Gospel or Gobbledygook

Seeing everything in light of the Resurrection

09/19/2021

Mk 9:30-37 Jesus and his disciples left from there and began a journey through Galilee, but he did not wish anyone to know about it. He was teaching his disciples and telling them, “The Son of Man is to be handed over to men and they will kill him, and three days after his death the Son of Man will rise.” But they did not understand the saying, and they were afraid to question him. They came to Capernaum and, once inside the house, he began to ask them, “What were you arguing about on the way?” But they remained silent. They had been discussing among themselves on the way who was the greatest. Then he sat down, called the Twelve, and said to them, “If anyone wishes to be first, he shall be the last of all and the servant of all.” Taking a child, he placed it in their midst, and putting his arms around it, he said to them, “Whoever receives one child such as this in my name, receives me; and whoever receives me, receives not me but the One who sent me.”

Every student eventually experiences that muddled moment when they realize they have no clue what their teacher is talking about. That must have been the case constantly for Charlie Brown, whose teacher always sounded like, “Wah-wah, wah-wah, wah-wah.” Is that what it sometimes sounds like sitting in church on Sunday and hearing a homily? The priest or deacon might as well be speaking Greek because his message either goes over our heads or right through our heads, in one ear and out the other, like cars driving through the Bobby Hopper tunnel. In other words, some sermons make the good news sound like gobbledygook.

But do you know when the Gospel is most susceptible to sound like gobbledygook? That happens when we hear some teaching we disagree with or we don’t like. A Pew Research Poll recently revealed doctrines with which many Catholics disagreed. See if you agree or disagree with these touchy teachings. For instance, only 30% of Catholics believe the bread and wine at Mass become the Body and Blood of Christ, 48% want married priests, 45% would like women priests, 65% accept birth control.

37% favor gay marriage, 50% believe in Communion after divorce and remarriage, and 46% go to Communion while cohabitating (that is, living together). When you hear Church teaching on those difficult doctrines, does it suddenly sound like Greek or Gobbledygook? I bet that is exactly how it sounds to many Catholic politicians today when their bishops warm them against supporting abortion: “Wah-wah, wah-wah, wah-wah.” So, they ignore them.

If that is how you feel, you are in good company, because that is how the apostles felt in the gospel of Mark today. Jesus has just revealed how he must suffer excruciatingly and die a demeaning death on the Cross and then rise 3 days later. What was their reaction? We read: “But they did not understand the saying, and they were afraid to question him.” But their reaction was actually worse than that. The apostles were debating about who was the greatest among them.

Instead of wrestling with and trying to understand how the Gospel is not gobbledygook, they turned to easier topics. What would it finally take for the apostles to see the fullness of faith and embrace it in its entirety? It would take the resurrection of Jesus. Only when they beheld the breath-taking beauty of Jesus’ glorified body did the gobbledygook start to sound like Good News.

The tough teachings about suffering and death only made sense in light of the Resurrection. Why? Well, because hindsight is twenty-twenty. When you arrive at the end of the road and look back, things make perfect sense. That is, only in the light of the Resurrection will what sounds like gobbledygook of no women priests, no birth control, no abortion, etc. start to sound like Good News. In the meantime, though, you might still keep hearing, “Wah-wah, wah-wah, wah-wah.”

My friends, when we hear about other people struggling with Church teaching, especially Catholic politicians, it can feel tempting to “throw the first stone” (Jn 8:7) as the Jews wanted to do to the woman caught in adultery. But one thing that helps me drop the stone of self-righteousness is when I recall I too have questioned and doubted Church teaching. Think about it this way: the way I believed and behaved as a 10 year old is not what I believed or how I behaved as a 20 year old. And again by 30 I had grown more and had better beliefs and behavior still, and even more so by 40 and 50.

That is why St. Paul said in 1 Co 13:11, “When I was a child, I used to talk like a child, think like a child, reason like a child; when I became a man, I put aside childish things.” St. Paul, the mature man of faith, saw everything in the light of the Resurrection – because he had seen the Risen Lord on the road to Damascus (cf. Acts 9) – and he could translate the gobbledygook into the Good News. In other words, what we need is not more criticism and controversy, but more prayer and patience with one another, as we all gradually grow in faith.

Folks, as the car of this homily reaches the other end of the Bobby Hopper tunnel of your head, I pray we are patient with “those whose faith is weaker” (Rm 15:1). Only when we stand before Jesus, the Risen One, in heaven, will our faith make perfect sense. On that day, we will say like a student to his teacher at the end of the semester: “Oh, that is what you were trying to teach us!” Until then, however, homilies will still sound like “Wah-wah, wah-wah, wah-wah.”

Praised be Jesus Christ!