say, 'Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you drink? When did we see you a stranger and welcome you, or naked and clothe you?  When did we see you ill or in prison, and visit you?' And the king will say to them in reply, 'Amen, I say to you, whatever you did for one of these least brothers of mine, you did for me.'

There has been a proliferation of panhandlers in Fort Smith lately, people standing on street corners holding signs asking for help. I do not know about you, but seeing someone in that situation causes real qualms of conscience for me and paralyzing moral confusion about my responsibility and the best response.

Here’s a sample of the thoughts that race through my mind as I drive up to an intersection where a panhandler is waiting. “Oh, look, the lady has a small child with her; surely it is a good thing to help a destitute mother and child. Well, what if it takes too long to roll down my window and reach the person; I don’t want to slow down traffic and have people honking at me. Maybe I will slip off my Roman collar so he will not notice I am a priest who is driving by ignoring him. Oh, I know, I will pretend to be on the phone and absorbed in conversation and I do not have the time to help. You know the only reason people stand there is because someone stops to help them: if no one helped them, this problem would just go away. Why do I even have to worry about all this, I am just going to the store for some deodorant and hair spray! Maybe I will donate the money I would have spent on hairspray – I don’t need as much hair spray as I used to.” In other words, I know I need to help the poor (especially if I call myself a Christian), but what is the most sensible way to succor them?

I really do not know how each person should respond in the face of such apparent and urgent need, but here are a few observations that might help form your conscience to deal with such cases. First of all, Jesus’ description of his final return leaves little doubt that the poor are a priority for our Lord. He says rather bluntly: “For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, a stranger and you welcomed me, naked and you clothed me, etc.” Loving the poor is identical with loving Jesus. There are also grave consequences for failing to love the poor, and fortunately, good consequences for caring for them. Our Lord concludes: “And these will go off to eternal punishment and the righteous to eternal life.” Nothing less than our eternal salvation rides on our decision to care and comfort the poor.

Secondly, Pope Francis has clearly made the poor a priority for his pontificate, and he has done so not only by his words, but also by his actions. His papal instinct is always to go first to the poor: he visits the poor countries first, he embraces poor people without hesitation, he even raises our awareness of our poor planet, that is suffering desertification, where fertile land becomes desert due to drought, deforestation or inappropriate agriculture. In many respect the pope is the conscience of the world (something we Catholics can rightly be proud of), and he should help shape our Catholic conscience, too.

Thirdly, maybe it is not possible for you to give money to the panhandlers (or you do not feel it is the right response), but in that case, perhaps you can donate to a local charity that does help the poor more effectively. I am always amazed at the generous outpouring of support for charitable fund raisers in our community. The Hope Campus is an especially powerful instrument helping the homeless because it consolidates various efforts and agencies under one roof (thereby eliminating duplication of services), and tries to move people out of homelessness and put them back on their feet.

Fourthly, sometimes I think the poor wish we would just stop and talk to them and hear their story. We all want someone to listen to our story. Instead of being a problem to be solved, the poor are persons to be loved. That panhandler also had a mother and father, perhaps brothers and sisters. He or she grew up with hopes and dreams and maybe wanted to be an astronaut or a fire fighter. Maybe they suffer mental or emotional disturbances that they had no control over or any opportunity to avert. I am so grateful to Dc. Greg and the St. Anne Society that help alleviate not only the material poverty but the deeper emotional poverty, too, by being a friend to the poor.

I am not sure if any of this helped you in your discernment as you drive around Fort Smith, and see the proliferation of panhandlers. Jesus said, “The poor you will always have with you” (Mt. 26:11). So I guess we better figure out how to love the poor until he returns in glory.

Praised be Jesus Christ!

Net Worth

Measuring our value in terms of love not money

02/18/2018

Mark 1:12-15 The Spirit drove Jesus out into the desert, and he remained in the desert for forty days, tempted by Satan. He was among wild beasts, and the angels ministered to him. After John had been arrested, Jesus came to Galilee proclaiming the gospel of God: "This is the time of fulfillment. The kingdom of God is at hand. Repent, and believe in the gospel."

             Recently I was talking with a local financial adviser who asked me a question no one has ever asked me before, and I doubt anyone will ever ask me again. He asked: “What is your estimated net worth?” He explained that was a standard question put to potential clients. I had never pondered that question, and my first reaction was to add up all the gift cards I received at Christmas and answer that “My net worth is approximately $75.” However, his question intrigued me so much I decided to look up the net worth of a few famous people, who by the way, do not live off gift cards like me. The singer-entertainer Madonna’s net worth is $550 million, Bill Gates’ net worth is $88.3 billion, and Tom Brady’s net worth is $180 million, which might take the sting out of not winning the Super Bowl.

            But net worth can be calculated in other ways than in money and gift cards. That was the lesson that Ebenezer Scrooge learned in Charles Dickens’ classic novel, A Christmas Carol. Who can forget the harrowing visits of three ghosts who carry Scrooge (while wearing his flimsy nightgown) into his past, his present, and finally his future? Scrooge slowly realizes that he has made money into his god. When he returns to his past, the old Scrooge witnesses how his former fiancée, Belle, tried to help the young Scrooge to see his growing attachment to money. She says sadly: “Another idol has displaced me…a golden one…I have seen your nobler aspirations fall off, one by one, until the master passion, Gain, engrosses you” (A Christmas Carol, 554). And it was precisely the purpose of the three ghostly visitors to restore Scrooge’s “nobler aspirations,” in a word, to teach him to measure his net worth not by the gold in his purse but by the love in his heart. By the end of the novel, Scrooge (still sporting his flimsy nightgown) can be seen prancing through the city streets graciously helping those in need, greedy now only for love. Scrooge exclaims, half crying, half laughing: “I don’t know what to do! I am as light as a feather, I am as happy as an angel, I am as merry as a school boy.  I am as giddy as a drunken man” (A Christmas Carol, 579-80) If my financial adviser friend had asked Scrooge what his net worth was, he might have answered that he was the richest man in the world, and his real wealth had little to do with how much money he had.

                Jesus also undergoes a harrowing visit from a spirit, only in his case, the spirit was not there to help but to harm, not to transform but to tempt. In a sense, you could say the evil spirit, Satan, was tempting our Lord to define his net worth by worldly standards rather than heavenly ones. The gospel of Mark only gives us the “cliffs notes” version of this duel in the desert, but Matthew provides the longer, play-by-play commentary. Matthew explains how Satan tries to trick Jesus with three temptations. First turn stones into bread; second, throw himself off the parapet of the temple and have angels catch him; and third, he takes him to a high mountain and offers him the wealth of the world if only he would bend his knee and worship Satan. As we all know, in the Scriptural story, the evil spirit’s traps only spring back on himself. Jesus already knew he was the richest man in the world because he was the Son of God, and he measured his net worth in terms of obedience to his Father’s will, in a word, by love.

               Every year for the forty days of Lent you and I, too, enter into a spiritual duel with the devil. The terms of our contest are no different than they were for Ebenezer and for Jesus: it is a question of defining net worth. In what do we find our peace and our purpose, our sense of self, or as they say in French, “notre raison d’etre” (our reason for being), why were we created? That is why our Lenten sacrifice should closely correspond to whatever we might place too exaggerated a value on. Perhaps we put too much emphasis on money, and hoard money like Scrooge. Maybe vanity is our vice and we spend hours exercising and staring in the mirror. It could be food or drink that dominates our lives and we are always dreaming about our next meal. Climbing the ladder of success can consume some people no matter what heights they reach. Sexual excesses grow to addictive proportions. And so on. Lent is the time to listen to the good spirits that help us prioritize our values so that love sits at the top, and it is the time to quell the voice of the evil spirit who offers us the world at the price of our souls. By the end of these forty days, like at the end of the A Christmas Carol,  we should be able to answer the question “What is your net worth?” a little differently than when we began.

               It is in this context that I want to invite you to consider your stewardship and financial support of our parish. You will receive a letter from me this week with a pledge card asking you prayerfully to consider how much you give to Immaculate Conception, and see, if possible, if you can increase that amount. Our parishioners already give so generously, I am a little embarrassed to even bring this up, and I want to thank you for your past gifts. But supporting our parish financially is an integral part of discipleship (following Jesus), and even more, it is a healthy part of spirituality, which is a matter of listening to the right spirits and not the wrong spirits. I would be derelict in my duty as your pastor if I failed to mention this. And I will do my part by throwing an extra gift card into the collection. The bulletin also has a brief summary of our annual budget so you can see how frugal we are with your gifts.

               If someone asked you, “What is the net worth of this church?” how would you answer them? Would you add the school endowment, our church savings, and our annual budget and then subtract our liabilities to come up with the answer? Or, would you instead count the Catholics in the pews on Sunday, and see how well they love God and their neighbor? “What is your net worth?” is a question that perhaps we should ask ourselves rather regularly.

Praised be Jesus Christ!

Ashes to Ashes

Seeing how small symbols teach big truths

02/14/2018

2 Corinthians 5:20—6:2 Brothers and sisters: We are ambassadors for Christ, as if God were appealing through us. We implore you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. For our sake he made him to be sin who did not know sin, so that we might become the righteousness of God in him. Working together, then, we appeal to you not to receive the grace of God in vain. For he says: In an acceptable time I heard you, and on the day of salvation I helped you. Behold, now is a very acceptable time; behold, now is the day of salvation.

Sometimes we use small symbols to teach big truths, because, to be entirely honest, the naked truth is too much for us to bear. Jack Nicholson defiantly declared to Tom Cruise in the movie, “A Few Good Men,” that “You cannot handle the truth!” And that is true because many truths are too much for the human mind to grasp, they are beyond human comprehension, and that is why we need small signs to help us in approaching these big realities.

You may be familiar with the playground poem called, “Ring around the Rosy.” But did you know that was originally intended to teach small children how to protect themselves again the Black Plague, or the Black Death? The Black Plague ravaged Europe and Asia in the 14th century, killing twenty to one hundred million people. For example it reduced the population of London by sixty percent. That would be like the population of Fort Smith going from 86,000 to 35,000.

The poem goes like this, as you will remember: “Ring around the rosy, pockets full of poseys, ashes, ashes, they all fall down.” What did that poem originally mean? The “rosy” referred to the rash that caused rosy colored cheeks in those who had just contracted the disease. People carried “poseys” in their pockets because in those days they believed that poseys were like a natural deterrent, an antidote, to the plague. When people died, they usually cremated the bodies – made them “ashes, ashes” – so as to halt the spread of the plague. And the phrase, “they all fall down” was a euphemistic way – a nice way – to describe how many people died, it seemed like “they all had fallen down dead.” Jack Nicholson was right: “You can’t handle the truth” because some truths, like death and highly infectious diseases, scare us too much. We would rather not think about them. But you can still teach people how to handle the truth, at least to start thinking about them, through small things, like poetry and poseys.

The Catholic Church also uses small symbols to teach big truths and we call that the “sacramental system” or the “sacramental economy.” In each sacrament a little sign or symbol points to a tremendous spiritual truth that if we really thought about them our minds would be blown. A little water poured over a baby’s head in baptism makes that human baby a child of God. A morsel of bread and a few drops of wine turn into Jesus’ Body and Blood in the Mass. A small smear of holy oil in the sacrament of Anointing rains down healing and wholeness on the infirm. A small gold ring on a finger speaks volumes of unbreakable love, not only between a man and a woman, but really points to Jesus’ love for us, his Church, his Bride. Small sacramental symbols teach big spiritual truths that are beyond the human mind to comprehend.

The blessed ashes of Ash Wednesday are another one of those small symbols that teach timeless truths. Now, the ashes are a sacramental (like holy water), and not one of the seven sacraments. Therefore, everyone can receive them, Catholics and non-Catholics alike. And the truth it teaches is similar to that playground poem: one day we will all die and return to ashes. That is a truth that not only small children but also big priests find hard to handle. Our mortality can be mind-blowing; it is no exaggeration to say that death is the ultimate “plague.” But Christians also carry around the antidote to that ultimate plague, not poseys in their pockets, but faith in their hearts and the grace of the sacraments in their souls, especially the Holy Eucharist. That is why the Catechism of the Catholic Church calls Holy Communion, “the medicine of immortality, and the antidote for death” (Catechism, 1405). Jesus said: “Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him on the last day” (Jn. 6:54).

As you come forward to receive the blessed ashes in a few moments, think about two things. Jack Nicholson said, “You can’t handle the truth!” and he was right about that. But Jesus said: “The truth will set you free” (Jn. 8:32). And he was even more right about that. And that is why we need small sacramental symbols to teach us about big eternal truths.

Praised be Jesus Christ!