Yes? or No?

4^th Week of Easter (W)

Fr. Philip Neri Powell OP

St. Albert the Great, Irving

So far this week, we've heard Jesus say that his is the only name given for the salvation of the human race. That he is the Good Shepherd and the only gate to the sheepfold. That his work is the Father's work and those given to him by the Father will never be lost. And this morning, he says, “...what I say, I say as the Father told me.” Setting aside for the moment the sheer, unadulterated audacity of these claims, setting aside their clarity and exclusivity – what motivates these claims? Why is Jesus saying these things in public? He has to know he's drawing the attention of some powerful people. He has to know that he's playing with political and religious hand grenades. He's stirring an already boiling pot, and he seems to be doing it with a great sense of peace. So, why is he doing it? The answer, I think, lies in a part of John's gospel that didn't make it into the lectionary. The passage immediately before today's passage: “...many, even among the authorities, believed in him, but because of the Pharisees they did not acknowledge it openly in order not to be expelled from the synagogue. For they preferred human praise to the glory of God.”

The clear, audacious, and exclusive claims we've heard this week – that Christ Jesus is the only salvation – force a stark choice on his audience: believe in me, or do not. There's no hiding in ambiguity; no skirting around the issue with clever philosophical dodges; no “well, what he really meant to say is. . .” It's yes, or it's no. Jesus knows the stakes at play. He knows that his mission isn't to create a vibrant community of sensible, moral people who like one another (more or less) and who get together once a week to sing happy songs and recall fond memories of his good deeds. His mission is to establish a living, breathing body of emboldened witnesses who will go out into the world and – if necessary – die, spreading the Good News of the Father's love of and mercy to sinners. This is not a mission founded on carefully parsed verbiage calibrated to appeal to the comfortable and the secure. It's a mission calculated to sting the world and draw attention. A mission to sear the conscience and demand a commitment. Yes or no. We see clearly the answer he himself gave [point to crucifix]. The rest of your life is your answer. Yes? Or no?    

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There's a temptation through that gate

4^th Week of Easter (M)

Fr. Philip Neri Powell OP

St. Albert the Great, Irving

Yesterday we heard Jesus say that his is the only name under heaven given for the salvation of the human race. This morning we hear him say, “I am the gate. Whoever enters through me will be saved...” Given that we are well-catechized and faithful Catholics, our reaction to these truths is something like: “Yeah. And?” But back in his day such claims were beyond heresy, beyond blasphemy. No mere man could be I Am Who Am, Creator of the universe and Savior of the People. Flesh and bone could not contain the voice that spoke to Abraham, Moses, and the Prophets. It was sacrilege to say otherwise. Nowadays, it seems heretical, blasphemous, and sacrilegious to proclaim that the Christ is the only name given for our salvation. That he is the sheep gate through which we enter the fold. Religious thought and practice is so diverse, so varied that we can't possibly say there is only one way to get to heaven. To be considered tolerant and thus cosmopolitan, we are told that we must instead think of God, heaven, and salvation as a mountain upon which there are many paths leading to the top. All paths are equally good, true, and beautiful. Choose a path and walk it with integrity.

But Jesus says, “...whoever does not enter a sheepfold through the gate but climbs over elsewhere is a thief and a robber.” Saying that sort of thing out loud won't get you invited to the best cocktail parties. But say it we must. The truth is always pastoral. Lying is never an option for a faithful witness. We should though consider why some might want us to deny Christ's claim to exclusive ownership of the keys of heaven. There's the practical: what about the billions of people who are not Christian? What happens to them? There's the religious: the pre-Christian religions prefigured Christ, so can't we say that Christ is prefiguring something beyond himself? There's the philosophical: since we are always learning, always unveiling truth, is it possible that there are new truths waiting to be revealed? And there's a dozen other categories that object to the exclusivity of Christ's claim. But I think there's one objection that we need to take more seriously than any of the others. Isn't such a claim – that Christ if the only means of salvation – a temptation for Christians to become arrogant, prideful, and maybe even bullying about their status as Christ's sheep? Yes, yes it is.

And we've seen this temptation victorious over the Church many times through the centuries. Combining worldly power, wealth, and arrogance has led us too many times to conclude that as Christ's sheep we are just better than Those People and therefore justified in dominating them, exploiting them. This is not the Gospel. Christ freely offers salvation to those who will repent, believe, follow his commands, and bear witness. He makes all this possible by gracing us with all that we need to see and hear his Good News. Our job as his followers is to show the world the concrete effects of being his followers. Freedom from sin. Freedom from eternal death. Freedom from anxiety and worry. We are to be the signs and wonders of his joy, his love, his mercy. There is no room in us for arrogance or pride. What little room our joy leaves us is filled with praise and thanksgiving for being given our freedom. Given our freedom. Not earned. Not bargained for. Given. We've done nothing to deserve our salvation. So what could we possibly be arrogant or prideful about? Christ is the only name given for our salvation. He is the only way into the fold. Ask yourself: am I holding the gate open, or locking it behind me? 

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How to be a better sheep

4^th Sunday of Easter

Fr. Philip Neri Powell OP

St. Albert the Great, Irving

We know who and what we are but not who and what we will become. This is either comforting or unnerving, depending on whether or not you trust the Father to keep His promises. If you trust God, then you are His child and you will be become something greater. If you don't, then you are not His child and you will become something much, much less. Since we are here this morning, we can assume that we do trust God's promises and that we are indeed His beloved child. What will you and I become? We don't know. John says so, “Beloved, we are God's children now; what we shall be has not yet been revealed.” Fair enough. I'm content knowing that whatever I become will be the result of God's providence, and that I will be of some use to His plan. Of course, all this being and becoming is conditioned on my cooperation, my willingness to receive and put into practice the graces God gives me. Being aggressively lazy at times and always shockingly thickheaded, I rely on the Good Shepherd to whack me with his shepherd's staff and occasionally rescue me from the briar patch I've wandered into. The Good Shepherd is always good. But his sheep, especially this sheep, could use some work. What can you/we do to be better sheep?

We have to start with the basics. As sheep, as Children of God, to whom do we belong? Well, the answer is in the question: God the Father. We belong to God the Father. Jesus says, “I am the good shepherd, and I know mine and mine know me.” Everything else about our lives in Christ and our growth in holiness flows from this point. We do not belong to the State, the world, the bank, to our culture, or our race/class/political party. We are wholly owned and operated by the Holy Trinity. Just to make this point absolutely clear, Jesus says about himself as our Shepherd, “There is no salvation through anyone else, nor is there any other name under heaven given to the human race by which we are to be saved.” No other name but Christ Jesus. How can we be better sheep for the Good Shepherd? In word and deed, in the way we speak, think, and behave publicly and privately, proclaim our total dependence on Christ for everything we have and everything we are. There is nothing we have and nothing we are that doesn't belong to Christ. Get this right and everything else follows easily.

So, if everything we have and everything we are belongs to Christ, then it follows that everything we say, do, think, and feel also belongs to Christ. This means all day, every day we live and move in the world as the property of the Christ. As sheep of the Good Shepherd. Those we meet, work with, play with – meet, work with, and play with the Good Shepherd himself. What do these people see and hear when they meet the Good Shepherd in you? Does what they hear and see reveal Christ as their Savior? Does what they see and hear reveal the offer of God's mercy to sinners? Do they see and hear the possibility of turning away from sin and receiving forgiveness? Or do they see disapproving rigidity or self-righteousness? Do they hear condemnation or moral scolding? To be the kind of sheep the Good Shepherd shepherds is to be at once deeply rooted in the truth of the Gospel and at the same time recklessly open to welcoming sinners. We welcome sinners (as we were once welcomed) so that they might join the flock and become themselves good sheep. There is no other name under heaven given to the human race by which we are saved. This truth does not belong to us. We belong to this Truth.

If we belong to the Truth that Christ Jesus is the only name given for the salvation of the human race, then we – each one of us – becomes individually and corporately living, breathing bearers of the Word in the world for the salvation of the world. My faith cannot be just about MY salvation, MY holiness, MY moral perfection. Our faith includes our individual salvation, holiness, and perfection but it can never be only about that. We are intimately connected by the Holy Spirit, connected at the level of the spirit in a way that binds us eternally together in a family governed by sacrificial love. If a member is sick. We are all sick. If a member is hurting. We are all hurting. When one rejoices, we all rejoice. We win together and lose together. And we all hear the voice of the Good Shepherd and obey. The Good Shepherd has said, is saying, and will always say, “I lay down my life for the sheep.” That is sacrificial love. And that is how we bear witness to the GS. In the face of lies, ugliness, evil, and sin, we lay down our lives for the GS's sheep. If we can't or won't die for the truth, goodness, and beauty of the name Christ Jesus, then we cannot be good sheep. We are children of the Father. He is waiting for us to reveal who we will become.  

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Dance, monkey!

3^rd Week of Easter (W)

Fr. Philip Neri Powell OP

St. Albert the Great, Irving

Yesterday the crowd was yelling at Jesus to perform a miracle. “What can you do?” What tricks can you perform to prove who you are. I thought of that popular song from a few years ago, “Dance Monkey.” Basically, they were poking Jesus with a stick and shouting “dance, monkey!” Rather than dance, Jesus reminded them that God gave Moses and his crew of former slaves manna from heaven. “My Father gives you the true bread from heaven. For the bread of God is that which comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.” Then, to make things more exciting, he adds, “I am the bread of life.” They see him, but they do not believe. And who can blame them? Here's a 33yo rabbi, a human male, claiming to be a piece of divine bread. Is he saying that he himself is manna from heaven? How is this possible? And even if it is possible and true, what are we supposed to do with this information? What all this means becomes clear at the Last Supper. And it is finished on the Cross. We now know that Jesus was referring to his body and blood in the Eucharist. But has this truth penetrated to the heart of our lives in prayer? Are we still poking at Jesus and shouting, “Dance, monkey!” when we pray?

IOW, are you hanging back in the crowd waiting for Jesus to do something amazing to prove his power? It might seem natural for the limited creatures that we are to want objective, verifiable evidence that Jesus is who he says he is. Or, even if we believe him when he tells us that's he's the Son of God, the Messiah, to hesitate and wait for proof. But there's almost always a rational explanation for what seems like a miracle. And if there is, we write it off and continue waiting. Dance, monkey! No, no. . .dance better. While we are waiting in our demanding prayer, our prayer for a fool-proof miracle, we miss the abundant gifts that God lays out before us. The small gifts, the subtle gifts, the gifts that accumulate over time and add up to a life given holiness and peace. The desert manna fed Moses' ex-slaves for forty years. They got tired of it and complained. The Body and Blood of Christ in the Eucharist has fed the Church for 2,000 years. Is there a greater miracle? Are you tired of it? We see and hear the Son in the Eucharist. We eat and drink. And we grow toward eternal life. The “monkey” can't dance better than that.

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Peace be with you

3^rd Sunday of Easter

Fr. Philip Neri Powell OP

St. Albert the Great, Irving

He's dead and buried. And now his body is missing. His disciples are confused, angry, disappointed, and deeply worried. Without cell phones or email, they start to gather in small groups to figure out what happened in Jerusalem. What went wrong? What about his promises to free them from slavery to Rome? What about his kingdom and his promise to be with them always? They can't help but be a little embarrassed by their apparent gullibility. He claimed to be the Son of God, yet he died like a criminal on a Roman cross. He claimed to be the Messiah, but the only thing he saved was the status quo. Nothing has changed. Pilate is still proconsul. Herod Antipas is still king. The Pharisees and scribes still preach and teach. And they are in hiding for being foolish enough to follow some guy from Nazareth who claimed to be the Savior spoken of in Isaiah's prophecy! Then, in a plot-twist worthy of a telenovela, he appears in their midst. And he's got a question for them: “Why are you troubled? And why do questions arise in your hearts?” That's a good question for us as well. Why are we troubled? What do questions arise in our hearts? The Risen Christ says to us: “Peace be with you.”

So, why are we troubled? Well, I could take you on a quick trip through last week's news cycle: the war in Gaza and Ukraine; Iran attacking Israel; earthquakes in Taiwan and Japan; Haiti overrun by gangs; terror attacks on Christians in Nigeria and a record number of attacks on churches in the US and Canada – you get the idea. There's a lot to be troubled about. Christ can hardly blame us for being just a little uneasy. Just a little squeamish about how we're supposed to live our lives in peace with so much chaos swirling around us. We haven't even mentioned our personal troubles – economic woes; raising kids in a digital world; national politics in an election year; our teens embracing nihilism over faith. It's all too much too fast to take in much less react to with a heart and mind given over to Christ. And so, Christ says to us, “Peace be with you.” Allow my peace to consume you. Allow me to remind you who and what you are. You are mine. Heirs to the Kingdom. A new creation free from sin and death. Freed to become Christ right when and where you are. “Whoever keeps [my] word, the love of God is truly perfected in him.”

And we know that the perfect love of God cannot be taken from us. Riots, dodgy elections, inflation, insane activists, wars, natural disasters, terrorist attacks, pandemics – nothing can take God's love from us. This is the peace of Christ. What the disciples back then forgot – nor never understood – is that God's love for us is more than just a person-to- person love, more than a passion we have for a spouse or a child. Divine love is that. But it is also much, much more. Love is the very stuff of creation itself. Love, Divine Love, is the logos of all that is, the organizing principle of being. All things – ALL things! – were created in, through, with, and for Christ, the Word made flesh. The rioters, the activists, the terrorists, the invaders, the viruses, even the politicians – all were created in, through, with, and for Christ. From the beginning, the Word is and the Word is God. All the trouble, all the chaos, all the apparent evil in the world at large and in our live writ small, all of it, in the end, serves God's providence. What He doesn't will positively, He wills permissively – He allows – so that His love can be manifest. So, why are we troubled? And why do questions arise in our hearts? Well, probably b/c you and I are not yet perfected in Christ. B/c you and I have not yet perfected our witness to the Good News.

What's keeping us from the perfection of Christ? Easy answer: sin. Thick minds and cold hearts. Failure to trust God and His promises. Disordered passions. Willfulness and intellectual dishonesty. Being too much of the world. And the most vicious of all the sins: Pride. The lie that we can become god w/o God. That we can be our own creator w/o any help from The Creator. The frightened disciples who witness Christ's sudden appearance among them were scared b/c their beloved teacher is dead and his body is missing. If we are frightened it's b/c we're not certain that God has the will and the power to bring love from evil. Maybe we're frightened b/c we think it's our job to take up God's slack and finish what He can't or won't. Maybe we're worried so deeply about How Things Are Going b/c we don't truly trust that God will do the right thing. That's what the Enemy is betting on. He tells us that we can be god w/o God and then tell us it's our job to fix the world, watches us panic in failure, and then points back to God and says, “See. Told ya He was powerless to help.” It's all a lie. The Lie. Our job is perfectly simple: Be Christ when and where you are. Bear witness to God's mercy. Love. Forgive. Be generous with what you have been given. Be truth bearers and lovers of beauty. Always, always will the best. Pray for your enemies. You are witnesses now. No troubles, no questions, no worries. Ground yourself in Divine Love, Christ and him crucified. Nothing in this world can uproot you. 

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Lame in one leg during the middle of the week

Octave of Easter (W)

Fr. Philip Neri Powell OP

St. Albert the Great, Irving

A healthy-looking beggar approaches Brian and his mom in the market, asking for a talent. His says in a sing-song voice, “Alms for an ex-leper.” Brian responds, “Did you say an ex-leper?” The beggar then tells him that this guy named Jesus cured him. Just touched his head w/o even a “by your leave” and cured him, ruining his livelihood as a beggar. Brian says that maybe he should find Jesus and ask to be made a leper again. The ex-leper says no to that but wonders if perhaps he should ask Jesus to make him lame in one leg during the middle of the week. Something beggable but not leprosy! I don't know for a fact that this scene from Monty Python's The Life of Brian is based on our story from Acts this morning, but it certainly brings it to mind. It also raises an interesting question: do we really want to be cured? I mean, sure, we probably would want to be cured of leprosy or cancer or some other deadly disease, but do we want to be free from sin? Do we want to be freed from our slavery to disobedience? There's something comfortable and securely familiar in our sins. Something predictable, something routine. And having that comfortable routine disrupted by a cure can be scary.

The disciples left behind in Jerusalem must be feeling some discomfort. Jesus is dead. And – for all they know – his body has been stolen. The Romans and the Jewish authorities may be searching for his followers to give them the Good Friday Treatment. Rather than falling back on their Master's teachings and bringing to mind his promises of being with them always, they begin to scatter in fear. Cleopas and another disciple are on their way to Emmaus. Despondent, verging on despair, they ponder on the traumatic events of the past few days. What if Jesus hadn't found them? What if he wasn't there to call them foolish and slow of heart? What if he didn't break open the Word and share bread with them? What if, instead, they continued on their way to Emmaus, found lodging, and kept on discussing what went wrong in Jerusalem? IOW, what if, in their despair, they forgot everything Jesus taught them, everything he prophesied, everything he did to heal, clean, and enlighten those who approached him? They might have ended up wondering if it would've been better to have never met the Christ. Meeting him and following him has brought them nothing but trouble.

But that's what meeting him and following him does. It brings trouble. It brings discomfort and disrupts predictable, comfortable routines. Especially those comfortable routines that keep us chained up in sin and death. Confessors here can tell you that there's nothing more predictable and boring than sin. And an eternal death is not the sort of excitement we want! So, do you want to be freed from your sins? Do you long for an adventure in growing in holiness? If you feel a chasm of nothingness opening under you, a life w/o purpose or direction, a life wasted in pointless petty acts of boring disobedience, then receive the cure Christ is offering you and be free. You wouldn't mourn the loss of a cancerous tumor, so why grieve over a victory against your rebellious heart and mind? Why go back to being a leper when you can be clean?

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We are the free children of the Most High!

Easter Sunday 2024

Fr. Philip Neri Powell OP

St. Albert the Great, Irving

You know what has happened all across Judea. All across Texas and the United States and the North American continent. You know what has happened all across Europe, Asia, Africa, Central and South America. All across the world's oceans. All across our tiny solar system; our galaxy, and all the galaxies created by the Word from the beginning. The Son of God, who became the Son of Man by the BVM, was crucified in Judea, buried in a borrowed tomb, descended into hell to preach his Good News, and then – as he promised – rose from that tomb, leaving it empty for his anxious disciples to discover so that they might believe. We know what happened in Judea. But do we know what it all means? Do we know and understand the effect of this astonishing historical event? The wound of Adam's disobedience in the Garden has been healed by the death and resurrection of Christ Jesus. We are no longer slaves to sin and death. We are no longer the children of darkness. When he rose from death in the tomb, he took us – all of us – with him. We are now the free children of the Most High, sons and daughters, heirs to His kingdom, and missionary-witnesses of the Good News.

Imagine the terrible grief of the disciples. Their teacher and friend is brutally tortured – publicly – and then executed on a Roman cross. Left to die a lingering death, suffocating in his own blood, he cries out in despair. A lance ends his life. A wannabe disciple pulls some strings to get possession of his body and buries him a rocky tomb. Everything he taught them is dead. Everything he wanted to accomplish is dead. The preaching, the teaching, all the healings and exorcisms, all the arguing with the scribes and Pharisees – all dead. The whole of his ministry is ended on that cross. His disciples are in hiding. Scared out of their minds that they will be rounded up, tortured, and executed like he was. Mary of Magdala, risking everything, goes to the tomb and finds it empty. One more cruel wound. The Romans or the Jewish priests or both have violated his tomb, removed his body, and hidden it. Or destroyed it. Leaving his followers with nothing of him but their memories. Do they know what has happened? Not yet. When John and Peter see the burial cloths, they know. He has risen from death just as Scripture said he would. Just as he himself said he would. Imagine their terrible joy at discovering that their teacher and friend still lived.

That terrible joy may be difficult for us – 2,000 years later – for us to feel with any urgency. We're used to the idea that Christ died and rose from his tomb. We've lived with this truth our whole lives. We know that over the centuries many have tried to explain the resurrection in psychological terms, or dismiss it through scientific investigation, or diminish its cultural importance by tying it to ancient pagan fertility myths. Some have tried to absorb our central mystery into political revolutions or religious novelties. Some have even tried to disrupt our terrible joy by co-opting Easter Sunday into their trendy secular campaigns. Just this last Friday – Good Friday – the WH officially declared today – Easter Sunday – “Transgender Visibility Day.” This bit of political theater tells us just how important, how fundamental today is to our faith. The world is desperate to distract its denizens from the glory of our freedom in the Risen Christ! Next year it might be a cry for Christian Nationalism, or another gesture toward the failed Sexual Revolution. What we – as missionary-witnesses – must bring into crystal-clear focus is our freedom to be bearers of the Word and living tabernacles of the living God. Let the world play its political games. We have real work to do.

You know what has happened. You and I are now the free children of the Most High, sons and daughters, heirs to His kingdom, and missionary-witnesses of the Good News. When Christ rose from his tomb – very much alive and well – he gathered us up with him and took us – from all eternity – into the presence of the Father, our true and only home. There we are citizens of heaven. Here – while we still live – we serve as ambassadors, as legates charged with being in word and deed Christs among those who do not yet know Christ. Our first duty as ambassadors is to ensure that everyone we meet sees in us and hears from us the freely offered mercy of the Father to sinners. From us must freely flow the power of forgiveness through charity. Never condemning the sinner but always naming the sin. From us must freely flow the power of hope in faith. Never succumbing to despair, never mistrusting God's promises, and never failing to reach for and grasp our divine end. And from us must freely flow the power of a humble witness, a truly child-like belief in the Father's enduring love of His children, a love anyone at anytime may receive and turn their lives around to enjoy the hard-won freedom of the empty tomb.

We know what has happened today. Our chains have been struck. We owe nothing to this world but the Gospel of Christ Jesus! So, remember who are – the free children of the Most High, sons and daughters, heirs to His kingdom, and missionary-witnesses of the Good News.

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What has he done to/for you?

Mass of the Last Supper

Fr. Philip Neri Powell OP

Church of the Incarnation, Irving

“Do you realize what I have done for you?” An ominous question for the disciples. Knowing as we do that all but John were horribly murdered for bearing witness to the Gospel, we can be forgiven for thinking the better question would be, “Do you realize what I have done TO you?” What did their teacher and friend do to them? He made them servants. He made them slaves to a way of life that requires them to become divine love incarnate. To the limits of their gifts, they must be living, breathing incarnations of the Father's love, bearing word of His freely offered mercy to the world. So, why would we think that this has been done TO them rather than FOR them? Because their intended audience – the world – hates a slave, loves sin, and despises mercy. Weakness. Cowardice. Helpless. Frail. For the world, sacrifice is failure. Surrender is impotence. Obedience, a disgrace. And service, service is best left to those too faint to rule. The world proudly shouts, “Non serviam!” The apostles with their freshly washed feet answer, “Serviam.” And b/c they served, they died. But they died bearing witness to the divine love that redeems the world. Do you realize what Christ has done for and to you?”

Jesus interrupts his last supper with the apostles to wash their feet. Everyone at that table understands what's happening. Their Master and Teacher is lowering himself, taking on the role of a house slave, to serve them in a way most actual slaves would resent doing. It's a dirty, humiliating job. Peter – being Peter! – objects. Though we can only speculate on his reasons for objecting, we can definitely say that he's forgotten Jesus' earlier rebuke – “Get behind me, Satan!” He hasn't yet learned that Jesus doesn't need Peter to protect his dignity. He doesn't want Peter to protect him from his prophetic mission. He says to Peter, “Unless I wash you, you will have no inheritance with me.” If you will not allow me to serve you, you cannot be my brother, a son to the Father. If you refuse my service, you cannot be an heir to the Kingdom. Peter relents and allows his Teacher to wash his feet. Peter receives the grace of service and becomes in the receiving a servant himself. He will die as Christ did – on a cross. A martyr-sacrifice, an incarnation of divine love.

If you have been washed in baptism and sealed with the Holy Spirit, do you realize what Christ has done for and to you?” Imperfect now, still growing in holiness and traveling the Way, he has made you a Christ for the salvation of the world. He has made you a slave to the Gospel, a servant of divine love and a witness in the prosecution of the world's hatred of mercy. You chose this life. Don't blame Mom and Dad or your peers. There are no armed guards here tonight forcing your presence at the sacrifice of the altar. You chose this. You chose the life of a servant. You chose the life of a witness. You chose to walk the way of holiness and peace. You even chose to wash the feet of Christ's littlest ones. If you live out your vocation of service, you will find yourself in trouble with the world. In large ways and small, you will bump into the dark spirit of non serviam and feel the power and allure of having it your way; of giving license to your passions to run wild; of using others to your advantage; you will feel the thrill of disobedience, the rush of violating boundaries, and the exhilaration of being applauded for your bravery in conforming to the world's low standards. If you fall to this power, you will “fit right in.” But you will not be a servant, a slave, a witness. And you will not be an heir. Jesus says, “You will have no inheritance with me.” The door to heaven is a service entrance.

If being a servant, a slave, a witness sounds weak; if it all sounds pathetic and dull, then consider: Christ died a servant to his students and rose to defeat death. He won. He didn't fight the Devil. He didn't wage a cosmic war against evil and come out barely alive but victorious. He did the one thing necessary to kill death. He died a servant of eternal life. He died a slave to divine love, as the incarnation of Divine Love. And he manifested that love in flesh and bone on the cross, sacrificing himself to make us holy – set apart, in the world but not of it. When we chose – and we did choose! – to be washed and sealed, we chose to become Christs for the salvation of the world. As mom and dad at home and at work, you are Christs. As students and professors, you are Christs. As priests and religious, you are Christs. As doctors, lawyers, accountants, cops, nurses, cashiers, you are Christs. Whoever you are and wherever you are, you are Christs. You are witnesses to his mercy. You are voluntary slaves of forgiveness and hope. Do you realize what Christ has done for and to you? He has made you foot washers in the world. You have chosen. Your serviam is your salvation.

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Speak kindly of Judas

Wednesday of Holy Week
Fr. Philip N. Powell, OP

St. Albert the Great, Irving

I will speak kindly of Judas. It has been fashionable among the fashionable to look at Judas and see a man unjustly maligned for his careful act of deceit and betrayal. Aren’t we being just a little too hard on the poor man? He was under a lot of stress! The agony of being the one of the Twelve who would betray his Master and friend must have been horrible to bear. The sweaty nights tossing in his bed, worrying about money problems. The constant gnawing bite of ulcers, watching Jesus intentionally provoke the authorities. The pounding headaches from anxiety as his Master and friend claims, near-suicidally, in the middle of thronging crowds, that he is the Son of God! The insults, the arguments with the priests and scribes, even that day when the crowd starting throwing stones and they had to run for their lives! Too much, too much. You can see why he did what he did. All was lost anyway. Jesus’ end was inevitable. Who could blame Judas for siding with the arc of History against a man determined to die? You and I were in the crowd shouting “blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord!” All too soon, you and I will be in the crowd shouting “crucify him!” On the last day, will we ask him, “Surely, it is not I, Lord?”

Some suggest that Judas was predestined to hand Jesus over. Others will claim that Jesus asked Judas to betray him in order to fulfill the OT prophecies that prefigure his sacrifice on the cross. Still others will claim that Judas is a modern, existential figure, a man persecuted by history for making a hard choice and playing out the consequences of that choice with focused integrity. Maybe. What we know for sure is that Judas went to the chief priest. Offered Jesus' freedom and his life to those who would see him dead. He negotiated a price to betray his friend – thirty pieces of silver, the fine for murdering a slave. And then he continued living, working, ministering with Jesus, waiting for an opportunity to hand him over to his enemies.

But I said I would speak kindly of Judas. We all should. Why? Judas is so repugnant to us, so vile a man, and deserving of our contempt that, if we believe, truly believe what Jesus died to teach us, we must find it in our hearts not only to forgive him his violence against Christ, but we must see clearly, staring back at us from the twisted face of the Messiah’s betrayer, our own face – disobedient and scarred by our battles against temptation, by our struggles to find, grasp, and cling to God.

If the Christ is the best face we could wear, turned to the Father in beatitude, then Judas is the face we could wear in those moments of loneliness and distress, moments of despair at ever finding the light again. His is the face we put on when that small devilish whisper causally speaks our ruin: “This cannot be forgiven. Not even God loves you that much.” What aren’t we capable of then? What act of betrayal, deceit, selfishness, or violence is beyond us when we believe we are unlovable?

Speak kindly of Judas. Not to excuse his sin, of course not. Not to make right what is always wrong. But perhaps as an act of caution against what we hope is impossible for us. He is our anti-exemplar, the model of what happens in the ruin of despair, the wreck we make of ourselves when we kill hope with yesterday’s hatred or today’s temporary anxiety. Sometime today, ask in prayer, “Surely, it is not I, Lord?” Wait for an answer and then, with whatever answer you receive, remember mercy, and speak kindly of Judas.

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You are free

5^th Week of Lent (W)

Fr. Philip Neri Powell OP

St. Albert the Great, Irving

The Jews think that they have never been slaves to sin b/c they are the children of Abraham. Children of the covenant who have never succumbed to idolatry. Fair enough. Except that Jesus isn't just talking about the kind of slavery that comes with the generational worship of idols. He's talking about the kind of slavery to sin that comes with just being human. A condition every child of Adam and Eve is born into. Because the Jews misunderstand the true nature of spiritual slavery, they misunderstand the true nature of spiritual freedom. Thus, in their minds, they are justified in trying to kill Jesus. He's telling them that their covenant with God through Abraham isn't enough to save them. Their freedom is deficient. He says, “Amen, amen, I say to you, everyone who commits sin is a slave of sin.” Covenant or no covenant, if you sin, you are a slave to sin. The first step to spiritual freedom in Christ is to confess to being a slave to sin. You cannot defeat an enemy you refuse to see. Jesus says, “If you remain in my word, you will truly be my disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.”

There are four stages here: remain in the Word; be a disciple of Christ; know the truth; and be free. Notice that the last three stages are rooted in the first: remain in the Word. Remain in the Word of God, the Christ. Remain in the Word of creation, what is really Real. Remain in the Word of Christ's Body, the Church. Remain in the Word of Revelation, scripture and tradition. Remain in him and with him and you will be a faithful student of the Way, the Truth, and the Life. A disciple of Christ, imperfectly Christ for now, but learning to become perfectly Christ along the Way. And along the Way, your freedom is completed as is your joy. Claiming to be a child of God while remaining in sin is nothing else but claiming to be free while wearing chains. Even worse: it's claiming to be free while wear chains you have put on yourself. The truth will set you free. And the truth is: there is no freedom from sin except in Christ Jesus. Consider Lent your cram session for the final exam of Easter. There's just one question on this final: will you be a disciple of the Word made flesh? If the answer is yes, then you are already free.

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Raining on the righteous and the unrighteous

3rd Week of Lent (S)
Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP
St. Albert the Great, Irving

A Pharisee and a tax collector go to the temple to pray. The Pharisee marches right into the temple courtyard, but the tax collector stands off at a distance. The Pharisee prays aloud. The tax collector prays silently. The Pharisee recounts his righteous deeds and gives God thanks that he is “not like the rest of humanity—greedy, dishonest, adulterous.” While the tax collector humbly beats his breast in contrition and prays, “O God, be merciful to me a sinner.” Watching from the sidelines, anyone with eyes to see could tell the difference btw these two men. Their demeanor, dress, speech; the stance each takes before God. All different. But can we see how they are alike? Is there any reason to believe that either of two men is lying? Not that I can see. Both are telling the truth. That's how they are alike. The Pharisee is righteous. And the tax collector is a sinner. What justifies each man, for Jesus, is what they do with these truths. To what purpose do they put their spiritual condition? Both the righteous and the unrighteous will be exalted if they humble themselves before God.

The key to understanding this deceptively simply parable is understanding the parable's audience. Luke writes, “Jesus addressed this parable to those who were convinced of their own righteousness and despised everyone else.” This parable at fired at those of us who are certain that we are righteous AND – b/c we are certain of our righteousness – despise everyone else. For a Pharisee to be sure of his righteousness is hardly scandalous. Follow the Law and your rightness with God is certain. There's no anxious hand-wringing about being in a state of grace. Now that we are certain of our rightness with God, what do we do? Well, one thing we do not do is despise everyone else b/c we are righteous. Nor do we give God thanks for helping us stay clean w/o also asking Him to pour out His graces on others in need of His help. Rather than despising your fellow sinners, your security in righteousness should compel you to further acts of sacrificial love in order to bring as many as possible into right relationship with God. The Pharisee's problem is his lack of genuine humility before God and his lack of genuine gratitude to God for his hard-won holiness. Humility and gratitude will persist in the truly righteous soul.

The Lord says to Hosea, regarding His chosen people, “Your piety [Judah] is like a morning cloud, like the dew that early passes away.” In place of “piety,” other English translations use love, goodness, loyalty. The Latin Vulgate uses misericordia, which conveys the notion of a compassionate mercy, a sympathetic humanity towards others. Through the mouth of His prophet, Hosea, the Lord condemns Judah for its fleeting compassion, its fugitive goodness and stingy mercy. He says, “. . . it is love that I desire, not sacrifice, and knowledge of God rather than burnt offerings.” Give Me your love, come to know Me in love. Keep your sacrifices, your burnt offerings. Dare to be genuinely righteous before Me; lay all your wounds before Me – your worry, your pride, your fear, all of your secret sins. Set these ablaze before My altar, come to know Me in love. And I will bind all your wounds. I will come to you like the rain, like spring rain watering the earth. Then, when you stand to pray, you can pray with genuine humility and give wholehearted thanks. True righteousness can abide only when humility and gratitude stand under you as your unbreakable foundation.

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Paid in full

3^rd Week of Lent (W)

Fr. Philip Neri Powell OP

St. Albert the Great, Irving

When you order a book from Amazon, it arrives in a package marked “Amazon Fulfillment Center.” When you pay a bill, you may receive a receipt marked “paid in full.” The obligations of a commercial contract are “fulfilled.” That word – “fulfill” – and all its variations means to complete, to be done with, to satisfy. It can also mean to perfect, to make whole again. So, when Jesus says he has come to fulfill the Law, he's saying that he's here to perfect the Law, to bring the Law to completion. Naturally, we need to ask: what is the telos, the end of the Law? The telos of the Law was and is to make of us a holy nation, a baptismal priesthood, a people assembled together to carry out His will. For centuries before Christ, the Law and Prophets worked toward this end. Sometimes with great success. But most of the time without. At the appointed time, the Son took on human flesh, becoming Man like one of us, and did what we could not – he gave himself to death in an act of sacrificial love so that our part in the Covenant could be fulfilled. The Law is not destroyed. It is made perfect. All of the Law and the Prophets is incorporated into the body and blood of Christ and our duty under the Law is complete.

Now that the obligations of the Law and the Prophets are complete, are we licensed to do as we please? No. The Law and the Prophets are completed under the first Law of Love: love God and neighbor as you love yourself. Do that and you perfectly obey the Law. You love perfectly. What we are doing right now – during Lent – is frankly inventorying our fidelity to the Law of Love. And while we take account of how well we love or do not love, we remember that we are only able to love in the first place b/c Love Himself loves us first. It is only through His originating love that we exist at all. Only through Him that we can love spouses, children, friends, and enemies. Only through Him do we come at last to the source of creating and re-creating love. If we follow Christ – and we say we do – and if Christ fulfilled the Law and the Prophets – and he did – and if we hope to find a place at the Wedding Feast – and we do – then we too will live and breathe and have our being in the world as fulfillers of the Law of Love. We are the Priests and Prophets of Divine Love sent to show the world its salvation in Christ Jesus.

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Fakin' it ain't makin' it

2^nd Week of Lent (W)

Fr. Philip Neri Powell OP

St. Albert the Great, Irving

One day during lunch at Notre Dame Seminary I was passing around an Ignatius Press catalog. One of the seminarians glanced at the address label and asked how I go the title “Very Reverend.” I said, “Because I'm prior at St. Dominic Priory. They probably got it from the Catholic Directory.” Seminarians being seminarians, they started calling me “Very Rev Philip Neri.” I countered with, “That would be 'the Very Rev. Fr. Dr. Prior' to you peons!” We got a good laugh out of it. But my underlying – and formational point, I hope – was that fancy ecclesial titles tell us nothing about the holiness of the title's bearer. They tell us nothing about the bearer's actual relationship with God. Father, Sister, Brother, Your Eminence, Your Holiness – none of these is descriptive of the person beyond his or her place in the hierarchy. In fact, I'm almost convinced the Lord allows these titles to test his vowed and ordained servants for humility and obedience. But Catholic Officialdom is not the only place where religious theater can quickly overtake one's earnest striving for holiness. By virtue of baptism, we are all priests, prophets, and kings. Everyone of us is vowed by baptism to be Christ in the world for the world. Here's your Lenten challenge: are you Christ in the world for the world? Or, are you an actor in religious theater?

It's a question for me as well. After all, the preacher preaches to himself first! So I'm not just being rude. The temptation is real. Very real. The rewards of appearing to be holy can be seductive. I get to be thought well of. I get all the public benefits of being holy w/o the bother of actually being holy. Who knows? Acting religious in public might actually rub off on me a little! The best part though is thinking of myself as holy, appearing holy, and getting to judge those who are not as holy as I am. The problem of course is that I could start to believe my part in religious theater is real and mistake faking it for making it. The only audience member clapping at that point is the Devil. When the sons of Zebedee ask to be elevated above their fellow disciples, Jesus asks a pointed question: “Can you drink the chalice that I am going to drink?” They answer: “We can.” A suicidal Hamlet says offstage: “Ay, there's the rub.” The sons of Zebedee have no idea what that chalice is or what it means. Besides, Jesus says, places of honor are not his to give. If he can't give them to us, we certainly can't give them to ourselves.

What the sons of Zebedee don't know and we do it is that the chalice Jesus drinks is the chalice of sacrificial love. It's not a cup of power or a cup of wealth and influence. It's the chalice of service and surrender; a slave's cup, leading to the Cross, the tomb, and – in hope – the resurrection. We are in a time of examination. Look hard at your religiosity. Look hard at your public holiness. Make absolutely sure that the inside matches the outside. Make sure that the depth of your love goes deeper than a finely tailored costume and a few scripted lines. Christ has handed you his chalice. Before you take and drink, ask yourself: am I Christ in the world for the world? Or, am I faking it so as to be seen making it?   

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Why do we love God?

2nd Sunday of Lent

Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP

St. Albert the Great, Irving

    God tells Abraham to sacrifice Isaac. Abraham goes up the mountain and begins the sacrifice. He's willingly, obediently about to kill his only son b/c God has ordered him to do so. We can stop here and ask: does Abraham love God more than he loves Isaac? No, he doesn't. But his obedience to God shows that he loves God first; he loves God before he loves Isaac, therefore, Abraham loves Isaac b/c he loves God first. At the very last second, an angel stays Abraham's knife and God provides a substitute sacrifice in the form of a ram. What we love most can only be loved through the love God has for us b/c He is love itself. That God loves us is never in question. He is love. Love is who He is and what He does. No question. But there is a question about God and love that we must ask, and ask daily: do I love God? If so, what purpose does my love for God serve? On Mt. Tabor – in the presence of Peter, James, and John – the transfigured Christ tells us why we love. We love God for the same reason He loves us: so that we may be made holy. And in holiness we live out sacrificial love.

So, how do we help God make us holy? That is, what do we do/think/say/feel on a day to day basis that assists God's love for us so that we are actually growing in holiness? Loving God, yourself, your family and friends, your neighbors, and even loving your enemies is easy in the abstract. It is far more difficult to get out there and perform loving acts; to perform forgiveness; to show mercy; to treat everyone you meet – at church, at the bank, at the office, in traffic – to treat everyone you meet as another soul deeply in love with God and eternally loved by God. This is why the Church has always bound faith and works together: our loving works demonstrate our trust in God and our trust in God is made real in our loving works. When we fail to love, we confess these failures as sins in thought, word, and deed. So, how do we help God make us holy? Well, first, we understand that loving God and those He loves is not simply an abstract, intellectual exercise; next, we understand that love is a behavior – like driving or walking or getting dressed. To love is to see, hear, think about, and treat yourself and everyone else the way God Himself treats us all. With kindness, compassion, dignity, patience, and forgiveness. Do this and you grow in holiness. You become more like Christ – set apart. You are transfigured.

Becoming more like Christ is we have vowed to do. But we need to hear this: loving God, self, and everyone else – becoming more like Christ – is dangerous. Dangerous how? Besides Jesus' promises of persecution, trial, and death for those who follow him, we can point to the forty days he spent in the desert being tempted by Satan. We too are tempted to play the Devil's Games with sin and death. The Devil always takes God's gifts and tweaks them ever-so-slightly and then presents them to us infected with his poison. God's love and His command to us to love is no different. With God's love and His command to love comes His truth and His command to obey the truth. Love and truth cannot be separated. When we love intensely, we dwell intensely in the truth. And when we tell the Truth we always express love. The Devil plays on our desire to love by pointing out all the ways we appear to fail at love. He accuses the Church of not loving women b/c we truthfully name artificial contraception, abortion, and sterilization evil. He accuses us of hatred b/c we truthfully call sex outside of a sacramental marriage evil. He accuses us of not loving orphans b/c we cannot place them in homes with two fathers or two mothers. He accuses us of not loving non-Christians b/c we truthfully teach that Christ is the only name under heaven through which all are saved. What Satan is tempting us to do, want us to do, is sever truth from love and then love without truth. This we cannot do b/c our Christ is the way, the truth, and the life. We follow him so that we may be transfigured.

Satan and the world he rules teaches that “Love” is to be practiced without Truth. Love w/o truth is nothing more than tolerance or indifference, an emotion that feels good to emote but ultimately leaves those who live it living a lie. Godly love is always true. Never a lie. True love is always gives the glory to God. Never to man. Love always carries us to goodness; never to evil. Love always binds us in obedience; it never frees us to be disobedient. Godly love always heals, always cleans, sometimes hurts, sometimes cuts away. Love never winks at sin, shrugs at injustice, or ignores the poor. Love always looks to Christ, his church, and his Mother. Love never uses the bottom-line, the convenient, the practical, or the efficient to destroy God’s creatures, especially His unborn children. Love always encourages spiritual growth from faithful experience. Love never gives license to novelty for novelty’s sake nor does love trust innovation for the sake of excitement. Love can be a terrible whirlwind, a bone-shattering blow, a heart-ripping loss. But love always builds up in perfection, grows in wisdom and kindness; love attracts questions about eternal things, and discourages attachment to impermanent things. The love that Satan and the world he rules wants to settle for is a passion for indifference, permissiveness, choice w/o consequence, and, ultimately, death.

Will you be made holy? Let's ask that differently: do you will to be made holy? If you will to become a transfigured instrument for God’s Word, you will love as He loves you. You will speak the truth and only the truth; you will spread goodness and only goodness; you will honor beauty and only beauty; you will correct error, confront sin, expose lies, forgive all offenses; and you will build up his Body with works of mercy and open the doors of your faith to the stranger. And you will remember – if you will to be made holy – that you are not alone. God is with us, and who can stand against Him?

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God loves those who hate us

1st Week of Lent (S)
Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP
St. Albert the Great, Irving

That we may be children of our heavenly Father, we must love our enemies, pray for them, especially those who persecute us. If there's a teaching in scripture that is more contrary to our animal instinct for self-preservation than this one, I'm not sure what it is. Loving family and friends comes easily. We can even manage to love God and ourselves without too much difficulty. But loving and praying for those who would see us destroyed is not only contrary to our survival it is downright suicidal. If our enemies defeat us b/c they are stronger, smarter, and more numerous, well, that's unfortunate for us but we can at least grasp the idea that we lost b/c our enemies were stronger, smarter, and more numerous. What is beyond comprehension is the idea that we would lose b/c we were too busy loving and praying to fight with all our strength! That's not a battle, it's a retreat, a surrender. And it's suicide. Jesus must be winking at the disciples when he teaches them to love and pray for their enemies. He must've spoken this nonsense in a sarcastic tone. As strange as it might be to hear: no, he's deadly serious and there was no winking. We defeat our enemies by wielding a weapon called Truth. “[The Father] makes his sun rise on the bad and the good, and causes rain to fall on the just and the unjust.” God loves those who hate us. And we must be perfect as He is perfect. 

If we will be the children of our heavenly Father, we must be perfect as He is perfect. God is perfect in His love. He is Love. Love is Who He is and What He does. In every thought we think, every word we speak, and every deed we do, we too must be thinkers, speakers, and doers of love. If we pick and choose whom to love, sort through the options and select this one or that to love but not that one or this one, then we do not love as God loves. The sun shines on both the good and the bad; the rain falls on our friends and our enemies. Jesus asks us, “. . . if you love those who love you, what compensation will you have? Do not [traitors] do the same? And if you greet your brothers and sisters only, what is unusual about that?” In other words, how does loving only those who love you make you a child of the Father? What truth are you living when you only pray for those who pray for you? “Do not the pagans do the same?” Why imitate those who would see us destroyed? Yes, we might die if we love them, but it would not be by suicide.

The key to understanding this difficult teaching is to understand that Jesus is pointing us to our lives beyond this one. Though our mortal lives are immensely important, they are not ultimately important; that is, in the Father's plan for our salvation it is more important that we practice love than it is to merely survive. It is essential to our eternal survival that we practice the love He gives us by loving those He Himself loves. Our enemies hate us. We can fight them with our own hatred, and we might even mortally defeat them. But in fighting them with hatred, we are immortally defeated. We become our own enemy, haters of self and God. Jesus understands our natural instinct for survival, but he pushes us to think and feel beyond the limits of this mortal life and live in the perfection of his Father's love right now. We trust in the loving-goodness of our God. And this is our fundamental strength, our deadliest weapon against the hatred of our enemies. If we bombard them with prayer, then both we and they win the battle against our mutual enemy – Sin and the death it brings.

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