On not selling your soul

5^th Sunday of Easter

Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP

OLR, NOLA

That phrase – “Love one another” – looks good on a bumper-sticker, or a cross-stitched pillow. We've heard it hundreds of times in homilies and lessons at school. We might even take it seriously and try to live it once and a while. But it's not always clear exactly what our Lord is commanding us to do. Is he commanding us to feel a certain way about everyone? Is he commanding us to express a certain sort of passion? He says, “Love one another as I have loved you.” That last bit – “as I have loved you” – is big qualifier. But even that doesn't do much to make things any clearer. Is he commanding us to die on a Cross for everyone? Why would he command that? He's already sacrificed himself for us. . .once for all. If look back over Jesus' public ministry we can something of what he might mean by this last command. He teaches the truth of the Father's mercy. He preaches the necessity of repentance from sin in order to receive that mercy. He heals the sick, the lame, the blind. He feeds the hungry – both the physically hunger and the spiritually hungry. And he proclaims the Kingdom of God by forgiving sinners. This is how he loves us. And this is how we love one another as he loves us. We preach and teach the truth. We repent and receive mercy. We help for those who need help, and we forgive one another so that the Kingdom may be proclaimed.

Pop quiz: which one of the disciples didn't hear Jesus' last command? Judas. Judas leaves the table, and then Jesus begins, “Now is the Son of Man glorified, and God is glorified in him. . .” Jesus waits until the Betrayer is gone before giving his last lesson in love to his friends. Why? B/c the treasonous disciple cannot bear witness to this truth, meaning, literally, he cannot. Even had he stayed with the others, we could not see it. He does not love the Lord; he does not love his brother disciples. He loves worldly glory and riches. He is blind to the heavenly glory that Christ shows to those who choose to love him. Had he stayed, Judas would not have heard Jesus say, “Love one another.” The ears of a traitor are closed to loyalty and love. And b/c loving one another is a hardship, betrayal come easily to those to who refuse to love. Judas didn't just sell his teacher for a pocketful of silver. He didn't just deny Christ and walk away. From the moment he listened to the offer to betray Christ – he sold his own soul. He sold the Way, the Truth, and the Life. . .and he sold his soul to the Enemy.

Judas refuses Christ's love, allowing the powers of this world to buy his integrity, his strength as a Good Man, as a man of God. He uses his friendship with Jesus to sell our Lord to his enemies. The powers of this world set a hardship for Judas. And he chose the easy work-around, the profitable exit. In other words, he compromises the very thing that made him a man of God, worthy of trust. Judas accommodates himself to the spirit of the age and ends his own life with a noose. We know all too well that the spirit of our own age is busy setting hardships for us. We are tempted to infect the Gospel with false religions. Compromise with secular power for material gain. Accommodate our moral principles for the sake of social standing. Surrender our freedoms in the name of security. And many of us lose our battles with these temptations. Many of us exhaust our strength by resisting. Here's what we need to know now: when we love another as Christ loves us, we have no need for a gospel other than the Gospel of Jesus Christ; when we love one another as Christ loves us, we don't need material gain, social standing, or security from the state. Everything we need is given by God so that we might live wholly in His love. 

 

Judas did not believe this. He thought he needed 30 pieces of silver. So, he died a traitor's death. Christ's love tells the truth; it never compromises or accommodates, nor do those who love one another in Christ. Jesus orders us, “As I [love] you, so you also should love one another.” His Passion and death began when the traitor left the table. Ours begins when we approach this table. . .and dare to share in his last meal.

Follow HancAquam or Subscribe ----->

Be a stinky sheep!

4^th Sunday of Easter

Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP

OLR, NOLA

Being a former farmboy, I am not all that happy about being compared to a sheep. Sheep are dirty. Loud. Stupid. And they stink. When I was in seminary, our preaching and Scripture professors told us to think carefully before we called God's people “sheep.” Is that really the image you want to leave with your parishioners? That they are dirty, loud, stupid, and stinky? If you call yourself a shepherd, then you're the keeper of the sheep; the rustler of the sheep; you poke at them to make them go where you want, and when the time comes, you fleece them! So, maybe the whole sheep/shepherd image is a bit outdated. Unless, of course, you remember that back in Jesus' day sheep were a foundation stone of the economy. They provided just about everything needed to survive. They were cared for almost like a family's children and were protected from lions and wolves. That sheep/shepherd image has two sides. The side Jesus uses this evening is the side that places the sheep well within the family, well within the protection of the Father. He places us – his sheep – in familiar territory, in comfortable reach of food, water, and shelter. He places us – his flock – within reach of his Word.

Jesus says, “My sheep hear my voice; I know them, and they follow me.” How do we explain that some who heard Jesus teach and preach turned away from him? That some openly opposed him? That others started to follow him but abandoned him along the Way? And still others stuck with him almost to the end? Those who have ears to hear will hear and those with eyes to see will see. Those who are most in need of mercy and desirous of it will hear and see the mercy Christ offers to them. The “poor” – those who live lives of spiritual poverty – see the riches Christ offers them. They recognize those riches as theirs, or they don't. They receive those riches, or they don't. IOW, we will choose to follow Christ, or we won't. There is no halfway. If we choose to follow, we follow. We follow behind, stepping where he steps and heading in the same direction at the same pace. If I am running head, or walking off in another direction, or skipping along toward a cliff – I am not following. I can say that I'm following Christ, but I can also say that I'm the 25yo multi-millionaire quarterback of the NOLA Saints. Don't make it so. Jesus says, “My sheep hear my voice; I know them, and they follow me.” If you follow Christ, he knows you. And if he knows you, then you have heard his voice.

To be a follower of the Good Shepherd means that you belong to a flock, a family of individuals who heard the voice of Christ and chose to follow him. We came into an existing family, a long-lived, long-suffering family that's been through every trial and tribulation the Enemy could invent. For over 2,000 years our flock has endured, persevered, rebuilt, struggled, and fought for the faith on just about every continent in every language known to man. And here we are doing it some more! We endure and persevere and rebuild and struggle and fight for the faith b/c we chose to follow the Good Shepherd. We rely on his protection, his strength, his love, his mercy. And we will always have all that we need to carry on. Some will hear and turn away. Others will hear, join us, and leave. Still others will recognize in the voice of Christ – that's me and you – the Father's offer of mercy and stay with us. If you'll forgive the image – they will add their stink to ours and become invaluable sheep. About us and for us, Jesus says, “I give [my sheep] eternal life, and they shall never perish. No one can take them out of my hand.”

Follow HancAquam or Subscribe ----->

No rationing the Spirit!

2nd Week of Easter/St. Athanasius

Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP

NDS, NOLA

In the midst of some horrible situation – final exams, Capstone project due in ten minutes, you've missed your homily tutorial – in the midst these horrible situations, have you found yourself crying out to God, “O Lord! Please help me! I'll pray three rosaries a day for a year; give up coffee for a week; and read all of my assignments next semester if you help me!” This cry from the heart is a cry for grace – divine assistance, and I've no doubt that all of us here have at one time cried out to God in such desperation. We might imagine a distant, mostly indifferent deity wafting around in heaven oblivious to our (mostly) self-inflicted wounds, a deity whose attention we must attract and whose pity we must entice with promises, bargains, and offers of sacrifice. So, we begin. We promise. We bargain. We offer sacrifice. And, inevitably, we slink away in confusion and disappointment when our rich bounty of proffered spiritual loot results in nothing more than a Grand Silence from the heavens. The problem here is this: this is how the pagans pray. John teaches us, “[God the Father] does not ration his gift of the Spirit.” And neither do those who follow His Son.

When we pray, we testify; that is, when we open ourselves to commune with the Divine, we bear witness to the reality of God's presence in our lives, and we manifest the Spirit of God who animates everything we think, say, and do. Because God does not ration His Spirit, His Spirit is freely given in infinite abundance to any and all who will receive Him. There is no promise, no bargain, no sacrifice that is worthy of this gift. There is no created thing that can be offered to Divine Love Himself that equals the generosity of this gift to the believer. The only proper response upon receiving the Spirit is infectious joy, copious praise, and perpetual thanksgiving. To be clear: in receiving the Spirit there is no necessary exchange btw God and His creature. We have nothing to give Him that is not already His. For our sake, we are allowed to speak as though there is an exchange – a way for us to grasp imperfectly the nature of Christ's sacrifice on the Cross. But truly – what we have to give ultimately comes to nothing: our sin, our disobedience, our rebellion. So, when desperate, do not promise or bargain or sacrifice. Instead, receive. Open your heart and mind to the abundance of the Spirit and bear witness in prayer to the Divine Love Who created you, who re-created you in Christ, and who will make you perfect as He Himself is perfect.

Follow HancAquam or Subscribe ----->

Make room for the Cross

Monday of Holy Week

Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP

St D.'s, NOLA

This is a week of “self-emptying” for Christ. Yesterday, he entered Jerusalem to shouts of “Hosanna!” and “Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord!” By Saturday, he will have been betrayed by a friend; arrested, denied, tortured, and nailed to a cross. He will be dead and buried. Yesterday, we heard Paul tell us, that “though he was in the form of God, [Christ] did not regard equality with God something to be grasped. Rather, he emptied himself (ἐκένωσεν). . .” He emptied himself of what? Not his divinity. Not his humanity. We need both for our salvation! Christ emptied himself of all attachments, all sentiments, all worldly weights and anchors. As Mary pours the expensive funereal oil on his feet and as Judas the Betrayer objects to the terrible waste, Jesus begins to die. He lets go of friends, family, disciples, anyone and anything that might allow “this cup to pass” from him. Jesus doesn't cease loving his family and friends in order to let them go. He begins to love them sacrificially. He pours them out so that the Father's will might more perfectly take their place. This is the challenge of Holy Week: detach, pour out, empty yourself so that there is nothing left in you but your desire to be crucified with Christ on Good Friday.

Follow HancAquam or Subscribe ----->

Remember: you asked for his crucifixion

Palm Sunday 2019

Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP

OLR, NOLA

Imagine walking into the French Quarter as thousands of people cheer your name, throw flowers at you, and as you wave, they cry out, “Blessed is the king who comes in the name of the Lord.” IOW, imagine you are Drew Brees and that the Saints won the Superbowl last year. The city, the state, the whole world is yours! Now, imagine just a week later those same people, those same adoring crowds, are cursing you, screaming for your blood, spitting on you, and cheerfully handing you over to the Feds for execution. This isn't a lesson in the vagaries of celebrity, or how we create our heroes in order to destroy them. This isn't any kind of lesson at all. It's history. It's what happened. Jesus entered Jerusalem – exactly as he had told his disciples many times he would – and the people of Jerusalem hailed him as their savior and king. Perhaps the disciples remember at this point that Jesus also told them that he would be betrayed, handed over to his enemies, and executed. That also happened. It's history too. And now we've begun in earnest our inexorable march toward Holy Week and Easter. Come Good Friday, remember Palm Sunday. When we cheer for his crucifixion, remember that we once cheered his kingship. 

 

This week, I challenge you to consider this: our Lord's resolve to die for us on the Cross didn't change b/c we greeted him with joy on Sunday, nor b/c we cheered for his death on Friday. He knew he mission. He knew his goal. And our wish-washy wants made no difference to him. He went to Jerusalem to celebrate the Passover feast. And his earlier prophecies played out exactly like he said they would. Judas betrays him. Peter denies him. Pilate scourges him. And the centurions nail him to the cross. As he prophesied – he dies, willingly, so that we might live and live eternally. Whether we boo or cheer, whether we believe or do not, whether we ask for it or not, Christ Jesus went to Jerusalem and died on a garbage heap for the salvation of the world. Receive this gift with praise and thanksgiving so that when he comes again you will be known and loved as child of the Most High.

Follow HancAquam or Subscribe ----->

When the mob comes -- bear witness!

5^th Week of Lent (F)

Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP

St Dominic, NOLA

A mob – complete with stones – demands that Jesus defend his claim to be the Son of God. His defense: if you can't take my word for it, then look at my works – look at the good that I am doing. If my words and works are not enough. . .well, there's little hope that you will ever come to believe that I am who I say I am. For us, in 2019, coming to know and love Jesus as the Christ can be a sudden revelation – think: St Paul on the road to Damascus – or it can be a long, slow process of growing in familiarity and trust. Being 2,000 years removed from Christ's words and deeds means that we will struggle to know even a little something about Jesus. The point – the point of all of this – is not to know more about Jesus but to come to know him, personally, up close, and in a way we can never forget. The point is to love him so that we might love one another. So that we might be living witnesses to the power of God's mercy. 

 

Jesus gives the mob demanding an answer two options: believe my word or believe my works. Taken together – his words and his works – Jesus clearly and convincingly reveals that he is the Son of God come to offer sinners his Father's boundless mercy. If we have come to believe that he is who he says he is, and if we have accepted baptism for the cleansing of our sins, then we too – by our words and works – reveal the Christ to others. One this last Friday of Lent 2019, how's your witness? We are rapidly moving toward Holy Week and Easter and we need to take account of how and how well we have taken the stand to testify to the Father's great work in our lives. If you leave this evening and find yourself confronted by a stone-wielding mob outside your home, demanding to know who this Christ-fellow is, will you bear witness? Will you – in word and deed – tell them how his sacrificial death on the cross made your salvation possible? Will you tell them that you are a new man, a new woman, remade in the perfect image and likeness of the Crucified Christ? That you have been granted an eternal inheritance, and that you confidently hope in the resurrection of the body at the end of the age? If you are not willing to bear such a witness, you might need to re-do your Lenten pilgrimage! If you are willing, then know this: “the Lord is with [you], like a mighty champion: [your] persecutors will stumble, they will not triumph. In their failure they will be put to utter shame. . .” Your words and works – spoken and done to bear witness to Christ – are spoken and done with Christ. He is with you – with us – always!

Follow HancAquam or Subscribe ----->

Latest Paintings. . .

I haven't posted pics of my paintings in a while. . .

Below of some of the latest:

 Calls into being what does not exist (18x24, acrylic, canvas board)

 Things of the past shall not be remembered (18x24, acrylic, canvas board)

 Do not be afraid, Mary (18x24, acrylic, canvas board) SOLD

Follow HancAquam or Subscribe ----->

Lost??? Get found!

4^th Sunday of Lent (C)

Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP

OLR, NOLA

If you were the older son in this parable, I'm betting you'd be angry too. I'm also betting that if you were the younger son – the Prodigal Son – you'd be overwhelmed with joy to be received back into your family. This parable remains a powerful spiritual lesson after 2,000 years b/c on any given day, each one of us can identify with either the Older Son or the Prodigal Son. We might even identify with both at different times in the same day. Who here hasn't been relieved of the burdens of sin and felt truly grateful? And who here hasn't resented That Sinner Over There being forgiven w/o so much as a slap on the wrist? When TSOT is me, I'm delighted. But when it's someone else – esp. someone who's hurt me – I'm resentful. During Lent, we face our temptations head-on and deny them through our victory with Christ on the cross. The temptation we are confronted with this evening is envy. So, our question is: are you envious of the Father's mercy toward others? Do you resent His generosity in forgiving the sins of others?

The older son is angry b/c his father welcomes back his wastrel of a younger brother. There's a feast of fattened calf. Gifts. Wine. Back-slapping. Tears of joy. Lots of hugging. And no one seems to be paying much attention to the fact that the young man abandoned his family; left the older brother to do his share of the work, and all the while blowing his inheritance on wine and prostitutes. Why is our father celebrating my brother's sins? Why isn't he heaping scorn and abuse on him? Why aren't we all shunning him and making sure that we knows how much we disapprove of his behavior? It doesn't take much for us to put ourselves in the older son's shoes. Other peoples' public sins need to be point out, named as such, and the sinner admonished. Even better: shame the sinner into repenting publicly and then show him/her doing penance. Call this a deterrent to future sin. If we don't see all this Penitent Drama for ourselves, then we really can't say for sure that the sinner has been properly punished, now can we? From the Christian perspective, what's missing here? What is the Older Son missing in his petulant anger? His father answers, “My son, you are here with me always; everything I have is yours. But now we must celebrate and rejoice, because your brother was dead and has come to life again; he was lost and has been found.’” 

 

The father in the parable tells his angry son to celebrate the return of his repentant brother. Our Father in heaven tells us to celebrate the return of our repentant brothers and sisters. Rather than worry about the sin, rejoice that a sinner has come home. Rather than agonize over whether or not forgiveness signals that a sin isn't really a sin, rejoice that a sinner has turned back to the Lord. Rather than be angry that a sinner – even a lately repentant sinner – has finally repented, rejoice that the Father's mercy is freely given to all who ask for it. In other words, if you are going to choose to be a character in this parable, always choose to be either the Prodigal Son or the Forgiving Father. . .never the angry, envious Older Son. Choose to come home, repentant and receive the Father's welcome. Choose to be the one who welcomes the sinner home and throws him/her a party for finding the way once again. Never choose to be the one who out of jealousy and petulance separates himself from his Father by being envious of God's infinite and unfailing generosity. That infinite and unfailing generosity includes you. . .always. As we quickly close on Holy Week and Easter, now is the time to repent of any jealousies, envious thoughts or words, esp. if those thoughts and words begrudge others of the Father's mercy for their sins. Remember what Jesus said to us last week: “Repent, or you will all perish.”

Follow HancAquam or Subscribe ----->

Sin, repentance, & Roto-Rooter

3^rd Sunday of Lent (C)

Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP

OLR, NOLA

We – all of us! – are sinners. And all of us need to repent. That's the Word of God spoken to us this evening. Now, you might respond to this bit of news with a heartfelt, “Duh, Father. Like I don't know that.” Or maybe a less enthusiastic but still sincere, “I'm trying, Father, I really am. Lord, help me!” Or you might choose to push back a little by saying, “Come on, Father. . .the Church got ride of all that Sin and Repentance Stuff years ago. Fire and brimstone is so outdated and offensive.” What you might think but not say is this: “Yeah. I'm a sinner. But I know some people who are a WHOLE LOT worse sinners than me! Compared to THOSE people, I'm a regular Mother Teresa!” Objectively speaking, you're probably right. I doubt anyone here this evening is a serial rapist, a child molester, or a cannibal. I doubt anyone here is secretly worshiping Satan, or planning a terrorist bomb attack on St. Louis Cathedral during the Easter Morning Mass. Nonetheless, the Word of God spoken to us tonight tells us that we are all sinners, and that we all need to repent. My neighbor's greater sins do not diminish my small sins. And my repentance can show him a better way.

You don't have to be a church historian or theologian to know that preaching about sin has become something of a fashion faux-pas in the past few decades. In an effort to bring the Church “up to date,” we've largely abandoned the notion of sin and prefer instead to talk about mistakes, struggles, addictions, or lapses in judgment. All of these things happen, of course, but not all mistakes, struggles, addictions, and lapses in judgment are sinful. Sin is something else entirely. At its root, sin is a deliberately chosen thought, word, or deed that prevents us from receiving God's grace, a conscious decision we make to refuse God's offer to share in His divine life. Large or small, sin blocks the free-flowing graces we could be receiving from the Father. If you need an image, try this one, familiar one: sin is the hairy, gelatinous gunk clogging your spiritual pipes. At baptism you were given the gift of freedom, the grace of redemption, so you – and only you – can freely receive the divine help you need to blow your pipes clean. The first step is recognizing the sin in your life. The next step is repentance, conversion. Jesus warn us, “. . .if you do not repent, you will all perish.”

You might think that our Lord is using scare tactics here, trying to frighten us with tales of eternal fire and torment. He's not. He's simply stating fact. Sin prevents us from receiving God's grace. Sin prevents us from participating in the divine life. If I die outside the divine life, then I live eternally in the same way I live temporally. . .outside the divine life. That's hell. Telling me that I am sinning and need to repent is an act of love not hate or judgment. Imagine a friend is driving at night on I-10 toward Baton Rouge. She calls you to chat. Suddenly, your friend turns off the headlights, crosses the median, and drives a 100mph the wrong way. All the while she's telling you what she's doing. You can hear horns blowing, tires squealing, sirens in the background. What do you say to her? Do you say, “Well, I understand your choice to drive the wrong way on I-10 at 100mph, and I want to affirm you in your decision. If you believe – in good conscience – that these actions will make you happy, then go for it!” NO! Of course, you don't. You beg her to recognize the foolishness of her choices. You tell her that if she continues on her chosen path, she will likely crash and burn. So, you beg her to stop, turn around, and head the right way. Telling her the likely consequences of driving recklessly isn't judgmental. It's an act of love. And Christ has given us the benefits of his supreme act of love – his sacrifice on the cross. 

 

One of the benefits of Christ's sacrifice for us is our ability to recognize sin and repent. The Devil obscures this benefit by tempting us to minimize our sin by comparing it with the sins of others. (You would think your friend insane if she said that her driving the wrong way on I-10 at 100mph at night was OK b/c some guy last week crashed and burned doing the same thing at 120mph). The temptation here is not just to minimize my sin but to call it something other than what it is – a mistake, a lapse in judgment, something I'm struggling with. Call it anything but what it is: a sin. You see, the Devil knows that you don't need to repent when you make a mistake. Mistakes aren't deliberate. Mistakes are just. . .mistakes. So, he tempts you to compare, measure your “mistakes” against the sins of others and conclude that you don't really need to repent. Jesus says that we do. We do need to repent. Or perish. Permanently. 

 

Lent is our time to look deeply and carefully at our lives in Christ. Not through some sort of ghoulish fascination with human failure. Or a legalistic microscope, nit-picking every choice. We can and should exam our lives in Christ with the joy and freedom we have received as heirs to the Kingdom. We all need the free-flowing graces we can only receive from the Father. Unclogging our spiritual pipes can and should be happy work. Think of Lent as your chance to become a Holy Roto-Rooter!

Follow HancAquam or Subscribe ----->

Who or what is your cornerstone?

2^nd Week of Lent (F)

Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP

NDS, NOLA

Here we are at the end of the second week of Lent, and we're reading about tenants and landowners, vineyards and stones. We are also reading about murder and fear – the murder of Christ and the fear of those who are threatened by the truth of his ministry and mission. They hear him say to the crowd, “. . .the Kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a people that will produce its fruit.” They know he's talking about them. And their fear is compounded by his popularity with the crowd. How is this parable suitable for a Friday in Lent? Put yourself among the chief priests and Pharisees and ask yourself: is he also talking about me? Am I among those who will lose the Kingdom of God b/c Christ is not the cornerstone of everything I am, of everything I strive to be? If there's anytime in the liturgical year to ask this question, it's Lent. So ask: who or what grounds and supports my daily life? Who or what gives strength and purpose to everything I am building here at Notre Dame? When everything I am and everything I have is taken away, who or what remains? 

 

Lent is a season for destroying idols, a time for us to count the false gods we worship and un-name them in the name of Christ. We have this time – out and away – so that we can inspect the foundation of our faith, looking for cracks and loose stones. Upon inspection, what do you find? Are you motivated and inspired for ministry by a need for power, prestige, applause? Are you hiding away from a scary world – is the apparent safety and security of the priesthood your cornerstone? Maybe your cornerstone is the chance to set the Church aright, to get out there and fix what you think is broken; to whip us all back into shape with a regular regime of a spiritual diet and religious exercise. Or maybe your cornerstone is a packed schedule, a full calendar – the busyness of being busy. Lent is the time – out and away – to ask: Is Christ your cornerstone? Your ground and support, your strength and your purpose? If not, Lent is the time to receive the grace you've been given and set Him firmly, permanently in place. And b/c we are not yet perfect, we'll need to receive that grace and set that cornerstone daily, hourly for all of the time we have left. By the Lord this will be done. Isn't it wonderful in your eyes?

Follow HancAquam or Subscribe ----->