Classic Conundrums

Solving the riddle of Bible versus Church

12/05/2023

Lk 10:21-24 Jesus rejoiced in the Holy Spirit and said, "I give you praise, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, for although you have hidden these things from the wise and the learned you have revealed them to the childlike. Yes, Father, such has been your gracious will. All things have been handed over to me by my Father. No one knows who the Son is except the Father, and who the Father is except the Son and anyone to whom the Son wishes to reveal him." Turning to the disciples in private he said, "Blessed are the eyes that see what you see. For I say to you, many prophets and kings desired to see what you see, but did not see it, and to hear what you hear, but did not hear it."

Today’s homily will not focus on one of the specific Scripture readings we heard today from Isaiah or Luke. Rather I would like to say a word about the use of Scripture in the Mass, and the importance of the Scripture in the liturgy cannot be exaggerated. You have heard of the classic conundrum of, “which came first, the chicken or the egg?” My vote has always been for the chicken, since in Gn 1:25, it says: “God made every kind of wild animal, [and] every kind of tame animal.”

But there is another classic conundrum that is equally vexing: which came first, the Bible or the Church? Have you heard of this internecine debate? In many ways this conundrum is the cause of the deepest divides between Catholics and Protestants. We are constantly arguing over which came first, and which is most important.

On the one hand, most Catholics would argue the Church came first, citing Mt 16:18, where Jesus declares to Simon Peter: “You are Peter and upon this rock I will build my Church.” That is, first Jesus establishes Peter and the apostolic foundations of his Church, which then later determines the canon, or official list of book of the Bible. Therefore, the Church clearly comes before the Bible.

Protestants, on the other hand, would insist on the primacy of faith before you can have anything resembling a Church. They might point to Rm 10:17, where Paul proclaims: “Faith comes from what is heard.” In other words, first you have the Bible and someone to proclaim and preach it, and thereby planting the seeds of faith in a believer’s heart. Once the seed of faith blossoms in believers, they gather together as a church community. The Bible, therefore, clearly comes before the Church. So, which is really first?

Perhaps one way to bridge this yawning divide is to recognize a third actor on the stage of history, namely, the liturgy, or the Mass, or the Eucharist. And I would suggest to you that even before there was an organized Church, or a complete Bible, there was the liturgy. At the Last Supper, for example in Lk 22:19, Jesus says: “This is my body, which will be given for you, do this in memory of me.”

Jesus did not say, “Write this in memory of me,” nor did he say, “Call a church council in memory of me,” he said, “Do this in memory of me." And that is exactly what they did in Lk 24, and in Acts 2:42, and later in Acts 20:7, in the “Breaking of the Bread.” In other words, that phrase, “the breaking of the bread” is a pregnant phrase because it not only refers to the liturgy or the Lord’s Supper, but also means the Mass gave birth to both the Church and the Bible. How so?

On April 17, 2003, Pope St. John Paul II wrote an encyclical called Ecclesia de Eucharistia (the Church from the Eucharist), in which he stated forcefully: “The Church was born of the paschal mystery. For this very reason the Eucharist, which is in an outstanding way the sacrament of the paschal mystery, stands at the center of the Church’s life” (no. 3). That is, the Mass gives birth to the Church and constantly nourishes her. So, to answer the question, which came first, the Bible or the Church?, the pope (and I) would answer: neither came first. The liturgy came first and gave birth to both.

We also see the indispensable role of the liturgy in the formation and eventually canonization of the Bible. That is, how the liturgy gave birth to the Bible. In the year 393 at the Council of Hippo in northern Africa, under the towering leadership of St. Augustine, the Church first codified the 73 books of the Bible. But how did St. Augustine and his brother bishops know to pick these particular 73, and not other holy and wise books floating around in the first few centuries?

After all, there was the Gospel of Thomas, the Apocalypse of Peter, the book of Jubilees, the Epistle of Barnabas, the Shepherd of Hermas that didn't make the cut. How did Augustine and the other bishops in 393 know to select Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, Acts, Romans, 1 and 2 Corinthians, and the rest of the New Testament rather than these other holy writings? Because these 27 book of the New Testament, as well as the 46 books of the Old Testament, were faithfully and consistently read whenever the Christians gathered for “the breaking of the bread.”

In other words, it was the uninterrupted use of these books in the Eucharistic liturgy that was the litmus test of which books were truly inspired by the Holy Spirit. That answers which books should be in the Bible. Which came first, the Bible or the Church? Neither did, but rather the liturgy came first. Why? Because Jesus said, “Do this in memory of me,” and everything else came later.

Praised be Jesus Christ!

 

Let’s Go to War

Understanding the motif of the Church Militant

12/04/2023

Mt 8:5-11 When Jesus entered Capernaum, a centurion approached him and appealed to him, saying, "Lord, my servant is lying at home paralyzed, suffering dreadfully." He said to him, "I will come and cure him." The centurion said in reply, "Lord, I am not worthy to have you enter under my roof; only say the word and my servant will be healed. For I too am a man subject to authority, with soldiers subject to me. And I say to one, 'Go,' and he goes; and to another, 'Come here,' and he comes; and to my slave, 'Do this,' and he does it." When Jesus heard this, he was amazed and said to those following him, "Amen, I say to you, in no one in Israel have I found such faith. I say to you, many will come from the east and the west, and will recline with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob at the banquet in the Kingdom of heaven."

One of the less familiar motifs (images) for the Church in Scripture is an army. We hear about the Church as the Chosen People in the Old Testament, or she is referred to as the Bride of Christ or the Body of Christ in the New Testament. But there is also the subtle analogy of an army that can help us to understand the nature of the Church we belong to.

I sometimes use the analogy of an army to explain what religious orders are, like the Franciscans, Jesuits, or Carmelites. Just like we have a large standing army in our country that fights our wars, with ranks of private, sergeant, captain, and general, so the Church is organized as a spiritual army of battalions of dioceses with the ranks of deacon, priest, monsignor, bishop, cardinal, and pope to engage in spiritual warfare.

But in addition to the army, our military also has special forces: Marine Commandoes, Army Rangers, and Navy Seals. They are smaller units or teams that have a specific purpose and they are the best in that field. Similarly, religious orders are like our spiritual special forces, who focus on one area of ministry or mission – the poor, or education, or health care, etc. So, when we envision the Church as a military, we can make more sense out of her different religious officers and religious orders.

In the gospel today, it is a centurion, a military man, who catches the nature of the Church, and whose faith impresses Jesus deeply. He says: “Lord, I am not worthy to have you come under my roof, only say the word and my servant will be healed.” And how does he know that will happen? He continues: “For I too am a man subject to authority, with soldiers subject to me. And I say to one, ‘Go,’ and he goes, and to another, ‘Come here,’ and he comes.”

And how does Jesus react? We read further: “When Jesus heard this, he was amazed and said to those following him, ‘Amen, I say to you, in no one in Israel have I found such faith’.” Wow, that’s a lot of faith since his apostles must have heard that comment and wondered how little their faith must be. In other words, this military motif of the Church is not unimportant or inconsequential; it gets to the heart of the identity and purpose of the Church.

Have you heard of the three states of the Church? That is, the whole Church is not only comprised of the roughly one billion Catholics on earth that we can see. It also includes those in Purgatory, as well as the countless multitudes in heavenly glory, all those we cannot see. Traditionally, the first state of those on earth was called the Church Militant, those in Purgatory the Church Suffering, and those in heaven, the Church Triumphant. But notice the terminology of the Church Militant, or military: that was exactly how the Centurion in the gospel understood the Church, and Jesus was impressed with his faith.

But if we are a military Church, we should have an enemy to fight, otherwise, we do not need an army. In the past some Church leaders mistakenly believed that we were at war with the Protestants, or with the Muslims, or with the Orthodox, or more recently with the atheists who deny God and religion. But our true enemies are not others, but rather the enemy within, our own weaknesses and vices. As the famous Pogo cartoon strip said, “We have met the enemy, and the enemy is us.”

That is why the Centurion’s faith in the Church Militant has to be balanced with Isaiah’s prophecy in the first reading. Isaiah said: “They shall beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks.” That is, the sword should not be raise against others, but against oneself. In other words, yes, the analogy of an army for the Church is accurate, but we have to identify the real enemy we are fighting, and he is looking back at us in the mirror. “We have met the enemy, and the enemy is us.” Let’s go to war.

Praised be Jesus Christ!

 

Follow the Poop

Seeing how our trash can become a treasure

12/03/2023

MK 13:33-37 Jesus said to his disciples: “Be watchful! Be alert! You do not know when the time will come. It is like a man traveling abroad. He leaves home and places his servants in charge, each with his own work, and orders the gatekeeper to be on the watch. Watch, therefore; you do not know when the lord of the house is coming, whether in the evening, or at midnight, or at cockcrow, or in the morning. May he not come suddenly and find you sleeping. What I say to you, I say to all: ‘Watch!’”

Last week a friend shared something about shepherds and sheep that I never knew. She said that when a sheep wanders off and gets lost a wise shepherd does not follow its tracks to find it. Do you know what he looks for? The sheep’s poop! Sorry to talk about that in church, but apparently sheep have very distinctive poop, and so if you want to find a specific sheep, look for his specific poop! As you know I have a dog named Apollo. And every time we go for a walk and he poops, I call that “true confessions.” Why? Well because sometimes he is sneaky and tries to hide things he should not eat, but the poop does not lie!

Now, all living organisms create waste, even whole communities do, called garbage. Garbage is the poop of a whole city. Back in high school a teacher posed this problem to my class. Imagine the world 2,000 years from now, there has been a great war, and this country is in ruins and rubble. If some aliens came to earth and wanted to study our civilization, where would be the best place to start?

One students said, “Go to the mall!” Another chimed in with, “Go to the grocery stores!” And Fr. Greg Luyet, who was a classmate of mine, said, “Go to the churches!” All those were good answers. But the best place to study a community would be in its trash dump. Why? Because all our trash and waste is what we truly bought, ate, and consumed. You see, our trash is the poop of our whole community, and it shows who we realy are: trash is our true confessions.

Today is the first Sunday of Advent, and we enter the holy season of waiting, and watching. So Jesus urges his disciples in the gospel today: “What I say to you, I say to all, ‘Watch!’” But what should we be watching for? Well, clearly we watch for the coming of the Lord. And where do we find him? Notice he is not born in a dignified inn or a clean hospital, but in a stable, surrounded by dirty animals. It was outside the civilized area, close to where people threw their trash.

And do you remember where Jesus would be crucified and die? Again, outside the city, on Golgotha, an area that was the garbage dump of Jerusalem. In other words, the best way to watch during Advent means looking in the most unlikely and unpleasant places – like a trash dump – where the Shepherd draws close to his sheep, where he was born and died. It’s like that old saying: “One man’s trash is another man’s treasure.” In the trash of Jerusalem, we would find the treasure of Jesus.

My friends, let me suggest three ways we can watch how Jesus draws near to us, and it happens during the tragic and trash-like places of our lives. In other words, the garbage, the poop, is not only where the sheep find the Shepherd, but also where the Shepherd finds his sheep. First, no one likes to go to the hospital, especially if you’re the patient! But often when I go to anoint someone at the hospital, they are so happy to see a priest and receive the Anointing of the Sick. Why? Because illness and death pry open our eyes to the coming of the Lord. We long for the Lord when we are sick or suffering like in Advent.

A second moment of watching for Christ’s coming is through our tears and troubles, especially in confession. Now no one likes to cry, right, because we don’t look very pretty: snot and makeup running everywhere. We are showing someone else our naked heart. But whenever someone sheds tears in my office while talking to me, I always thank them. Why? Because tears mean they trust me enough to share the trash of their sin that they hide from the rest of the world. I am amazed how the trash of sin can become a treasure of mercy.

And a third suggestion of watching for Jesus is in the poor and the homeless. And I have to tell you, we gets lots of chances to do that being a downtown church. We have people who spend the night on the church steps and Apollo and I wake them up when we open the church. We see people who come in to Mass, who clearly are not Catholic, but just want to get out of the cold and warm up. One time a guy spent the night in the confessional. Heck, the homeless come to Mass and confession more than some Catholics do.

Recently I have started to stop and talk to these folks. That is, instead of money, I give them my time, and listen to their stories. They welcome someone to talk to. Loneliness can be colder than sub-freezing temperatures. I have to admit I used to be kind of scared of the homeless – some people might call them the trash, the riff-raff, of our society – but if we watch them closely this Advent, we may see Jesus in them, like Mother Teresa always did. In the trash of our society, we will find the treasure of our Savior, like when he first came.

Folks, I know we would all rather watch for Jesus’ coming in a beautiful, Gothic church, filled with garland, glittering lights and poinsettias, and singing “O Come, O Come Emmanuel.” Or we would like to watch for Jesus seeing all the homes lit up with glimmering lights and decorated with snowmen, Santa, and reindeer. And all those are good places to watch for Jesus.

But the best way to watch for the Shepherd drawing near is in our illness and crosses, our tears and troubles, and in the homeless and outcast. It was in the garbage dump that the sheep first found the Shepherd 2000 years ago. And it is in the trash-like moments in our lives that the Shepherd finds his sheep today. Because a good Shepherd find the lost sheep by following its poop.

Praised be Jesus Christ!

 

Stealing Lollipops

Seeing how Satan is always plagiarizing God

12/2/2023

Dn 7:2-14 In a vision I, Daniel, saw during the night, the four winds of heaven stirred up the great sea, from which emerged four immense beasts, each different from the others. The first was like a lion, but with eagle's wings. While I watched, the wings were plucked; it was raised from the ground to stand on two feet like a man, and given a human mind. The second was like a bear; it was raised up on one side, and among the teeth in its mouth were three tusks. It was given the order, "Up, devour much flesh." After this I looked and saw another beast, like a leopard; on its back were four wings like those of a bird, and it had four heads. To this beast dominion was given. After this, in the visions of the night I saw the fourth beast, different from all the others, terrifying, horrible, and of extraordinary strength; it had great iron teeth with which it devoured and crushed, and what was left it trampled with its feet.

One of my all-time favorite movies is “Hunt for Red October.” There is a little known scene when the president’s national security advisor is talking to Jack Ryan, the hero. In a very honest moment, the National Security Advisor admits: “Listen, I’m a politician, which means I am a cheat and a liar. And when I’m not kissing babies, I am stealing their lollipops.”

Now, to be sure I know lots of honorable and virtuous politicians, so not all politicians are a corrupt as the one in the movie. But it’s a real tragedy when a politician goes bad because we rightly expect more from our elected officials. We don’t want just good policies, we want good people in office.

Have you heard of the old Latin maxim, “Corruptio optimi pessima”? It means “the corruption of the best becomes the worst.” Or sometimes we say, “The higher they climb, the harder they fall.” For example, when a pope goes bad he doesn’t just go a little bad, he causes the Protestant Reformation.  When the highest angel Lucifer falls he doesn’t become some second-rate demon, he becomes the Prince of Demons.

And one of the ways Satan shows his corrupted nature is that he has no capital of his own, like the National Security Advisor said, he has to “steal lollipops.” In other words, all Satan can ever do is “steal” what God creates and distort its original beauty and goodness. The Devil never does anything original; he is a born plagiarist, a copy-cat.

In the first reading today we see Satan sort of “stealing lollipops” and plagiarizing God’s perfect creation. In Daniel 7 we hear of four evil beasts that come out of the sea. They take the form of a lion, a man, a bear, and a leopard. But these four earthly creatures are only cheap imitations of the four living creatures that Ezekiel sees in heaven. In Ezekiel 1:10, the prophet describes the four living creatures as a lion, a man, an ox, and an eagle.

In the New Testament, these four symbolic creatures would represent the four Gospels: the lion for St. Mark, the man for St. Matthew, the ox for St. Luke, and the eagle for St. John. In other words, all the Devil ever does is take God’s original masterpieces and duplicates and defaces them like graffiti on the Mona Lisa. He has not capital or currency of his own: “he’s a cheat and a liar, and when he’s not kissing babies, he’s stealing their lollipops.” The Devil doesn’t have his own lollipops.

Let me give you some modern examples of how all Satan can do is “steal” when he wants to commit sacrilege. Have you heard of the so-called “Black Mass”? It is a mockery of a Catholic Mass by mimicking the words and gestures of a priest but giving them diabolical meanings. But notice Satan does not “create” his own liturgy, he has to plagiarize God’s perfect Eucharist.

And a little more subtle stealing is when Satan tempts someone to get drunk and become an alcoholic, which is a mockery and mimicry of receiving the Precious Blood in the form of wine at Mass. Corruptio optimi, pessima: the corruption of the best – the Eucharist – becomes the worst that Satan can do.

This same kind of stealing of lollipops happens in sexual sins. How so? What sacred action if being copies and caricatured – blown out of proper proportion – in all sexual sins, like pornography, adultery, sex before marriage? The holiness of Marriage, which is consummated by the sexual relations of a husband and wife on their honeymoon. Is sexual sins we act like the four evil beasts of Daniel 7 rather than the four living creatures of Ezekiel 1, that is, we take what is holy and make it hideous. All Satan can do is “steal lollipops” because he has none of his own.

Here is another sacrament that Satan tries to sabotage, namely, confession. How does he corrupt the best here? Well, in confession we tell our deepest, darkest secrets to a priest. And every priest is bound under pain of excommunication to guard the seal of the confessional. That means we have to take everything we hear to the grave. And by the way that is pretty easy because men forget everything we hear.

And that is the real reason women cannot become priests: because you would remember everything you hear in confession. And how does Satan make a mockery of the seal of the confessional? Through the sin of gossip and slander, where we take other people’s secrets – which they might confide to us like a confession – and we broadcast them to the world. Satan never does anything original; he’s a plagiarist through and through.

My friends, remember the Latin phrase, “corruptio optimi pessima.” It doesn’t just refer to politicians and popes. It also refers to Satan, who always takes the best and tries to make it the worst. That is what is does because that is what he is: the greatest angel who became the worst devil. Satan is always just “stealing lollipops.”

Praised be Jesus Christ!

Hindsight is 20/20

Seeing today in light of the end of the world

11/26/2023

Mt 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 the least brothers of mine, you did for me.'

There is an old saying that hindsight is 20-20. Do you know what that means? It means that when you are at the end of the road looking back, you see the path you should have taken more clearly. For example, when you are in college, you know what you should have focused on back in high school. I should have paid attention in algebra and anatomy instead of sleeping. After you have been working for 5 years you realize what you should have majored in back in college, business or engineering not philosophy like me!

By the way, I actually used hindsight as teenager to help me figure out I should become a Catholic priest. How so? I tried to imagine myself as two different 80 year old men. First, I tried to visualize myself as a retired CEO of Walmart, having been married to Sandra Bullock for 50 years, and we had 10 children and 40 grandchildren. And I asked my 80-year-old self, “If I had a chance to do it again, is this the life I would have chosen?” And I tried to feel in my heart either peace and joy or regret and sadness, and that feeling would indicate the right choice. At the end I know how I should live.

Then I switched scenarios and saw myself now as a retired 80-year-old monsignor, oh, let’s say bishop, what the heck, let’s make it an archbishop! I am retired and living as a chaplain for a cloister of Carmelite nuns. And I ask myself: do I feel any regrets?  That is, if I could live this life over, is this priestly path the one I would have chosen? And listening to my heart I can either feel peace and joy or sadness and regret. I bet you can guess which 80-year-old man felt peace and joy. In other words, hindsight is 20/20, when we are at the end and looking back, things become clearer.

Today is the last Sunday of Ordinary Time, and really the last Sunday of the whole liturgical calendar. It is kind of like the December 31 of the secular calendar. We are at the end of the year and so we can now look back. It is also the solemnity of Christ the King. That is, if you really want the 20/20 vision of hindsight, don’t stop at your 80th birthday (like I did), but go all the way to the end of time. And what do we see there? Not me as a CEO or an archbishop, but Jesus Christ enthroned as King and coming back to judge the nations (me and you). In other words, the end of the liturgical year sort of catapults us to the end of all years, that is, to the end of time.

It is so interesting how the gospel of Matthew shows Jesus creating two scenarios like I did for myself to help us harness this hindsight of faith. For instance, in one scenario we are like “sheep” who help the poor, imprisoned, the naked, the sick. In the second scenario we are like goats who ignore the sick, imprisoned, and naked. Jesus’ parable makes it pretty easy to know which life – that of the sheep or goats – leads to peace and joy rather than regret and sadness. Again, notice the dynamic at work in Jesus’ words: the clear 20/20 vision of hindsight. When we are at the end – at the real end – and look back, suddenly things become crystal clear.

Another way that hindsight can help us is not to exaggerate our problems and pains. Have you heard of something called “first world problems”? Those are things like, “Oh, I cannot believe I broke a nail!” or “Gosh, our flight was delayed two hours!” or “Can you believe the waiter brought me a dirty martini, when I clearly said I wanted the dirty on the side???” Or, “My dad won’t let me play videogames until after I finish my homework!!” Or, “I can’t understand the priest’s foreign accent!” Or, “You expect me to give up deer hunting to go to Mass on Sunday?!”

These are not problems people in the “third world countries face, who are like the people Jesus describes in need: the hungry, the naked, the strangers, the imprisoned, etc. In other words, our first world problems make us start acting more like the goats rather than the sheep, who are focused more on helping others rather than what hurts them. When we try to think of what the end of time will be like –separating the sheep and the goats – we can ignore our first world problems and start helping people with their third world problem. Hindsight help us see which who has the real problems.

My friends, from Thanksgiving until Christmas we enter the crazy season – the mad dash to shop for gifts, decorate home and hearth, make it to as many parties as possible, getting Christmas cards out on time, and look as adorable as Santa Claus and Mrs. Claus every time we step out of the house. And all this is good and part of the seasons. But when the Christmas season makes us lose our joy and peace, we start to feel more like the Grinch: anxious, angry, and depressed, perhaps a little hindsight can come to the rescue. Am I behaving like a sheep (helping others) or a goat (worried about myself)?

Instead of hurrying and scurrying about this holy season, take time to sit quietly and pray and ponder the great mystery we are awaiting: the birthday of our Savior. In order to do that, you will have to miss a party or two, or not get your cards out in time this year, or you might not get the tree you really wanted this year. But what of any of this will matter in the end? The answer: the only thing that will matter is the birthday of Jesus, the Incarnation, and the lesson to help our neighbor like a sheep. Heck, you might even think it’s a good idea to become a priest.

Praised be Jesus Christ!

Follow the Breadcrumbs

Learning how important marriage is in Christianity

11/25/2023

Lk 20:27-40 Some Sadducees, those who deny that there is a resurrection, came forward and put this question to Jesus, saying, "Teacher, Moses wrote for us, If someone's brother dies leaving a wife but no child, his brother must take the wife and raise up descendants for his brother. Now there were seven brothers; the first married a woman but died childless. Then the second and the third married her, and likewise all the seven died childless. Finally the woman also died. Now at the resurrection whose wife will that woman be? For all seven had been married to her." Jesus said to them, "The children of this age marry and remarry; but those who are deemed worthy to attain to the coming age and to the resurrection of the dead neither marry nor are given in marriage. They can no longer die, for they are like angels; and they are the children of God because they are the ones who will rise.

It is no exaggeration to say that if we get marriage wrong, we get virtually everything else wrong in the Catholic religion. If we can’t quite nail it when it comes to marriage, we sort of blow it when it comes to the rest of Christianity. That sounds like an exaggeration, but it is not. There is something fundamental and foundational about marriage that kind of opens up the whole of Christianity, or else it remains a closed book.

In a sense marriage is like the breadcrumbs that lead us not only back to the Garden of Eden, but also forward into heaven and paradise. Marriage is not only something that happens on earth, but it also gives us a clue as to what it was like in the Garden of Eden, and if we follow marriage like breadcrumbs we end up back in the Garden with Adam and Eve.

There is a beautiful line in the Nuptial Blessing, that long blessing that a priest gives a couple on their wedding day. It says that marriage is that one blessing that was not forfeited by original sin or washed away by the flood. What that means is that there was one sacrament that existed in Eden. Adam and Eve were married. Gn 2:24 refers to marriage: “A man will leave his father and mother and cling to his wife and the two shall become one flesh.”

Notice how Adam and Eve did not get baptized, nor did they receive First Communion, nor go to Confession or receive Confirmation, or the Anointing of the Sick. But there is one sacrament they received, namely, marriage. So marriage in a sense is like breadcrumbs which if we follow it, leads us back to the Garden of Eden.

But marriage is also breadcrumbs that lead us forward into paradise and heaven, because that is the one sacrament that will be there in heaven, too. There we will not need any other sacraments: no one will be baptized in heaven, nor go to confession, or receive Holy Communion, or receive the Anointing of the Sick. But everyone will be married in heaven.

Even though Jesus says in today’s gospel from Luke 20 when we get to heaven there will neither be marriage, nor being given in marriage. Nonetheless, there is a marriage in heaven, a mystical, eternal, spiritual, supernatural marriage. The whole Church, which is the Bride of Christ, will be married to her spouse Jesus.

That is exactly why the Sadducees get marriage wrong. They are still thinking very narrowly about earthly marriage. You marry a guy, you don’t have any kids, so you marry is little brother, again no kids, and marry his little brother. When they all die and get to heaven, whose wife is she going to be? Maybe you have thought the same thing: if someone marries after their spouse dies, who do you pick as your spouse in heaven? That is a very earthly way of thinking and also very mistaken.

But if we get marriage right, as Jesus and the Bible teach us, and we follow the breadcrumbs of that marriage, we can get both to paradise and back to Eden, and surprisingly you find a marriage in both places. And so there will be a kind of marriage in heaven, between the whole Church, which is the Bride of Christ, and Jesus, the Bridegroom.

And this, by the way, is the whole reason why priests and nuns do not get married. We are waiting for that eternal marriage. It is not that we don’t want to get married at all, but rather, just not now. We are willing to wait for the best Spouse, and we will be married in heaven, and so will everyone else who gets to heaven.

This is why it is so important to get marriage right, and not monkey with it. That is what we are doing in our modern culture talking about silly things like same-sex marriage. That is getting marriage wrong. Consequently, we lose the breadcrumbs, and we cannot get back to Eden. Such thinking makes us foolish like the Sadducees, and we cannot get up to heaven. We lose our way.

This is why the Church is so insistent about what marriage is and what it isn’t. Marriage is our ticket home, so don’t tear up the ticket! Two or three times a week I sit down at my computer and work on annulments. I am looking for ways to help people annul their previous marriage, so they can get married to someone else, and have that marriage blessed in the Church.

And there is a very important pastoral purpose for that: to help people return to the sacraments. But there is also a kind of downside, a negative, to that, namely, we are eroding our understanding of marriage. What is marriage? And when we get it wrong, we lose our way. We don’t know where we came from in Eden, and we don’t know where we are going to in heaven. Marriage is our ticket.

Finally, this is why Pope St. John Paul II called marriage the “primordial sacrament.” And by that I think he meant that marriage is the breadcrumbs because marriage was present in some mysterious, mystical way with Adam and Eve in Eden, and marriage will be present in some mysterious, mystical way in heaven. And that is why we have to get marriage right.

Praised be Jesus Christ!

The Hushers

Thanking God for seven special book of the Old Testament

11/23/2023

Sir 50:22-24 And now, bless the God of all, who has done wondrous things on earth; Who fosters people’s growth from their mother’s womb, and fashions them according to his will! May he grant you joy of heart and may peace abide among you; May his goodness toward us endure in Israel to deliver us in our days.

Here is a little joke about little kids in church. Six-year-old Angie and her four-year-old brother, Joel, were sitting together in church. Joel giggled, sang, and talked out loud. Finally, his big sister had had enough of his antics. She warned him, “You’re not supposed to talk out loud in church.” Joel answered: “Why not? Who is going to stop me?” Angie pointed to the back of church, and said, “See those two men standing by the door? They are hushers.” You know, I wish our hushers would do a better job of hushing people like they do in Angie’s church. Just kidding, I love our ushers!

Today is Thanksgiving Day, and we have so much to be thankful for: our family, our friends, and our freedoms, especially our religious freedom. What a blessing to be able to go to Mass every day, especially Sundays and Holy Days, not out of a sense of obligation but joyfully because we are free to do so. Why is that important?

Well, just like with so many other things in life, if we don’t use it, we lost it. You know, when I was a little kid and living in New Delhi, India, I spoke Hindi fluently. But since I came to the US I never used it again, and so I don’t know a word of it today. And I am so sad about that, what a loss. So, it’s good we celebrate Thanksgiving every year to remember our many blessings, not take them for granted, and lose them because we fail to use them.

But as Roman Catholics we have seven blessings that our Protestant brothers and sisters do not, namely, seven books in the Bible that were removed from the King James Version. Now, I do not say any of this to be critical of other Christians but only to be grateful for what we have and not take our blessings for granted, especially the Sacred Scriptures.

These seven books are all in the Old Testament; so all Christians have the same 27 books in our New Testament. In other words, while Protestant Bible have 39 books in their Old Testament, Catholic Bibles have 46 books. I suppose that if one of those disputed books were read aloud in a Protestant church, the hushers would have to hush them, “Shhh!”

But in the Catholic church we are more like little Joel, and we giggle, sing, and talk out loud discussing these seven disputed books in the Old Testament. So, in an effort not to take our Sacred Scriptures for granted, I want to explain (1) what these seven books are and (2) how they came to be in the Catholic Bibles but not in the Protestant ones.

But gratitude is not just an attitude; it must lead to action. That is, we shouldn’t take these precious books for granted but read, study, and even memorize them. How wonderful, then, our first reading today was from Sirach, one of those disputed books, and that is why our hushers did not tell the lector to “Shhh!” when he read it.

A couple of years ago I was driving around in my car and came up with a mnemonic device to help me remember these seven books. It is a sentence in which the first letter of each word stands for one of those seven books. It goes like this: “The wise Jews slipped banishing 1 and 2 Mac and cheese.” I know that sounds a little silly, but that is why you will remember it.

So, what are those seven special books? “The” stands for “Tobit”, “Wise” is for “Wisdom”, “Jews” means “Judith”, “Banishing” is for “Baruch”, and 1 and 2 Mac and cheese” is for “1 and 2 Maccabees.” Can you remember that sentence now: “The wise Jews slipped banishing 1 and 2 mac and cheese”?

That catchy sentence also gives us a clue to how these seven books came to be in one Old Testament and not in the other. How so? Well, around the year 300-200 B.C. (so before Jesus) the Jews had developed both a Hebrew version and a Greek version of the Old Testament, like we have English and Spanish translations of the Bible today. By the time of Jesus, his disciples, and the early Church, the Greek version is what was commonly used by all Christians.

These Greek versions contained those seven disputed books, while the Hebrew versions did not. Therefore, for 1,500 years all Christians unanimously accepted these Greek version of the Old Testament – with all 46 books of the Old Testament – until Martin Luther decided we needed to start using the Hebrew version instead with only the 39 books. And ever since then hushers in Protestant churches have hushed people when the read from Tobit, Wisdom, Judith, Sirach, Baruch, and 1 and 2 Maccabees.

Folks, I am sorry to give you a Scripture study class on Thanksgiving Day. I know you just want to get back home and stuff your face with turkey and watch football till you can’t see straight. And that is all good. But today is also the day for counting our blessings, like family, friends, freedom, and yes, football.

But don’t forget to include faith in that long list, and especially our precious Christian family heirloom called the Sacred Scriptures, and also mention the seven special books in the Old Testament. Like with all our other talents, gifts, and blessings: if we don’t use it, we lose it, like back back in the day when I used to speak Hindi fluently.

Praised be Jesus Christ!