In Memory of Rick and Gene

Increasing in faith in the face of death

11/11/2019

Luke 17:1-6 Jesus said to his disciples, "Things that cause sin will inevitably occur, but woe to the one through whom they occur. It would be better for him if a millstone were put around his neck and he be thrown into the sea than for him to cause one of these little ones to sin. Be on your guard! If your brother sins, rebuke him; and if he repents, forgive him. And if he wrongs you seven times in one day and returns to you seven times saying, 'I am sorry,' you should forgive him." And the Apostles said to the Lord, "Increase our faith." The Lord replied, "If you have faith the size of a mustard seed, you would say to this mulberry tree, 'Be uprooted and planted in the sea,' and it would obey you."

For Christians Sundays are supposed to be filled with rest from labor and resurrection to new life. But yesterday turned out to be exactly the opposite experience for me and for two Immaculate Conception families: it felt like a day marked by death and despair. I hope you have already heard the sad news, and I apologize if you’re hearing it first from me, instead of directly from the affected families. Yesterday, Rick Reedy, while hunting in Kansas, died of a heart attack. He and his family had all become Catholic four years ago here at I.C.

Also, last night, our beloved Gene Bruick suffered a massive heart attack and died at Mercy Hospital. I was able to give Gene the Last Rites last night. Last Saturday, Gene played golf, one of his favorite things to do, and Friday he helped me distribute Holy Communion at 7 a.m. Mass. Whenever he handed me the ciborium after distributing Communion, he would smile really big and wink at me. As you can imagine both families are distraught and struggling with this unexpected tragedy. As a parish family, we all suffer when any one person suffers, and so we join them in grieving their loss, which is also our loss. As you pastor, the spiritual father of our parish family, here at three thoughts of how I’m dealing with their deaths, and maybe it will help you handle your own grief a little more faithfully and a little more fruitfully.

First, there’s an old proverb that teaches – you know you’re getting older when you know more people in heaven than on earth. Yesterday, I felt like I aged twenty years in visiting the Reedy family at home and the Bruick family in the hospital. Tragic deaths of loved one has an uncanny way of inducing maturity and growth. Death makes “days” feel like “years” of life. Death ages us. The surplus value of dealing with death, however, lies in seeing heaven as our home, populated by those we love, and who await our passage home to them. Every Christian should live with one foot on earth and the other foot in heaven. And every funeral we attend should make us want to have both feed in heaven, which is where we pray Rick and Gene’s feet are trodding today. There are a lot of people waiting and waving “hello” to Rick and Gene on the sunny shores of heaven than there are people waving “good-bye” to them here in this vale of tears on earth. Death makes you grow up fast.

Secondly, death opens our eyes and helps us to have more faith. The Apostles beg Jesus in the gospel today: “Increase our faith.” Jesus answered that prayer by all his amazing miracles and astounding teachings. But perhaps his greatest answer to increase their faith was by his own death and resurrection. On Good Friday and Easter Sunday, Jesus opened the eyes of faith of the Apostles to see that he had come to give them abundant life, as he said in John 10:10. But they would experience that abundance fully in heaven. Jesus has not forgotten his promise of giving abundant life to Rick and Gene either. How so? When we look at death with the eyes of faith, we see Jesus also wants to bless them with the glorious resurrection he himself experienced. Yesterday I read Psalm 23 with the Reedy family and I gave Gene the Apostolic Pardon. Those two prayers can help increase our faith in Jesus’ resurrection, and also in Rick and Gene’s resurrection. Death can increase our faith.

Thirdly, the death of a loved one fills the Mass with more meaning, at least for me. Every day before I celebrate Mass, I look at the little piece of paper on the altar that shows the “intention” for the Mass, usually the name of a deceased loved one. A wry smile crosses my face because I usually officiated at most of their funeral Masses. Every time I celebrate the Mass, therefore, I feel a spiritual closeness and contact with those who have died. Now, I will feel especially close to Rick and Gene at every Mass. At the Last Supper before our Lord suffered and died, he commanded his apostles: “Do this in memory of me.” By extension, every Mass is also a chance to “remember” all those who have died in Christ, and now to remember Rick and Gene. The Mass makes people feel close especially when death makes them feel far away. The Mass is often called the “medicine of immortality,” not only for those who have died, but also for us who are still living on earth. That is one reason Catholics are required to attend Mass every Sunday: so that no matter how close death comes, Sunday will still feel like a day of rest from labor and resurrection to new life.

Eternal rest grant unto them, O Lord, and let perpetual light shine upon them. May their souls and the souls of all the faithful departed, through the mercy of God, rest in peace. Amen.

Praised be Jesus Christ!

Friendly Footnotes

Seeing Scripture as footnotes of faith

11/08/2019

Luke 16:1-8 Jesus said to his disciples, "A rich man had a steward who was reported to him for squandering his property. He summoned him and said, 'What is this I hear about you? Prepare a full account of your stewardship, because you can no longer be my steward.' The steward said to himself, 'What shall I do, now that my master is taking the position of steward away from me? I am not strong enough to dig and I am ashamed to beg. I know what I shall do so that, when I am removed from the stewardship, they may welcome me into their homes.' He called in his master's debtors one by one.To the first he said, 'How much do you owe my master?' He replied, 'One hundred measures of olive oil.' He said to him, 'Here is your promissory note. Sit down and quickly write one for fifty.' Then to another he said, 'And you, how much do you owe?' He replied, 'One hundred measures of wheat.' He said to him, 'Here is your promissory note; write one for eighty.' And the master commended that dishonest steward for acting prudently. For the children of this world are more prudent in dealing with their own generation than the children of light."

As you know, I am helping lead a Bible study on Monday evenings. Before each class, the participants (whom I call “Scripture scholars” so they’ll keep coming back) are required to read the footnotes at the bottom of the page of the chapters we are reading. That sounds easy enough, but not in the Ignatius Catholic Study Bible. There, the footnotes are almost always longer than the text of Scripture itself. In other words, we spend more time reading the footnotes than the Bible itself. Why?

Well, the Bible is not self-interpreting, or self-evident; its meaning is not obvious. It was written for people and by people and in a language and at a time completely foreign to 21st century Fort Smithians. Basically, the footnotes build a bridge that spans 2,000 years of time, from the culture of 1st century Palestine to 21st century Pine Bluff. If there’s one lesson I hope people learn from my Bible study it is that footnotes are our friends. Don’t fly over the footnotes too fast. You will not understand the wisdom of the Holy Spirit whispered in every word of Sacred Scripture without the help of the friendly footnotes.

Today’s gospel from Luke 16 is a perfect example of how footnotes are our friends. You have heard the parable of the dishonest steward tons of times. And if you’re like me, you probably scratch your heard trying to understand the point of the parable. On the surface it seems the steward has just cheated his master out of his money but cutting what his debtors owe him. The footnotes on Luke 16:1-8, however, explains: “The parable of the dishonest stewards has to be understood in light of the Palestinian custom of agents acting on behalf of their masters and the usurious practice common to such agents.” That is, people charge exorbitant interest on loans.

The footnote continues: “The master commends the dishonest steward who has forgone his own usurious commission on the business transaction by having the debtors write new notes that reflected only the real amount (i.e. minus the steward’s profit).” In other words, imagine a car dealer who sold cars at cost and took no commission for himself, and you get the point of the parable, and why the steward was commended. He was self-sacrificing. Could you feel how the footnote on Luke 16:1-8 felt like a bridge that connected two distant cultures? We can say after reading the footnote: Luke is speaking my lingo!

Now I would like to apply this analogy of footnotes being our friends to the whole Bible. That is, try to see the Sacred Scripture itself as the footnotes of our faith in Jesus Christ. St. Jerome, the patron saint of scripture scholars, famously said in his Introduction to Isaiah, “Ignorance of Scripture is ignorance of Christ.” In other words, when it comes to knowing and loving Jesus, we also need a bridge to him to reach us and for us to reach him. And that bridge was built by the Holy Spirit and the Church when we read the Bible. The whole Bible is a bridge that spans the vast vacuum of space and time between heaven and earth. The Bible serves as the footnotes of our faith.

If you want to understand the Catholic faith: the seven-fold sacraments, Marian motherhood, papal primacy, the succor of the saints, the reverence of relics, the place of the priesthood, the activity of the angels, the hope of heaven, the horrors of hell, the mystery of the Mass, the comfort of confession, the parade of prophets, the ecstasy of evangelization, the deception of the devil, the mission of the martyrs, the role of religious, the continuity of the liturgical calendar, which all leads us to the loving heart of the Holy Trinity, then read the footnotes of the faith, called the Holy Bible.

Sometimes our Catholic faith can feel like a far-away fairyland unrelated to the reality of daily life in downtown Fort Smith. That’s why we need to read the footnotes of our faith called the Holy Bible. To make it through Bible study, as well as to make it through life, be sure to take time to carefully read the friendly footnotes.

Praised be Jesus Christ!

Mother's Milk

Accepting our Lord’s invitation to his banquet

11/05/2019

Luke 14:15-24 One of those at table with Jesus said to him, "Blessed is the one who will dine in the Kingdom of God." He replied to him, "A man gave a great dinner to which he invited many. When the time for the dinner came, he dispatched his servant to say to those invited, 'Come, everything is now ready.'

But one by one, they all began to excuse themselves. The first said to him, 'I have purchased a field and must go to examine it; I ask you, consider me excused.' And another said, 'I have purchased five yoke of oxen and am on my way to evaluate them; I ask you, consider me excused.' And another said, 'I have just married a woman, and therefore I cannot come.' The servant went and reported this to his master. Then the master of the house in a rage commanded his servant, 'Go out quickly into the streets and alleys of the town and bring in here the poor and the crippled, the blind and the lame.' The servant reported, 'Sir, your orders have been carried out and still there is room.' The master then ordered the servant, 'Go out to the highways and hedgerows and make people come in that my home may be filled. For, I tell you, none of those men who were invited will taste my dinner.'"

One of my favorite functions as a priest and pastor is to visit families for dinner. Whenever I arrive at a new home, though, I have to smile at the irony of my dinner dates. Why? Well, growing up, my parents never invited the priest over for supper. Sometimes it’s good to keep the pastor at arm’s length and not get too close. He may ask for more money! One thing that humbles me the lengths people go to prepare for dinner with the priest. Recently, I visited a family and asked the children: “What did you do all day?” They sulkily replied: “We spent the whole day cleaning the house for your arrival.” I answered, “Oh, gee, thanks! Sorry to ruin your day.” And I thought: no wonder my parents never invited the priest over for supper.

Another sacrifice people make it the length they go to prepare the meal and set the table. Some people cook for hours, set the table with fresh flowers, bring out their best china, and even eat in the formal dining room. Indian cooking doesn’t take hours, some dishes take days. On some dates, though, I receive multiple invitations and cannot honor them all, on holidays like Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Year’s or Easter. Sometimes, I table hop and try to get to several meals in one night. Ah, the sacrifices we priests make for Jesus!

Over 23 years of visiting families I have literally shared thousands of meals with parishioners. I’ve learned that being invited to supper is not only something special, it is even something intimate. If you’ll forgive the comparison – I believe it is similar to a mother breast-feeding her baby. A family feeds its dinner guests with the milk of their love and sacrifice, and guests should feel grateful for this great gift.

In Luke 14, Jesus teaches a parable about a dinner to which many were invited but they declined the dinner. What does the host do? He commands his servants: “Go out quickly into the streets and alleys of the town and bring in here the poor and the crippled, the blind and the lame.” In other words, the host has gone to great lengths to prepare this banquet and the invited guests were not grateful for his love or sacrifice. When we remember the feast refers to the meal in the Kingdom of God, we realize it took all eternity to prepare, not just a few hours, or even a few days like some Indian dishes.

But now let’s apply the intimate analogy of breast-feeding to giving a meal, and we discover how harsh the rejection of the invited guest feels. And by the way, in case you think I invented the analogy of breast-feeding to a banquet, listen to Isaiah 66:1, the last chapter of Isaiah and the fulfillment of God’s prophesies and promises. The Seer says: “So that you may nurse and be satisfied from her consoling breasts; That you may drink with delight at her abundant breasts.” That is, God’s heavenly banquet is nothing short of the milk of his love. Therefore, rejecting his invitation to dinner is tantamount to a baby rejecting its mother’s milk. What could be worse?

My friends, we don’t have to wait till heaven to sit at the banquet God has prepared for us from all eternity. That banquet of his love is spread out for us at every Mass, in the Body and Blood of the Eucharist. The Eucharist is the milk of divine love. One of the most ancient images of the Eucharist is that of the mother pelican that wounds its breast to feed its babies. Have you ever seen that image in churches? You can see, I hope, how the image of the pelican and the image of the breast-feeding easily combine to give a rich meaning to the meal of the Mass. That’s the Good News.

Here’s the bad news. Just like in Jesus’ parable, many are invited but not many accept the invitation to dinner. How many Catholics have left the Church and snub our Lord’s invitation to dinner at Sunday Mass? Like in the parable where the invited guests have lots of ready excuses for declining the dinner, so too modern Catholics have a ton of excuses to miss Mass, and other things they’d rather do. But the heart of our Lord hurts like a mother who wants to breast-feed her baby, but is rejected.

Our Savior wants to feed us with the Blood of his sacrifice and the milk of his love in the Eucharist. Please don’t decline Jesus’ invitation to dinner, and I won’t decline your invitation to dinner either.

Praised be Jesus Christ!

Picture of Purgatory

Reflections on the resurrection of the righteous

11/04/2019

Luke 14:12-14 On a sabbath Jesus went to dine at the home of one of the leading Pharisees. He said to the host who invited him, "When you hold a lunch or a dinner, do not invite your friends or your brothers or sisters or your relatives or your wealthy neighbors, in case they may invite you back and you have repayment. Rather, when you hold a banquet, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind; blessed indeed will you be because of their inability to repay you. For you will be repaid at the resurrection of the righteous."

In the month of November both the Book of Nature and the Book of Scripture invite us to meditate on the end of earthly life and the hope of heavenly life. We watch the lovely tree leaves falling and the world falling asleep; likewise, we blessed cemeteries yesterday and prayed for those who had fallen asleep in Christ. In the gospel today, Jesus talks about “the resurrection of the righteous,” and I would like to offer you three reflections on that resurrection of the righteous, since it seems both Nature and Scripture beckon us to do it.

The first point: a few years ago my uncle passed away in New Delhi, India and my parents and returned for the funeral Mass. The Indian tradition required that after a funeral Mass, the family should invite the poor neighbors to their home for a feast in honor of the deceased. But what often happens, though, is only the family and friends attend and the poor are neglected. My parents decided, therefore, that instead we would go to a leper colony run by Mother Teresa’s Sisters and feed the people there, which we did for lunch. My parents also made a generous donation to the ministry of the Sisters.

That tradition is rooted in today’s gospel from Luke 14, where Jesus taught: “When you hold a banquet, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind; blessed indeed will you be because of their inability to repay you. For you will be repaid in the resurrection of the righteous.” But notice the pivotal point: that act of charity was not for our benefit, but rather for my uncle’s. In other words, we prayed God would apply that act of charity to my uncle’s list of good deeds and usher him out of purgatory more promptly, so he might more speedily enjoy the resurrection of the righteous.

Second point: Do you ever wonder what really happens in purgatory? Certainly, it is a place of purgation and purification and preparation for entry into heaven. In addition, I would like to suggest this analogy, in order to give you a “picture of purgatory.” I believe all the dead in purgatory are undergoing “seminary training” in order to become priests and nuns in heaven. In heaven, therefore, everyone will be a priest or a nun. We know that on earth the fundamental focus of priests and nuns is to love God and neighbor, and we achieve that objective primarily by not being married.

St. Paul taught in 1 Corinthians 7:32, “An unmarried man is anxious about things of the Lord, how he may please the Lord.” A few verses later, the Apostle adds this for ladies: “An unmarried woman or virgin is anxious about the things of the Lord, so that she may be holy in both body and spirit.” In purgatory, therefore, we will be purified from worldly anxieties so we can be anxious about the things of the Lord” and please him. In Matthew 22, Jesus adds his own weight to this analogy of purgatory as seminary, saying: “At the resurrection they neither marry nor are given in marriage but are like the angels in heaven.” In other words, if you’ve ever wondered: “What would it be like to be a priest or a nun?” well, you will find out in purgatory, where human marriage will give way to divine marriage between Jesus and his Bride, the Church. Ironic as it may sound, purgatory is simultaneously seminary preparation and marriage preparation. We will be both celibate toward human persons, but married to the divine Person, the Second Person of the Holy Trinity, Jesus Christ, the Word made Flesh.

Here’s the third point: have you been keeping up with the latest synod of bishops and laity that Pope Francis has convoked in Rome? The purpose of the synod is to discuss issues of evangelization and ecology. But the headlines have been hijacked by the controversial topic of allowing married deacons become ordained priests. Now, to be clear, priestly celibacy is a tradition that slowly evolved over the first 600 years of Church history, and finally became normative and normal about 1, 000 years ago. It is a discipline not a doctrine and therefore it can be changed. The Holy Father would be acting fully within his apostolic authority if he modified that discipline, especially in the Amazon region rather than universally.

But personally, I hope he does not do that. Why? When we lose the celibate priesthood, we lose our picture of purgatory as preparation for heaven. Every Sunday when we attend Mass we see a celibate priest preaching the Good News and feeding Christ’s flock with the Lord’s own Body and Blood. But because he is celibate, he does even more than that: he gives every parishioner who stops to reflect deeply a preview of coming attractions, a picture of purgatory. In other words, beholding a celibate priest at the altar every Christian could say with confidence: “Someday I will be like Fr. John.” That picture of purgatory, and future heavenly glory, is what Amazonia would lose if the Holy Father relaxes the discipline of celibacy.

That’s what I believe Jesus means when in Luke 14 he refers to the “resurrection of the righteous.” And now you know what people are doing in purgatory.

Praised be Jesus Christ!

Cinderella Stories

Striving for spiritual success in life

11/03/2019

Luke 19:1-10 At that time, Jesus came to Jericho and intended to pass through the town. Now a man there named Zacchaeus, who was a chief tax collector and also a wealthy man, was seeking to see who Jesus was; but he could not see him because of the crowd, for he was short in stature. So he ran ahead and climbed a sycamore tree in order to see Jesus, who was about to pass that way. When he reached the place, Jesus looked up and said, "Zacchaeus, come down quickly, for today I must stay at your house." And he came down quickly and received him with joy. When they all saw this, they began to grumble, saying, "He has gone to stay at the house of a sinner." But Zacchaeus stood there and said to the Lord, "Behold, half of my possessions, Lord, I shall give to the poor, and if I have extorted anything from anyone I shall repay it four times over." And Jesus said to him, "Today salvation has come to this house because this man too is a descendant of Abraham. For the Son of Man has come to seek and to save what was lost."

I am a huge fan of the actor Russell Crowe, and have enjoyed all his movies, except maybe Noah, which was really weird. One movie that touched me deeply was called “Cinderella Man,” where Russell Crowe played a boxer in New Jersey during the Depression. Did you see it? The movie epitomizes the American spirit that loves the underdog. Americans instinctively cheer for David against Goliath. Russell Crowe plays James Braddock, an Irish-American boxer who breaks his right hand in a fight and has to give up boxing. Even though Braddock eventually finds work as a longshoreman, the family barely makes enough money to survive. Braddock gets another chance to box, and discovers that his left hand has grown much stronger; he has become ambidextrous and can box with both hands. Surprisingly, Braddock beats the number-two contender in the world, a fellow named Corn Griffin. Feeling he can fight again, Braddock begins boxing, over the out-spoken objections of his very worried wife.

One victory in the ring leads to another and the family find itself with more money than they really need. What does Braddock do? In a gesture of extreme generosity, he actually returns some of the government money he received while unemployed, giving it back to the government. Can you imagine anyone voluntarily giving money back to the government? One sportswriter dubs Braddock with the nickname of “Cinderella Man” because of his rags to riches story. After several more victories, Braddock finally gets a chance to fight the reigning world champion, Max Baer, who really is a “bear” because he mauls his opponents in the ring. Baer had previously killed two fighters in a match. Braddock was given a 10 to 1 and clearly the underdog: David against Goliath. But on June 13, 1953, Madison Square Garden witnessed one of the greatest upsets in boxing history: Braddock defeated Baer and was crowned world champion. You might say that Cinderella got her tiara.

Braddock symbolized the fighting American spirit during the Depression and he gave hope to a whole nation. But I would suggest to you that Braddock also stood as a sign of hope for countess immigrants, like from Ireland like him, as well as from India, like my family, who all came to these shores dreaming of a rags to riches story for us, too. Maybe someday I will be crowned with a tiara, too.

In the gospel today, we witness another Cinderella story, but not in the material sense, but rather in the spiritual sense. That is, going not from rags to riches, but from sinner to saint. By all external standards, Zacchaeus appears to be a very unlikely candidate for sainthood. He is the chief tax collector in Jericho and known for extortion at the expense of the poor people. Put simply: his wealth was the cause of their poverty. But Zacchaeus’ sins are no match for Jesus’ sanctity in Jericho, just like Baer’s malice was no match for Braddock’s metal in the boxing ring.

Zacchaeus even takes a page out of Braddock’s playbook and pays back money he received but doesn’t really need. He promises to the poor: “Behold, half of my possessions, Lord, I shall give to the poor, and if I have extorted anything from anyone, I shall pay it four times over.” Jesus expresses his profound pleasure and praises Zacchaeus for his change of heart, his conversion. In other words, Jesus sort of crowns Zacchaeus with the tiara of a saint. Zacchaeus too experienced a Cinderella story: not from rags to riches, but from sinnerhood to sainthood.

Folks, which of these two Cinderella stories inspires you more: going from rags to riches or from sinner to saint? Or to put it more personally: which of these two would you like to be storyline of your own life? Is there anyone in this church, including this priest, who has not dreamed of winning the lottery and striking it rich? People tell me periodically: “Fr. John, if you’ll bless this lottery ticket, I promise to give half of the jackpot to the church.” Of course, I bless that ticket with holy water and with incense and with holy oil, too! There’s nothing wrong with working hard and enjoying the fruits of our labors. A rags to riches story is laudable in many respects.

But how hard are we working for spiritual success, for sainthood? Are we are zealous as Zacchaeus to invite Jesus into our homes and hearts? Are we anxious to pay back and make restitution to anyone whom we may have wronged? When was the last time you went to confession and told Jesus we are sorry for our sins? Every confessional is like the boxing ring where we go toe-to-toe with a spiritual Max Baer, namely, Satan. Most of us are too afraid of confession and never step into the ring. I am convinced that the best barometer for spiritual zeal is the frequency of confession. For instance, Pope St. John Paul II and St. Mother Teresa were known to confess weekly. J.P. II and Mother Teresa are the James Braddocks of the spiritual life.

During the month of November, we remember our family and friends who have died and gone before us. In a sense, their earthly stories have come to a close, and the final chapter has been written. As they stand on the far shore of eternity, looking back at this earthly life, which Cinderella story do you think they wish their life had resembled: that of Braddock or that of Zacchaeus: rags to riches or sinner to saint? Each person will be crowned with the tiara that we earned on earth. Everyone gets a tiara.

Praised be Jesus Christ!

Death Dealing

Meditating on the scriptures to face death

11/02/2019

John 6:37-40 Jesus said to the crowds: "Everything that the Father gives me will come to me, and I will not reject anyone who comes to me, because I came down from heaven not to do my own will but the will of the one who sent me. And this is the will of the one who sent me, that I should not lose anything of what he gave me, but that I should raise it on the last day. For this is the will of my Father, that everyone who sees the Son and believes in him may have eternal life, and I shall raise him on the last day."

We all deal with death in different ways. Some ways are good, others are better, and some are best, and some ways are not good at all. Let me give you some examples. Last Sunday I received a call to go to Mercy Hospital Emergency Room. A little girl named Millie Giana, who was only 5 years old, had died from pneumonia. By the time I arrived, the family was gone but the grandmother was sitting next to Millie’s bed and caressing her cheeks. The little girl was strikingly beautiful, and I wondered if she resembled the daughter of Jairus in Mark 5, whom Jesus raised from the dead. The grandmother and I recited the prayers called “Commendation of the Dying.” I was so sad to leave the grandmother and granddaughter there in the ER, but what else could I do? I prayed the rosary for them and we have prayed for Millie at Mass. That’s one way to deal with death: prayerfully.

                I’ll never forget something Msgr. Hebert (my first pastor) said upon returning from Baptist Hospital in Little Rock. He had just anointed someone in ICU, who was hooked up to numerous tubes and medical devices all keeping him alive. Msgr. Hebert said stoically: “John, if I’m ever in that situation, I want you to anoint me, give me the Apostolic Pardon, and then as you leave the room, kick the plug out of the wall.” As you know Catholics are not required to resort to extraordinary means of life support, so Msgr. Hebert was making a morally laudable request. That’s another way to deal with death: get ready spiritually and then get heck the out of here.

Last week Fr. Matt Garrison from Sacred Heart in Barling gave a talk on funeral planning at “Pints with a Priest.” The talk was titled: “Putting Fun back in Funerals.” He basically outlined the do’s and don’t’s of a Catholic funeral Mass, such as the legitimacy of having the body cremated. At the end, he helped people to actually plan their funeral Mass. And that’s another way of dealing with death: preplanning.

Perhaps the best way to deal with death, however, is meditating on the sacred scriptures. The bible is a Christian’s compass to navigate this world and find our way home to heaven. The Mass of November 2, the Commemoration of All Souls, offers us great scriptures to help us wrestle with our great enemy, Death. Wisdom 3 consoles us with the words: “The souls of the just are in the hand of God.” So, we can pray with confidence that 5 year-old Millie sits smiling in the hand of God today. Psalm 23 is familiar to everyone, which describes the Good Shepherd, who leads us – his sheep – to verdant pastures, which ultimately turn out to be Paradise. The final verse reads: “And I shall dwell in the house of the Lord for years to come.”

Two options for the New Testament epistles are taken from Romans. In Romans 5 we read: “God proves his love for us in that while we were still sinners Christ died for us.” That is, Jesus’ death sheds new light on our own death. We see that death is not the last word on life. Death is not a period at the end of the sentence of life, but only a comma. Romans 6 sheds an even brighter light by bringing in baptism. Have you noticed how I always quote Romans 6 at every funeral as I sprinkle the casket with holy water, a sign of baptism? Paul teaches in Romans 6: “If, then, we have died with Christ [by baptism], we believe that we shall also live with him.” In other words, baptism throws open the doors of Paradise for us believers.

But there are no better words in the whole bible, though, than those that fall from the lips of our Lord, as for instance, in John 6. Jesus assures us: “That everyone who sees the Son and believes in him may have eternal life, and I shall raise him on the last day.” We hear the powerful promise of the only One who did hand-to-hand combat with Death and came out victorious. On the Cross it was not Jesus who died, but rather Death who died, because Jesus is alive and lives forever. The best way to deal with death, therefore, is to incorporate ourselves into Jesus’ own death and resurrection, not just at the end of our natural life, but every day.

Finally, may I suggest one way we should not deal with death, namely, we should not ignore it, or pretend like it is no big deal. Our modern culture has grown increasingly desensitized to death. Whether it is abortion, or euthanasia, or suicide, or mass shootings, or suicide bombers, death feels like no big deal. Perhaps that’s our great Enemy’s ultimate weapon: to make us ignore him or to take him lightly as no enemy at all. That would be the worst way to deal with death because it would make a mockery of our Lord’s saving death on the Cross. It would mean that Christ was crucified for nothing.

How do we deal with death? We can laugh at death, we can cry at death, but please do not ignore death or pretend like he’s no big deal. Why? Because that’s how in the end death wins.

Praised be Jesus Christ!

Passport to Paradise

Seeing the Beatitudes as our passport to paradise

11/01/2019

Matthew 5:1-12A When Jesus saw the crowds, he went up the mountain, and after he had sat down, his disciples came to him. He began to teach them, saying: "Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the Kingdom of heaven. Blessed are they who mourn, for they will be comforted. Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the land. Blessed are they who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be satisfied. Blessed are the merciful, for they will be shown mercy. Blessed are the clean of heart, for they will see God. Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God. Blessed are they who are persecuted for the sake of righteousness, for theirs is the Kingdom of heaven. Blessed are you when they insult you and persecute you and utter every kind of evil against you falsely because of me. Rejoice and be glad, for your reward will be great in heaven."

One of the most valuable pieces of identification you and I possess is our U.S. passport. It is even more valuable than your cell phone because a passport is a lot harder to replace if it gets lost. But do you know when your passport goes from being valuable to being invaluable, that is, when it becomes priceless, worth more than gold? That happens every time when you leave the United States to travel abroad. Occasionally, I’ll take out my passport and thumb through its pages and reminisce and remember the many exotic foreign lands I’ve visited. My passport has been stamped in Honduras, in Frankfurt, Germany, in Rome, Italy, and in New Delhi, India.

The best part of every trip, however, is returning home to this beloved and blessed country. As I stand in line to go through customs and immigration, I see everyone else also holds their passports in their hands. I love to spy at people’s passports and see what countries they come from: some hail from Europe, others from Asia, still others from Africa or South America. I always feel a sense of deep pride as I hold my American passport, and know people are probably checking out what passport I have, and I make sure they can see it. Why am I so proud of this little blue book? On the cover are emblazoned the symbols of our country: an eagle holds arrows of war and an olive branch of peace, thirteen stars stand for the thirteen colonies, and a banner in the eagle’s beak declares in Latin: “E pluribus unum,” meaning, “out of the many, one.”

That little Latin phrase packs a big punch. It not only means out of the original thirteen colonies one country emerged, but it also suggests that out of people from many cultures, languages, ethnicities, backgrounds and histories, one united people emerged. Grade school children are taught the Pledge of Allegiance, and we learn to say: “One nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.” The pride of an entire people is embodied in that little blue book that I hand to the immigration official when it’s finally my turn in line. I cannot suppress a smile when he says, “welcome home, Father Antony.”

In the gospel today, Jesus delivers his timeless Beatitudes, the beginning of his Sermon on the Mount. In a sense, the eight Beatitudes are the oral equivalent of a passport. How so? Well, Jesus promises entry into the Kingdom of Heaven for those whose lives are defined by the Beatitudes, like a passport describes the life of Americans. Notice Jesus is not talking about how to get into the country of Honduras, but rather entry into the Kingdom of Heaven. I love Hamlet’s haunting description of heaven, “the undiscovered country.” The country we came from and to which we long to return. In other words, the Beatitudes is not your typical passport because the country we wish to enter is not your typical country, indeed, it is no country at all, but rather a Kingdom. And in that heavenly Kingdom, the King has instructed his head of Homeland Security, St. Peter, to check people’s papers, their passports, for entry.

What will your passport need to show? It must show how you were poor in spirit, how you were meek, how you mourned, how you hungered for holiness, how you were merciful, how you were clean of heart, how you were a peacemaker, and how you were persecuted for righteousness. Just like everyone standing in line at an international airport makes sure their passport and customs documents are updated and accurate, so too each one of us will one day stand in line to enter the Kingdom of Heaven. Our passport will have eight boxes to check to show we have the credentials to enter that “undiscovered country” of Paradise. The time to prepare our passport for the final leg of our journey home is today, by practicing the eight Beatitudes.

There is another sense in which the Beatitudes can be compared to a U.S. passport, especially today, on the Feast of All Saints. Just like the eagle on the cover of the U.S. passport holds a banner that says “E pluribus unum,” so the Kingdom of Heaven is also made up of people from many ethnicities, languages, cultures, customs and histories, people from all places and from all times. That’s why we read in Revelation 7:9 (our first reading), “After this I had a vision of a great multitude, which no one could count, from every nation, race, people and tongue.” In other words, no other country on earth enjoys the ethnic diversity of the United States of America, and in that sense, this country is a shapshot of the Kingdom of Heaven. To be sure, our country is far from perfect, but when we respect our rich cultural heritage which hails from everywhere, we really hit the heavenly nail on the head.

Let me leave you with the inspiring exhortation found on the second page of the U.S. passport. Most people usually skip over it, but it is insightful and instructive. It reads: “The Secretary of State of the United States of America hereby requests all whom it may concern to permit the citizen/national of the United States named herein to pass without delay or hindrance and in case of need to give all lawful aid and protection. And if you don’t, we will bomb you back to the Stone Age.” Just kidding, I added that last part. So much for being meek and merciful!

In a similar spirit, we can say our King, Jesus Christ, watches over us as we travel abroad – as “strangers and sojourners” in far off lands we read in 2 Peter 2:11 – until we return safely home to the Kingdom of Heaven. The best part of every trip is returning home, especially if you hold a current and accurate passport with all 8 boxes of the Beatitudes checked. I cannot wait to smile when St. Peter says: “Welcome home, Fr. Antony.”

Praised be Jesus Christ!