How you feel about it is irrelevant. .. .

11th Sunday OT 2013  
Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP  
St. Dominic/Our Lady of the Rosary, NOLA 

Let's get right to it: why does the notoriously sinful woman wash Jesus' feet with her tears, dry them with her hair, and anoint them with oil? But before we tackle that question, let's ask another one: why should we ask that question at all? Why should we ask why she does what she does? Two reasons: 1) her motives for doing what she did tells us a great deal about how and why her sins are forgiven; and 2) the parable Jesus tells Simon is meant to teach him (and us) about the long-term effects of forgiveness. So, why does she do it? She wants Jesus to reward her with absolution. She wants to embarrass the smug Pharisee in his own home. She wants to appear in public with a great prophet and discredit him by association. Or, we can go with Jesus' assessment of her motives, “. . .her many sins have been forgiven because she has shown great love.” The notoriously sinful woman honors Jesus in a way his host did not b/c she wants to show Jesus Great Love. Tying her devotion back to the parable of the generous creditor, Jesus concludes, “. . .the one to whom little is forgiven, loves little.” We are forgiven everything. How big is your love? 

Here's a better question: how big can your love be? The only thing we know for sure is that our love cannot be bigger than God who is Love Himself. So, btw the Nothingness of Evil and the Perfection of God, we have plenty of room to grow and shrink, to expand and contract. When we grow in love, we do so along with God in response to the Great Love that He gives us. When our love shrinks, we do so as well. We become less human, less like the image and likeness of God who made us. Of course, it's sin that causes us to shrink in love, to contract away from God. It's sin that derails us on our Way to God, and sin that staunches the free flow of mercy into our lives. This is why Jesus directly ties the sinful woman's love for him to her forgiveness. Which came first: her love or his forgiveness? Did Jesus forgive her as a reward for loving him? Or does she love him b/c he forgives her? Jesus says, “. . .her many sins have been forgiven because she has shown great love.” So, she loves first, then he forgives. But how does she love in the first place while wallowing in sin? Surely, she must be forgiven before she can love? Can our love ever be big enough to overcome your sin? No. But God's love for us is big enough to make up the difference, big enough to bring us all to repentance through Christ. 

Paul writes to the Galatians, “I have been crucifed with Christ; yet I live, no longer I, but Christ lives in me…” You see the genuis of the Catholic faith is that nothing required of us all is truly required of us alone. We admit from the beginning that we can do nothing without first receiving the grace necessary to complete the task. Even our desire to cooperate with God’s various gifts is itself a gift. Our completed tasks in grace are no more responsible for saving us than any number of goats sacrificed and burned on an altar. We are not made just by our works. In other words, we cannot work our way into holiness apart from the God of grace Who motivates us to do good works. Paul writes, “We who know that a person is not justified by works of the law but through faith in Jesus Christ even we have believed in Christ Jesus…b/c by works of the law no one will be justified.” We are made just when we are crucifed with Christ (in baptism) and when he abides in us (in confession and Eucharist) we remain just. We can proclaim with Paul then, “I live by faith in the Son of God who has loved me and given himself for me.” We can say, “I live by knowing, trusting that Christ loves me away of my sin.” 

Can we, then, be members of the Body of Christ, the Church, who participate in the ministries of the Church not for pragmatic gain, nor the need to “feel something,” nor in the hope of fitting-in, but b/c we long to show Christ a Great Love, the love that he first showed us on the cross and shows us even now on this altar? Can we do what the sinful woman does: freely, openly, purely, and without caring about gossip or any negative consequences, can we express our Great Love for Christ and one another with the gifts of tears—humility, forgiveness, mercy; and the gifts of service—teaching, preaching, healing, feeding? Can you show others—for no other reason or purpose than your Great Love for God—can you show others the Christ Who Lives In You? And can you show them that Christ did not die for nothing but that he died and rose again for everything, everyone everywhere? And can you show them that b/c he died and rose again for everything and everyone everywhere, that they too, saying YES to his gifts of trust, hope, and love, that they too can shine out a Christ-light for all to see, that they too can wash filthy feet with repentant tears and anoint them clean with precious oil? 

Now, you might thinking at this point: “Hmmm. . .I can say that I love God, but I don't really feel like I love God. He loves me, I know, but I don't feel Him loving me.” Let me gently remind you: your feelings on the truth of God's love for you are irrelevant; that is, whether or not you feel God's love is irrevelant to the truth that God does love you. Since at least the middle of the 19th c.,* Christians have been duped into believing that emotions take priority over the intellect in all things theological, that the only worthy human response to reality is emotional. We've replaced “What do you think?” with “How do you feel?” and we've decided that how we feel is more important than what we think. This is not the Catholic faith. We are rational animals not emotive animals. We are human persons composed of a human body and a rational soul. That which makes us most like God is our intellect not our passions. Why am I ranting about this? B/c too often I see otherwise faithful Christians anguishing over their apparently empty spiritual lives b/c they do not feel God's presence. Feelings ebb and flow, come and go. Yes, feelings are spiritually significant, but they do not tell us much about the truth. The truth is: God loves you. He is with you. And how we feel about these truths is irrelevant to whether or not they are true. 

The notoriously sinful woman's sins are forgiven whether she feels forgiven or not. The Pharisee is a hypocrite whether he feels like a hypocrite or not. Jesus did not command us to feel love. He commanded us to love. So, angry, sad, joyful, exhausted, pitiful, happy—does it matter to our obligation to love? No, it doesn't. Do not let fleeting emotions bargain away the triumphs of God's Love. Feel what you feel and Love anyway. Feel angry and love anyway. Feel depressed, exhausted, spiteful, and love anyway. Feel elated, ecstatic, on cloud nine, and nearly uncontrollably happy, and love anyway. Feel bored, isolated, cranky, and mean, and love anyway. Christ did not die for nothing. He died for you. And you are not nothing. You are everything to him. We are everything to him. Yes, our sins betray us. But his Great Love forgives us. Our debt is always canceled, always forgiven. Knowing this, is your love big enough to forgive others? Probably not. But God's love for you is big enough to make up the difference. He loved you first anyway, so allow Him to forgive through you. Allow yourself to be just one small way for His Great Love to be found in this world. Allow yourself to be the greater love of Christ who lives in you. 

*I'm thinking particularly of Friedrich Schleiermacher, who reduced religious faith to feeling and intuition.

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How big can your love be?

11th Sunday OT 2013 
Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP 
St. Dominic/Our Lady of the Rosary, NOLA 

Let's get right to it: why does the notoriously sinful woman wash Jesus' feet with her tears, dry them with her hair, and anoint them with oil? But before we tackle that question, let's ask another one: why should we ask that question at all? Why should we ask why she does what she does? Two reasons: 1) her motives for doing what she did tells us a great deal about how and why her sins are forgiven; and 2) the parable Jesus tells Simon is meant to teach him (and us) about the long-term effects of forgiveness. So, why does she do it? She wants Jesus to reward her with absolution. She wants to embarrass the smug Pharisee in his own home. She wants to appear in public with a great prophet and discredit him by association. Or, we can go with Jesus' assessment of her motives, “. . .her many sins have been forgiven because she has shown great love.” The notoriously sinful woman honors Jesus in a way his host did not b/c she wants to show Jesus Great Love. Tying her devotion back to the parable of the generous creditor, Jesus concludes, “. . .the one to whom little is forgiven, loves little.” We are forgiven everything. How big is your love? 

Here's a better question: how big can your love be? The only thing we know for sure is that our love cannot be bigger than God who is Love Himself. So, btw the Nothingness of Evil and the Perfection of God, we have plenty of room to grow and shrink, to expand and contract. When we grow in love, we do so along with God in response to the Great Love that He gives us. When our love shrinks, we do so as well. We become less human, less like the image and likeness of God who made us. Of course, it's sin that causes us to shrink in love, to contract away from God. It's sin that derails us on our Way to God, and sin that staunches the free flow of mercy into our lives. This is why Jesus directly ties the sinful woman's love for him to her forgiveness. Which came first: her love or his forgiveness? Did Jesus forgive her as a reward for loving him? Or does she love him b/c he forgives her? Jesus says, “. . .her many sins have been forgiven because she has shown great love.” So, she loves first, then he forgives. But how does she love in the first place while wallowing in sin? Surely, she must be forgiven before she can love? Can our love ever be big enough to overcome your sin? No. But God's love for us is big enough to make up the difference, big enough to bring us all to repentance through Christ. 

Paul writes to the Galatians, “I have been crucifed with Christ; yet I live, no longer I, but Christ lives in me…” You see the genuis of the Catholic faith is that nothing required of us all is truly required of us alone. We admit from the beginning that we can do nothing without first receiving the grace necessary to complete the task. Even our desire to cooperate with God’s various gifts is itself a gift. Our completed tasks in grace are no more responsible for saving us than any number of goats sacrificed and burned on an altar. We are not made just by our works. In other words, we cannot work our way into holiness apart from the God of grace Who motivates us to do good works. Paul writes, “We who know that a person is not justified by works of the law but through faith in Jesus Christ even we have believed in Christ Jesus…b/c by works of the law no one will be justified.” We are made just when we are crucifed with Christ (in baptism) and when he abides in us (in confession and Eucharist) we remain just. We can proclaim with Paul then, “I live by faith in the Son of God who has loved me and given himself for me.” We can say, “I live by knowing, trusting that Christ loves me away of my sin.” 

Can we, then, be members of the Body of Christ, the Church, who participate in the ministries of the Church not for pragmatic gain, nor the need to “feel something,” nor in the hope of fitting-in, but b/c we long to show Christ a Great Love, the love that he first showed us on the cross and shows us even now on this altar? Can we do what the sinful woman does: freely, openly, purely, and without caring about gossip or any negative consequences, can we express our Great Love for Christ and one another with the gifts of tears—humility, forgiveness, mercy; and the gifts of service—teaching, preaching, healing, feeding? Can you show others—for no other reason or purpose than your Great Love for God—can you show others the Christ Who Lives In You? And can you show them that Christ did not die for nothing but that he died and rose again for everything, everyone everywhere? And can you show them that b/c he died and rose again for everything and everyone everywhere, that they too, saying YES to his gifts of trust, hope, and love, that they too can shine out a Christ-light for all to see, that they too can wash filthy feet with repentant tears and anoint them clean with precious oil? 

Now, you might thinking at this point: “Hmmm. . .I can say that I love God, but I don't really feel like I love God. He loves me, I know, but I don't feel Him loving me.” Let me gently remind you: your feelings on the truth of God's love for you are irrelevant; that is, whether or not you feel God's love is irrevelant to the truth that God does love you. Since at least the middle of the 19th c.,* Christians have been duped into believing that emotions take priority over the intellect in all things theological, that the only worthy human response to reality is emotional. We've replaced “What do you think?” with “How do you feel?” and we've decided that how we feel is more important than what we think. This is not the Catholic faith. We are rational animals not emotive animals. We are human persons composed of a human body and a rational soul. That which makes us most like God is our intellect not our passions. Why am I ranting about this? B/c too often I see otherwise faithful Christians anguishing over their apparently empty spiritual lives b/c they do not feel God's presence. Feelings ebb and flow, come and go. Yes, feelings are spiritually significant, but they do not tell us much about the truth. The truth is: God loves you. He is with you. And how we feel about these truths is irrelevant to whether or not they are true. 

The notoriously sinful woman's sins are forgiven whether she feels forgiven or not. The Pharisee is a hypocrite whether he feels like a hypocrite or not. Jesus did not command us to feel love. He commanded us to love. So, angry, sad, joyful, exhausted, pitiful, happy—does it matter to our obligation to love? No, it doesn't. Do not let fleeting emotions bargain away the triumphs of God's Love. Feel what you feel and Love anyway. Feel angry and love anyway. Feel depressed, exhausted, spiteful, and love anyway. Feel elated, ecstatic, on cloud nine, and nearly uncontrollably happy, and love anyway. Feel bored, isolated, cranky, and mean, and love anyway. Christ did not die for nothing. He died for you. And you are not nothing. You are everything to him. We are everything to him. Yes, our sins betray us. But his Great Love forgives us. Our debt is always canceled, always forgiven. Knowing this, is your love big enough to forgive others? Probably not. But God's love for you is big enough to make up the difference. He loved you first anyway, so allow Him to forgive through you. Allow yourself to be just one small way for His Great Love to be found in this world. Allow yourself to be the greater love of Christ who lives in you. 

*I'm thinking particularly of Friedrich Schleiermacher, who reduced religious faith to feeling and intuition.

________________

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Pour out your hearts before Him. . .and serve Him alone.

8^th Sunday OT (A)

Our Lady of the Rosary, NOLA

Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP

Audio File

O Lord! Why have you forsaken me? “Rest in God alone, my soul.” O God! Why have you forgotten me? “Rest in God alone, my soul.” O Lord! Why have you abandoned me? “Get a grip already! I haven't forsaken, forgotten, or abandoned you. Remember, my soul, I AM your rock, your salvation, your refuge and your strength. I AM your stronghold and your hope. Trust in Me at all times, O my people! Pour out your hearts before Me, and nothing will ever disturb you.” So says the Lord to His anxious people. Pour out your heart before the Lord. And nothing will ever disturb you. At the center of your love for God and one another – your heart – who or what takes up the most time and space? That is, when you carefully consider the source and summit, the foundation and center of your day-to-day existence, who or what directs your heart and mind? If that who or what is anyone or anything but Christ himself, then pour out your heart before the Father, pour out whatever or whoever it is that directs you, and surrender yourself once again to Christ. If you are worried that God has forgotten you, ask yourself: have I forgotten God? 

 

God's people are anxious. They are afraid that He has forgotten them. So, He asks Isaiah, “Can a mother forget her infant, be without tenderness for the child of her womb? Even should she forget, I will never forget you.” Lay to rest then any worry that God will forget us. If we are going to worry, let's worry about a very real and dangerous possibility: that we will forget God. That we will abandon the Lord and His covenant with us in Christ. Pushed and pulled from every side by the seductive forces of a godless culture, it is all too easy, all too expedient to give up on the Father and His Christ. He promises that nothing and no one will ever disturb us. True. But He doesn't promise that nothing or no one will never try. Whether or not we will be disturbed by this world's seductions is predictable. Whether or not we will be seduced is also predictable. How? Ask yourself: who or what sits on the throne of my heart? Who or what rules you? To put it in gospel terms: whom do you serve? Whose call do you answer? If Christ rules your heart; if you serve Christ and his Church, then there is only one call to answer, one voice that gets your attention and obedience: “Trust in Me at all times, O my people! Pour out your hearts before Me, and nothing will ever disturb you.” Pour out your hearts before Him. . .and serve Him alone.

Jesus says it as plainly as it can be said: “No one can serve two masters. . .You cannot serve God and mammon.” God cannot rule your heart if your heart is already ruled by a foreign god. . .or a disordered passion, or an alien creed, or your own ego. The throne of your heart has room enough for just one Master. Who will it be? Financial security? Personal achievement? Social prestige? Jesus urges his disciples, “Look at the birds in the sky; they do not sow or reap, they gather nothing into barns, yet your heavenly Father feeds them.” Then he asks, “Are not you more important than they? Can any of you – by worrying – add a single moment to your life-span?” If the Father feeds the birds of the sky so that they do not worry about food, and if we are more important than they, then it follows that the Father will care for us as well. When you place the Father on the throne of your heart, you do not worry. Why? B/c nothing bad will ever happen to you? No. B/c you will never again feel want or need? No. Well, why? B/c you will know that whatever comes will never be, can never be more anxiety-producing than forgetting the One you serve. With Christ as the source and summit, the center and foundation of our day-to-day living, nothing and no one can disturb you.

There's room enough on the throne of your heart for just one Master. Who will it be? Financial security? Personal achievement? Social prestige? A job can be lost, money stolen. Works can be destroyed or bettered by another. And there's always someone ready to take your place as king of the social hill. It's all just more junk to worry about. Jesus reminds us, “So do not worry and say, ‘What are we to eat?’ or ‘What are we to drink?’ or ‘What are we to wear?’” And then, sounding very much like he did last week, he adds, “All these things the pagans seek.” Who are these pagans? They're the ones who serve Money, Popularity, Vengeance, the Thing of This World – all passing away as fast as an empty heart can grab them and give them a crown. This is not who we were made to be – temples to house the temporary gods of a failing world. We were made – pagans and Christians alike – we were made for eternity, built to endure the purifying Love of the One Who made us. But such endurance is only made real by a decision, a decision to serve the One Who made us, to serve Him alone. “No one can serve two masters. . .” No one can survive with a heart divided in two.

Nor can one with a divided heart be trusted. Paul, writing to the Corinthians, describes himself and his fellow apostles, “Thus should one regard us: as servants of Christ and stewards of the mysteries of God.” A steward holds the keys to the castle and the treasury, so he must be trustworthy, a servant deserving of his master's trust. Since we can do nothing good w/o Christ, whatever trust we deserve as servants is his before it is ours. And given our very human tendency to fail his trust, it's a good thing that we do not have to rely on our trust alone! Paul notes that when the Lord returns to judge his stewards' care of his kingdom, “. . .he will bring to light what is hidden in darkness and will manifest the motives of our hearts. . .” What will he see when the light shines inside? What motives will squirm into view? If Christ rules our hearts, he will see his serene reflection – perfect love, hope, and faith. If Christ rules, he will see what the Father sees when He looks at Christ – a beloved child, a pure soul, perfect trust. However, if some foreign god or disordered passion or bloated ego rules. . .well, all he will see is a heart that has chosen to rule itself, a heart that has chosen to spend eternity primping in a cracked mirror. If we want to Christ to see himself reflected in us at the judgment, then he must be the one we serve. 

 

As Lent fast approaches and we set ourselves on the 40 day trek, remember all that the Father said to Isaiah, “I haven't forsaken, forgotten, or abandoned you. Remember, my soul, I AM your rock, your salvation, your refuge and your strength. I AM your stronghold and your hope. Trust in Me at all times, O my people! Pour out your hearts before Me, and nothing will ever disturb you.” Pour out from your heart whatever or whoever it is that takes you away from your salvation. Pour out the foreign gods, the disordered passions, the causal idols of deceit and gossip; pour out anything that stands btw you and Christ, anyone who threatens Christ's trust in you. Lest we forget, the Psalmist sings over and over again, “Rest in God alone, my soul. Rest in God alone.” There is no rest, no eternal rest, in anyone but Him.

 
______________________
 
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Have you forgotten God?

NB. I'm preaching this morning at St D.'s but not presiding. The knee is gimpy again (sigh).

8^th Sunday OT (A)

St. Dominic, NOLA

Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP

O Lord! Why have you forsaken me? “Rest in God alone, my soul.” O God! Why have you forgotten me? “Rest in God alone, my soul.” O Lord! Why have you abandoned me? “Get a grip already! I haven't forsaken, forgotten, or abandoned you. Remember, my soul, I AM your rock, your salvation, your refuge and your strength. I AM your stronghold and your hope. Trust in Me at all times, O my people! Pour out your hearts before Me, and nothing will ever disturb you.” So says the Lord to His anxious people. Pour out your heart before the Lord. And nothing will ever disturb you. At the center of your love for God and one another – your heart – who or what takes up the most time and space? That is, when you carefully consider the source and summit, the foundation and center of your day-to-day existence, who or what directs your heart and mind? If that who or what is anyone or anything but Christ himself, then pour out your heart before the Father, pour out whatever or whoever it is that directs you, and surrender yourself once again to Christ. If you are worried that God has forgotten you, ask yourself: have I forgotten God?

God's people are anxious. They are afraid that He has forgotten them. So, He asks Isaiah, “Can a mother forget her infant, be without tenderness for the child of her womb? Even should she forget, I will never forget you.” Lay to rest then any worry that God will forget us. If we are going to worry, why not worry about a very real and dangerous possibility: that we will forget God? That we will abandon the Lord and His covenant with us in Christ. Pushed and pulled from every side by the seductive forces of an increasingly secular culture, it is all too easy to give up on the Father and His Christ. He promises that nothing and no one will ever disturb us. True. But He doesn't promise that nothing or no one will never try. Whether or not we will be disturbed by this world's seductions is predictable. Whether or not we will be seduced is also predictable. How? Ask yourself: who or what sits on the throne of my heart? Who or what rules you? To put it in gospel terms: whom do you serve? Whose call do you answer? If Christ rules your heart; if you serve Christ and his Church, then there is only one call to answer, one voice that gets your attention and obedience: “Trust in Me at all times, O my people! Pour out your hearts before Me, and nothing will ever disturb you.” Pour out your hearts before Him. . .and serve Him alone.

Jesus says it plainly: “No one can serve two masters. . .You cannot serve God and mammon.” God cannot rule your heart if your heart is already ruled by a foreign god; or a disordered passion; or an alien creed; or your own ego. The throne of your heart has room enough for just one Master. Who will it be? Financial security? Personal preferences? Social prestige? Jesus urges his disciples, “Look at the birds in the sky; they do not sow or reap, they gather nothing into barns, yet your heavenly Father feeds them.” Then he asks, “Are not you more important than they? Can any of you – by worrying – add a single moment to your life-span?” If the Father feeds the birds of the sky so that they do not worry about food, and if we are more important than they, then it follows that the Father will care for us as well. When you place the Father on the throne of your heart, you do not worry. Why? B/c nothing bad will ever happen to you? No. B/c you will never again feel want or need? No. Well, why? B/c you will know that whatever comes will never be, can never be more anxiety-producing than forgetting the One you serve. With Christ as the source and summit, the center and foundation of our day-to-day living, nothing and no one can disturb you.

There's room enough on the throne of your heart for just one Master. Who will it be? Financial security? Personal preferences? Social prestige? A job can be lost, money stolen. Works can be destroyed or bettered by another. And there's always someone ready to take your place as king of the social hill. It's all just more junk to worry about. Jesus reminds us, “So do not worry and say, ‘What are we to eat?’ or ‘What are we to drink?’ or ‘What are we to wear?’” And then, sounding very much like he did last week, he adds, “All these things the pagans seek.” Who are these pagans? They're the ones who serve Money, Popularity, Vengeance, the Thing of This World – all passing away as fast as an empty heart can grab them and give them a crown. This is not who we are made to be. We are not made to be temples to house the temporary gods of a failing world. We are made – pagans and Christians alike – we are made for eternity, built to endure the purifying Love of the One Who makes us. But such endurance is only made real by a decision, a decision to serve the One Who makes us, to serve Him alone. “No one can serve two masters. . .” No one can survive with a heart divided in two.

Nor can one with a divided heart be trusted. Paul, writing to the Corinthians, describes himself and his fellow apostles, “Thus should one regard us: as servants of Christ and stewards of the mysteries of God.” A steward holds the keys to the castle and the treasury, so he must be trustworthy, a servant deserving of his master's trust. Since we can do nothing good w/o Christ, whatever trust we deserve as servants is his before it is ours. And given our very human tendency to fail his trust, it's a good thing that we do not have to rely on our trust alone! Paul notes that when the Lord returns to judge his stewards' care of his kingdom, “. . .he will bring to light what is hidden in darkness and will manifest the motives of our hearts. . .” What will he see when the light shines inside? What disordered motives will wiggle into view? If Christ rules our hearts, he will see his serene reflection – perfect love, hope, and faith. If Christ rules, he will see what the Father sees when He looks at Christ – a beloved child, a pure soul, perfect trust. However, if some foreign god or disordered passion or bloated ego rules. . .well, all he will see is a heart that has chosen to rule itself, a heart that has chosen to spend eternity primping in a cracked mirror. If we want Christ to see himself reflected in us at the judgment, then he must be the one we serve.

As Lent fast approaches and we set ourselves on the 40 day trek, remember all that the Father said to Isaiah, “I haven't forsaken, forgotten, or abandoned you. Remember, my soul, I AM your rock, your salvation, your refuge and your strength. I AM your stronghold and your hope. Trust in Me at all times, O my people! Pour out your hearts before Me, and nothing will ever disturb you.” Pour out from your heart whatever or whoever it is that takes you away from your salvation. Pour out the foreign gods, the disordered passions, the causal idols of deceit and gossip; pour out anything that stands btw you and Christ, anyone who threatens Christ's trust in you. Lest we forget, the Psalmist sings over and over again, “Rest in God alone, my soul. Rest in God alone.” There is no rest, no eternal rest, in anyone but Christ.

Futile w/o Christ

18th Sunday OT
Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP
Our Lady of the Rosary, NOLA

Have you ever lost your mind and wondered where you put it? Have you ever changed your mind and wondered if you are now another person? Ever have something on your mind and wondered if the weight of it was showing up on the bathroom scale? What is the mind anyway? Most contemporary philosophers have accepted that the mind is simply the work of the brain and that when we use “mind-terms” to describe mental activities and states (sadness, confusion, insight), we are really just talking about neuro-chemical activity in the brain. “Happiness” is just this amount of serotonin and these neurotransmitters firing. Nothing more. Most modern psychological theories of mind tell us what the mind is; how it works with memory, perception, learning, and will; how we use it, and how we lose it. So, when Paul writes to the Ephesians, “I declare and testify in the Lord that you must no longer live as the Gentiles do, in the futility of their minds; that is not how you learned Christ...,” we much ask: have we learned Christ, or do we live as the Gentiles do in the “futility of their minds”? 

 

By the third time I attempted college algebra—having dropped it twice out of abject fear—I concluded that my brain was not wired to comprehend the occult lore of math. To my mind, geometry is an ancient magical system for plotting an eternity of suffering. Calculus is a demonic wisdom that tricks us into giving our souls to the Devil. Confronted by the squiggly gibberish of numbers in formulas, my mind freezes in fear and then flees to poetry where nothing can hurt me, or make me hurt myself or others. I failed to learn math as a kid, and now, as an adult, I will not put on the mind of math because such a renovation project seems to me be utterly futile, hopelessly empty of promise. So, along with all the number-challenged souls in the world I rejoice to hear Paul say, “...truth is in Jesus...” Alleluia! This truth is the one truth I do not fear. Though I seek this truth, there is some question about whether or not I have learned it. This is a judgment to be made at the conclusion of this world, the Mother of All Final Exams. I hope Professor Jesus allows us all a crib sheet! 

 

Desperate to witness signs of wonder and learn the mysteries of salvation, crowds follow Jesus around throwing questions at him like paparazzi after Beyonce. On occasion, Jesus obliges the crowds by healing the blind, the demonically possessed, and even the dead. He teaches his Father's mercy and calls all to repentance and a new way of living life toward a glorious end in heaven. He even demonstrates his command of math by multiplying five loaves of bread and two fish into enough food for five thousand. Impressed but unfulfilled, the crowds demand more and wait on the next miracle to confirm their faith. Jesus tells them that they are asking him to teach the wrong lesson: “...you are looking for me not because you saw signs but because you ate the loaves and were filled.” They are lead by the stomach not the mind; hunger-pangs brings them to Christ not the pangs of ignorance. Though the bread they eat fills the belly, it does not fill the soul. Therefore, Professor Jesus concludes, “Do not work for food that perishes but for the food that endures for eternal life. . .” 

 

What do you hunger for, thirst for? What do you need to see, to learn, to feel before you can say that you are filled-up, completely satisfied? If you were in one of those crowds following Jesus around, what one gift would you beg him for; what one question would you ask him? You might say, “I only desire to do the work of God!” Do you know what that work is for you? Have you read the job description for being a good Christian? Have you learned Jesus as your one truth, putting “away the old self of your former way of life, corrupted through deceitful desires, and [been renewed] in the spirit of your minds”? If you have, then you have done the work of God. Jesus says, “ This is the work of God, that you believe in the one he sent.” First, believe; then think, feel, act, be always out of this belief in Christ and your life will be a sign to others that you have “put on the new self, [and have been] created in God’s way in righteousness and holiness of truth.” You will be a sign of hope to all those who seek the truth that Christ is the truth they seek.

Though we have a long, long history of exploring the philosophical, scientific, and theological nature of the human mind, we do not need a philosophical or scientific theory of consciousness in order to comprehend and live the mind of Christ. We do not need a clear and distinct idea about the structure of memory or perception, or a fulsome argument for the nature of thinking, or the workings of emotion and will. If mind is simply the neuro-chemical activity of the brain, fine. Do your dopamine, serotonin, and norepinephrine belong to Christ? If mind is the rational faculty of the soul that allows us to abstract ideas from sense experience, fine. Does your reason belong to Christ? Do you see and hear and touch Christ first? And if mind is a reflection of the One Mind corrupted by the body, so be it. Are you receiving God's graces to perfect your body and elevate your mind? If not, Paul reminds you, “...you must no longer live as the Gentiles do, in the futility of their minds.” For Paul, the Gentile mind reaches for knowledge and understanding without first having grasped Christ. This is utterly futile because “truth is in Jesus.” 

 

You might be the one in the crowd who yells out to Jesus, “OK! The truth is in you. What sign can you do, that we may see and believe in you?” Jesus says to you, to all of us, “What can you do? Our ancestors ate manna in the desert...it was not Moses who gave the bread from heaven; my Father gives you the true bread from heaven.” You look to the sky. Glance around at the ground. Your stomach rumbles a bit. “Well, sir, give us this bread always.” Jesus smiles. This is the perfect set-up, the best of all segues. He takes the moment in hand, pauses just long enough to build an arc of anticipation, and then teaches the crowd, “I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me will never hunger, and whoever believes in me will never thirst.” Never hunger. Never thirst. First, believe; then think, feel, act, be always out of this belief in Christ and your life here and now will be a reflection of your promised life at the foot of the throne. You will be the only sign any of us will need to believe, the only miracle any of us will ask for. 

 

Have you learned Christ? If so, then be Christ for us! If not, then let the Body and Blood you take this evening be your food and drink for the pilgrimage to heaven. Receive him as you would a rescuer come to take you from the wilderness. He will bring you to a far holier land.

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You are who you say he is. . .(AUDIO LINK added)

Audio Link

12th Sunday OT 2016
Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP
Our Lady of the Rosary, NOLA

Deny yourself. Take up your cross. Follow Christ. If you will save your life for heaven, you will lose your life for Christ on earth. But if you seek to spare yourself suffering, trial, and persecution while you're alive, you'll just end up losing your eternal life. The choice couldn't be any clearer, or any more depressing. To follow Christ, it seems, is to live a life of self-sacrifice and self-denial; grimly determined to slog through this valley of tears, hoping and praying that our lives after this one will be better. The most we can hope for while trapped in this mortal coil is that we'll be given the chance to die a martyr's death and escape a long sentence in purgatory. Deny yourself. Take up your cross. And follow Christ to your execution in the Valley of Skulls. Of course, what this dreary picture leaves out is the daily reward of following Christ: the peace that comes from detaching ourselves from the weight of impermanent things; the joy that comes from forgiving and being forgiven; the knowledge that our love for others is perfecting God's love in us. It leaves out the part where self-sacrifice and self-denial are our ways of offering God praise, of giving Him thanks. It forgets to ask, “Who do you say that you are?”

Paul starts us on the way to an answer. Addressing the Galatians, he writes, “Through faith you are all children of God in Christ Jesus. For all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ.” Who do we say that we are? Let's change Paul's declaration up a bit: “Through faith we are all children of God in Christ Jesus. For all of us who were baptized into Christ have clothed ourselves with Christ.” Who do we say that we are? Children of God in Christ. Dead, buried, and raised with Christ in baptism. We have put on Christ, been clothed with Christ. We belong to Christ. So, when we deny ourselves, we only give away that which is no longer ours to keep. When we take up a cross, it is Christ's cross that we lift up. When we follow after him, it is not our lives that we are spending but his. What is truly dreary, truly dismal is living a life ordered toward the things of this world, the things that will pass away, that will inevitably abandon us. What's truly depressing is spending your life staring at an end where nothing begins, where your only hope is that after you die someone might remember you. Is that who you are? Who you will be? A memory—fond or not—just a memory?

How do we get to the best answer to the question of who we are? We can start with the questions Jesus asks his disciples. First, he wants to know who the crowds say that he is. They answer. Then, he turns to his friends and students and asks them, “But who do you say that I am?” Peter answers for the disciples. Note that Jesus first asks about the crowds, then he directly questions his friends. What do the disciples know about Jesus that the crowds do not? This is exactly what Jesus wants them to recognize and confess. They know who he is, and those in the crowds do not. Knowing who Jesus truly is means knowing what his purpose is, what he is here to be and do. The crowds think that Jesus is a just another prophet, like Elijah or John the Baptist. So, at most, those in the crowds will see a miracle or two; maybe two or three of them will be healed. But b/c the disciples know and confess Jesus' identity as the Christ of God, they belong to Christ; they are Abraham’s descendants; and “heirs according to the promise.” The best way to answer the question of who we are is to correctly answer the question: who do you say that Jesus is? Who you say Jesus is is who you are.

And if you say that Jesus is the Christ, then you will deny yourself, take up your cross daily, and follow him. If you will save your life for heaven, you will lose your life for Christ on earth. But if you seek to spare yourself suffering, trial, and persecution by denying Christ while you're alive, you'll just end up losing your eternal life. The reason for this is simple: you belong to Christ. We all belong to Christ. And belonging to Christ has consequences. As heirs to the promise, we have our own promises to keep. To seek holiness through self-sacrifice and self-denial. To bear witness to the mercy we've received from God. To forgive those who have sinned against us. To enthrone the Holy Spirit in the tabernacles of our hearts and surrender all of our gifts to His service. None of these promises is easy to fulfill. But they are all the more difficult to keep if we shy away from confessing that Jesus is the Christ, if we persist in following the crowds and making him into a latter-day prophet, or a social reformer, or a political revolutionary. He showed us the way to eternal life on his cross—sacrificial love. And it is sacrificial love that will nail each one of us to our own cross. . .if we will follow him; if we deny the Self and all that bloats and rots the Self in this world.

So, who do you say that Jesus is? Do you follow after a Barbie Doll Jesus, changing his designer outfits whenever the whim strikes? Do you say that he was just a religious leader that died in the first century? Some biblical scholars argue that Jesus was really an early second century literary composite of many different prophets. The gospel writers and editors invented Jesus to help the early church in its PR campaign against the Jews and Romans. Or maybe you would say that Jesus was a peace-nik vegetarian hippie prototype with serious Daddy issues? Just remember: whoever you say that Jesus is tells you who you are. And what you have promised to do with your life. And what you will be after you are gone. Our Lord isn't a Barbie Doll or a literary composite. And following him isn't always a parade. He tells the disciples what will happen to him: “The Son of Man must suffer greatly and be rejected by the [religious leaders] and be killed and on the third day be raised.” If they follow him, they can expect the same. And so can we. Knowing this, expecting this: who do you say that Jesus is? Not just “who is Jesus to you” but who is he really, truly? If he is the Christ, deny yourself, take up your cross, and follow him. Daily. Daily, seek to spend your life living as a child of God clothed with Christ. You belong to Christ. You are Abraham’s descendants, and you are heirs according to the promise.

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Mission Two: Grace and Divinization

Advent Mission Two: 2 Peter 1.3-7
Fr. Philip N. Powell, OP
Sacred Heart Catholic Church, Alva, OK

I was born in the Mississippi Delta into a cotton-growing family. This means that I grew up in the middle bible-believing Baptists—hard-shell, heart-felt, deep-down Jesus folks who were certain of their salvation, possessed of a perfect understanding of their redemption. There was no doubt, no hemming or hawing, not even the passing shade of a question that Jesus is Lord. Their personal meeting with Christ defines who they are and who they will become: upright, moral people, righteous, God-fearing and heaven-bound. Salvation for them is an acre-sized mural painted with sharp lines, undiluted colors, and exactly framed. And this mural hangs, perfectly balanced, in the center of their lives. These folks know their faith. They can tell you what you need to know about Jesus, the Bible, about sin and salvation, and they can do it with profound conviction.

Here in Alva, OK you have no doubt heard the following questions: are you saved? Have you accepted Jesus Christ into your heart as your personal Lord and Savior? Do you know Jesus?

As a Catholic, how do you understand your salvation? When we talk about our redemption, what do you hear? If you were asked by a Protestant friend—“Are you saved?”—what would you say? Another (more indirect) way to ask this same question: what are you doing when you come to church? Why do you show up here on Sunday morning? Meeting an obligation? Did mama drag you outta bed? Wife badger you into showing up? Guilt? Habit? Piety? The need for true worship? The presence of the Risen Lord in the sacrament? Why do you come here? Answer me that and you can answer me this: “Are you saved?”

Do you as a Catholic understand what it means to be in a redeeming relationship with the Father through Christ in the Holy Spirit?

In his second letter, Peter points us unswervingly to the conclusion that for us to be saved in Christ we must become Christ; we share in his cup and his sacrifice, partake in his divine nature. There is no other name under heaven given to us by which we can saved. We are God’s children now; what we will be has not yet been revealed, but we do know that when what we will be is revealed we shall be like him. Ss. Irenaeus and Thomas Aquinas have proclaimed: Brothers and sisters, see what love the father has bestowed on us—He became man so that we might become God!

Are you saved? Have you accepted Jesus Christ into your heart as your personal Lord and Savior? Why are you here this evening? I hope you are here this evening to hear of God’s mercy; to listen to the Word proclaimed and preached; to offer praise and thanksgiving to God; to ask for what you need and to ask for others what they need; to place yourself—your worries, your loves, your resentments, jealousies, your impatience, yourself—all of you, placed on the altar to be offered to God, sacrificed, made holy in surrender. All of your wounds can be closed up. Now the question is: do you want to be healed? Will you do what is necessary to properly use God’s gifts to you? In other words, will you go out there and look and work and play like a redeemed child of the Father? Or will you refuse your redemption by failing to use your gifts for the service of others?

For Catholics, to be redeemed is not to be “holistically integrated as a person,” if by this we mean nothing more than to be made psychologically balanced. Jesus did not die on the cross and rise again to treat a psychiatric diagnosis. For Catholics, to be redeemed is not to be “made one with Earth.” All of creation will be redeemed in time, but Jesus did not die on the cross and rise again to show us the love and faithfulness of Mother Earth. For Catholics, to be redeemed is not to be “absorbed into the Universal Oneness.” Jesus did not die on the cross and rise again so that we might be dissolved into stardust and fall back into the ocean of space like a drop of water. For Catholics, to be redeemed is not to be “liberated from oppressive economic and gender hierarchies” Jesus did not die on the cross and rise again to spark an academic revolution that fetishizes authoritarian political correctness and moral anarchy.

For Catholics, to be redeemed is to be made a son and daughter of the Father through the freely given sacrifice of the Son in the love of the Holy Spirit. To be redeemed is to be repaired, to be rescued, to be healed. We are found by our shepherd. Loved as children; raised from death by the Only Name given to us for our salvation. To be redeemed is to be brought to Him as an votive offering, a sacrifice; made holy, perfected in His image and likeness. To be redeemed is to be transformed into Christ through Christ. And to do what Christ did while we wait for his coming again.

The longest tradition of the Catholic Church understands our redemption and sanctification, our one time rescue and our growing into holiness, as an on-going process of turning each of us individually and all of us together into Christ. The Biblical tradition, the Patristic tradition, the scholastic tradition, and all of the traditions of the Church loyal to the magisterial ministry of Peter agree: God became man so that men might become God. That’s right. You heard me correctly: to be saved is to be made God. We call this deification or divinization—the God-initiated, God-driven, God-bound process of bringing a man or woman into the fullest possible participation in the divine life. Think about what the phrase “to partake” means. We can partake in a meal. Partake in a game of poker. Partake in an discussion. This means that we are involved, engaged, deeply committed to the activity, and open to the players, the actors; open to the game, and ready to be caught up, absorbed, taken in and changed. You eat a steak and that steak becomes part of you. You drink a glass of water and that water becomes part of you. You marry and your single flesh joins another single flesh to become one flesh. You eat the Body and drink the Blood of Christ and you become Christ. You are what you eat!

To partake of the divine nature, then means to share in, to participate in, to live with right now and forever the Blessed Trinity. To be supremely intimate with God the Father who loves His Son in the Holy Spirit. But we have to be absolutely clear about one thing: we do nothing to deserve this gift of the divine life; we do nothing to merit our redemption in Christ; we cannot reach for God until God teaches us to reach; we cannot grasp at an everlasting life until God teaches us to grasp; we cannot pray, sacrifice, sing, forgive, confess, repent, show mercy, grow in holiness—none of this!—we can do none of this until God teaches us to pray, sacrifice, sing, forgive, confess, repent, show mercy, grow in holiness.

Last night, I preached about Adam and Eve and their disobedience. They fell for the lie of the serpent who told them that they could become gods w/o God. Essentially, the serpent told them that they could make themselves into gods. Common sense tells us that no imperfect thing can make itself perfect. How can two creatures of the Creator make themselves into the Creator Himself? Impossible! It is not impossible, however, for the Creator to bring His creatures to Him and make them a part of His life. Adam and Eve enjoyed God’s favor until they decided to become gods w/o God. Now, thanks to these two, we are plagued by the same temptation, the same devilish bait; and we fight—I hope we fight!—against the seduction of a divinity that cannot be ours unless it is given to us by God Himself.

And thank God that He does want to give us a share in His life. God has been calling us back to Him for generations, for centuries, through empires, wars, prosperity, disaster, and leaps in human development, and we have responded eagerly at times, soberly at others, sometimes violently and sometimes joyfully. Regardless of our response, He wants us with Him but He wants us freely, of our own accord, or not at all. Because of the Fall we are unable—alone—to say Yes to God, to come to Him as He wishes. So, we are graced. The Catechism defines grace this way: “Grace is favor, the free, undeserved help that God gives us to respond to his call to become children of God, adoptive sons, partakers of the divine nature and of eternal life”(n. 1996).

Thomas Aquinas teaches us that grace is God’s invitation to live the divine life with Him. To say, “I am graced” is to say “God has invited me to live with Him forever.” To say, “God gives me the grace I need to resist temptation” is the same as saying “God’s invitation to me to live with Him forever is all I need to obey His will for me.” Grace is not magic; it is not quantifiable in inches or pounds; it is not measurable in minutes or hours or days; grace cannot be bought, sold, or exchanged. There is no economy of grace that runs on barter, credit, or your good looks! Grace, by definition, is free. Gratis. It is a gift. Unmerited. Undeserved. And without limit or appeal.

God wills that you be with Him always. He also wills that you come to Him freely. To free you from sin—a slavery of disobedience—He sent His only Son to become one of us, like us in all things but sin, to take on our humanity in order to heal humanity, to restore us to a right relationship with Him so that His invitation to us to spend eternity with Him could be clearly heard. Jesus spoke this invitation over and over and over again, healing, preaching, teaching, praying, publicly witnessing to the Father’s grant of mercy, witnessing to the death sin’s power, calling everyone, from everywhere to come to Him, to confess their disobedience, to repent, and to live a life of holiness now, waiting on the coming of the Lord so that we might live in holiness with Him forever.


You see, brothers and sisters, the Devil has convinced us—at least some of us!—that we do not deserve God’s grace and that we should be horrified that He would grant us anything much less mercy for our sins. The Devil, as usual, is only half-right. We don’t deserve God’s grace. Getting what you deserve is called justice. Getting a favor granted when there is no good reason to have it granted is called a gift, a grace. The Devil needs for you feel bad about this grant of mercy. He needs for you to be upset that your sins so are easily forgiven. You are supposed to say, “I can’t believe that God just wiped all those sins away! I’ve been horrible!” Then you are supposed to worry that your sins haven’t really been forgiven or that only some of them have been forgiven or that God is playing a game where He says He’s given you but really He’s waiting to pounce later on and punish you for your disobedience. The Devil needs this from you b/c he wants you focused on your misery, your contrition; he wants you anxious about many things, the most prominent being the possibility, the likelihood that you will sin again and fall into despair. He wants despair. He wants you to come to think that your sins are so awful, so heinous that there is simply nothing God can do in the face of your terrible treachery, your murderous betrayal. If he can get you here, you will stop asking for God’s grace. What’s the point of grace when you’ve done nothing to deserve it?

Be careful! When you start believing that you have to be good or do good to make God love you, you are standing on the edge of a bleak abyss, a soul-sucking desert that will draw you in like moisture to a dry sponge and set you on a spiral of self-destruction and chaos that has no other end than your permanent death in Hell. Let me say that again: if you think that you can earn God’s love, in some way work your way into God’s favor or somehow wrangle a bit more love out of Him by “being good,” then you are poised right on the edge of handing your soul over to the Devil. Do you think I’m being too dramatic? The whole point of grace, folks, is that it is undeserved. Gifts are freely given. If you give a gift to get a gift, it ain’t a gift! It’s an exchange of goods. If you give a gift to get a favor, it’s not a gift; it’s a bribe. We, as creatures, are in no position to bargain with God. We have nothing He needs. Everything we have and everything we are is His already. We don’t need to convince God to love us. God is love. It is Who He Is to love. And He loves us most of all!

Now, we have to be careful again. The Devil is always a liar and sometimes he lies by telling the truth. It is absolutely true that God loves us unconditionally. He grants us His favor without condition. Christ died once for all. Everyone is invited to the banquet table, everyone gets an invitation to the wedding feast. But remember: Gods wants us to come to Him freely. He freed us from the slavery of sin so that we might come to Him unhindered, that we might travel His Way to Him without restraint. No angel, no devil, no person can stand in the way of your journey. No one but you. God’s grace strengthens your legs to you to walk His path. But grace will not walk the path for you. God’s grace holds out a helping hand. But grace will not grab you and drag you home. God’s grace will enlighten your mind on the way. But grace will not overwhelm your will. You cannot be a puppet and love God. Only the freed children of the Father can love in freedom.


It is true that God loves us unconditionally. But this doesn’t mean that God’s love has no consequences for our lives. God loves us to change us. He loves the adulterer, the rapist, the murderer, the pornographer, the child molester. He loves the liar, the thief, and the wife beater. He loves men who gossip, women who cheat at cards, teens who lie to mom and dad, men who look too long at the check out girl, and boys who spend too much time in the bathroom. But we must not think of God’s unconditional love for us as approval for our sin. God loves the murderer to change him into a saint—to make him passionate for holiness. God loves the gossip to change her into a prophet—to make her tongue into a witness. God loves the wife beater to change him into a good husband—to change his rage into furious charity. God’s grace is never permission to sin or to remain in sin or to plan to sin some time down the road. The Devil will whisper to you on the Way, “Ah, go ahead and do what you want. God loves you regardless, right?” Yes, He does. And He will love you as you choose again and again to defy Him and He will love you when you make your final choice to live without Him and He love you right into Hell. Your choice. Not His.

Peter tells us tonight that God’s “divine power has granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness [so that we may] become partakers of the divine nature.” Therefore, brothers and sisters, b/c God has granted you all that you need to live in abundance and to grow in holiness, work to enrich your faith with good habits and work to strengthen your good habits with wisdom and use your wisdom with temperance, with self-control and charity. Show your godliness with affection for your brothers and sisters in Christ. Mean-spirited holiness is like muddy cleanliness or dirt poor wealth. Doesn’t make sense. If you are unwilling to show charity. Don’t expect it. If you are unwilling to forgive. Don’t wait to be forgiven. Jesus assures us that we will judged in the same way that we judge others—measure for measure. You’ve been warned! So be careful that you do not become your sin. Be careful that you do not allow pride or envy or greed or lust to set up an altar in your heart and demand worship from you. The Psalms tell us that those who worship idols become the idols they worship. Will you become the nothingness that never gets full, the blackhole of want and need that never closes, never stops taking and taking?

Are you saved? Do you know Jesus Christ as your personal Lord and Savior? If you have been baptized by water into the Body of Christ and in the name of the Blessed Trinity, and you have received the seal of the Holy Spirit in the anointing of oil, and you have eaten at the altar the Body and Blood of Christ himself, then you had better believe you know Jesus as your Lord and Savior! And what’s more you have stepped into the adventure of living with Christ in the Father’s love and growing holier and holier with the grace of the Spirit. Do not be made a fool by the Devil: we are the freely adopted sons and daughters of a loving Father who wills that we come to Him now and stay with Him forever. We can’t live just Now and ignore Forever. Nor can we live just Forever and ignore Now. We are given the difficult task of living Now as if we were in heaven already. But thank God we are also give all the grace, all the gifts we need to do all this perfectly.

Tomorrow night we will gather here again to celebrate the sacrament of reconciliation. Between now and then I want you to ask yourself two questions to prepare for your conversion: 1) when have I failed to use my gifts to serve others for God’s glory? and 2) how do I plan to make better use of God’s gifts tomorrow and tomorrow?

Remember: as Catholics we do nothing alone! Our holiness is an art and a science. We paint with bright lines and pure colors. And we grow in wisdom and knowledge. But we do so only b/c God has loved us first. And He loves us even now!

Pull down the idol of Self

 

 Audio

26^th Sunday OT

Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP

OLR, NOLA

It seems that disobedience comes naturally to us. Our first impulse is to say NO to God and hope we can get away with saying NO. We can. For a little while at least. In the end though – disobedience comes around to bite us in the. . .the rear. If we're smart, we'll take that bite, jump in surprise, and mend our ways, returning to the straight and narrow that leads to eternal life. Like the first son in Jesus' parable, we might say NO at first but then realize how dumb that is and repent. Saying NO and repenting later is certainly better than the path taken by the second son – saying YES to God and then doing nothing. This is both a lie and an act of disobedience. The bite that comes after this little charade will hurt. . . forever. So, how do we overcome the vicious habit of saying NO to God? How do we get into the habit of obedience, the habit of listening for God's will and following Him? Paul helps us out here: “Do nothing out of selfishness or out of vainglory; rather, humbly regard others as more important than yourselves. . .Have in you the same attitude that is also in Christ Jesus.” Disobedience grows out of pride; pride is conquered by humility; and humility is nurtured by repentance.

Disobedience grows out of pride. Fundamentally, pride is the vicious habit of thinking and acting as if I can become god w/o God; that is, that I can achieve perfection w/o any help from God. If I can achieve my end – perfection in heaven – w/o any help from God, then there is no reason for me to be obedient to God's will. This is the lie that the Serpent told Eve in the Garden – “You can be like God.” How? By disobeying Him. This tendency to ignore God and outright defy His will is part and parcel of our fallen human nature. How much time and energy do we waste trying to find the perfection we long for and at the same time ignore the only Perfect Way available to us? DIY religion is quite the trend these days. Pick and choose, buffet-style from a wide diversity of options and blend them all together into a comfortable, happy little spirituality that soothes the seared conscience and provides an incredibly shallow sense of spiritual depth. Or we could substitute political activism for religion and feed self-righteousness with outrage, believing that our anger will somehow propel us into a secular saintliness. If we choose anyone or anything but Christ, we are choosing Self. We are choosing pride and willful ignorance. And this path leads to destruction. Every single time.

Fortunately, pride is conquered by humility. If choosing the Self above all others – including God – leads to destruction, then choosing Others over Self perfects humility. Humility is nothing more than acknowledging the truth that I am totally dependent on God for everything I have and everything I am. Nothing I have, nothing I am is truly mine. It all belongs to God. Whatever gifts I have belong to God. My education, my experiences, my talents, my memories, my priesthood, my religious life – all belong to God. My family, friends, colleagues; those who call themselves my enemies – all of them belong to God. The more deeply I acknowledge and live out this truth, the more deeply am I able surrender to God's will and use all that He has given me to preach and teach His Good News. And the more deeply I surrender, the closer I get to being perfected in His Christ. IOW, the less I struggle to take control of my own perfection, the freer I am to receive the perfection He freely gives. Pride clings to Self. Pride stubbornly controls and seeks control. Pride urges me to proclaim myself the god of my life. Pride makes ME into an idol for me.

How do we depose the idol of Self and turn toward Others? Humility is nurtured by repentance. The first son says NO and then repents. Saying NO to God is certainly a sin, but repenting and turning to obedience is salvation. We are free to say to God NO. But saying NO to God traps us in slavery to sin. Once we say NO, it gets harder and harder to say anything else. Over time, we become fools, unable to distinguish Good from Evil. We can hold pride in check and put off becoming fools by naming our sins, repenting of them, and receiving God's always, already offered forgiveness. This is simply a process of saying to God, “I belong to You, Lord. Everything I have and everything I am is Yours! What would You have me do with what is Yours?” Think of repentance as the daily, hourly intentional return to the Truth of who you really are in Christ. When some other god worms its way onto the throne of our heart, repentance is only tool you need to accomplish a coup. Turn to Others and give freely from all that the Father has freely given to you. Turn to God and freely give back to Him everything you have and everything you are. Pull down the idol of Self. Be free to become Christ!

 

 

 

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Heirs according to the promise

12th Sunday OT 2013 
Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP 
St. Dominic, NOLA 

Deny yourself. Take up your cross. Follow Christ. If you will save your life for heaven, you will lose your life for Christ on earth. But if you seek to spare yourself suffering, trial, and persecution while you're alive, you'll just end up losing your eternal life. The choice couldn't be any clearer, or any more depressing. To follow Christ, it seems, is to live a life of mortification, sacrifice, and self-denial; grimly determined to slog through this vale of tears, hoping and praying that our lives after this one will be better. The most we can hope for while trapped in this mortal coil is that we'll be given the chance to die a martyr's death and escape a long sentence in purgatory. Deny yourself. Take up your cross. And follow Christ to your execution in the Valley of Skulls. Of course, what this dreary picture leaves out is the daily reward of following Christ: the peace that comes from detaching ourselves from the weight of impermanent things; the joy that comes from forgiving and being forgiven; the knowledge that our love for others is perfecting God's love in us. It leaves out the part where mortification, sacrifice, and self-denial are our ways of offering God praise, of giving Him thanks. This dismal picture of Christian life forgets to ask, “Who do you say that you are?” 

Paul starts us on the way to an answer. Addressing the Galatians, he writes, “Through faith you are all children of God in Christ Jesus. For all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ.” Who do we say that we are? Let's change Paul's declaration up a bit: “Through faith we are all children of God in Christ Jesus. For all of us who were baptized into Christ have clothed ourselves with Christ.” Who do we say that we are? Children of God in Christ. Dead, buried, and raised with Christ in baptism. We have put on Christ, been clothed with Christ. We belong to Christ. So, when we deny ourselves, we only give away that which is no longer ours to keep. When we take up a cross, it is Christ's cross that we lift up. When we follow after him, it is not our lives that we are spending but his. What is truly dreary, truly dismal is living a life ordered toward the things of this world, the things that will pass away, that will inevitable abandon us. What's truly depressing is spending your life staring at an end where nothing begins, where your only hope is that after you die someone might remember you. Is that who you are? Who you will be? A memory—fond or not—just a memory? 

How do we get to the best answer to the question of who we are? We can start with the questions Jesus asks his disciples. First, he wants to know who the crowds say that he is. They answer. Then, he turns to his friends and students and asks them, “But who do you say that I am?” Peter answers for the disciples. Note that Jesus first asks about the crowds, then he directly questions his friends. What do the disciples know about Jesus that the crowds do not? This is exactly what Jesus wants them to recognize and confess. They know who he is, and those in the crowds do not. Knowing who Jesus truly is means knowing what his purpose is, what he is here to be and do. The crowds think that Jesus is a just another prophet, like Elijah or John the Baptist. So, at most, those in the crowds will see a miracle or two; maybe two or three of them will be healed. But b/c the disciples know and confess Jesus' identity as the Christ of God, they belong to Christ; they are Abraham’s descendants; and “heirs according to the promise.” The best way to answer the question of who we are is to correctly answer the question: who do you say that Jesus is? Who you say Jesus is is who you are. 

And if you say that Jesus is the Christ, then you will deny yourself, take up your cross daily, and follow him. If you will save your life for heaven, you will lose your life for Christ on earth. But if you seek to spare yourself suffering, trial, and persecution by denying Christ while you're alive, you'll just end up losing your eternal life. The reason for this is simple: you belong to Christ. We all belong to Christ. And belonging to Christ has consequences. As heirs to the promise, we have our own promises to keep. To seek holiness through sacrifice and self-denial. To bear witness to the mercy we've received from God. To forgive those who have sinned against us. To enthrone the Holy Spirit in the tabernacles of our hearts and surrender all of our gifts to His service. None of these promises is easy to fulfill. But they are all the more difficult to keep if we shy away from confessing that Jesus is the Christ, if we persist in following the crowds and making him into a latter-day prophet, or a social reformer, or a political revolutionary. He showed us the way to eternal life on his cross—sacrificial love. And it is sacrificial love that will nail each one of us to our own cross. . .if we will follow him; if we deny the Self and all that bloats and rots the Self in this world. 

So, who do you say that Jesus is? Do you follow after a Barbie Doll Jesus, changing his designer outfits whenever the whimsy strikes you? Do you say that he was just a religious leader that died in the first century? Some biblical scholars argue that Jesus was really an early second century literary composite of many different prophets. The gospel writers and editors invented Jesus to help the early church in its PR campaign against the Jews and Romans. Or maybe you would say that Jesus was a peace-nik vegan hippie prototype with serious Daddy issues?Just remember: whoever you say that Jesus is tells you who you are. And what you have promised to do with your life. And what you will be after you are gone. Our Lord isn't a Barbie Doll or a literary composite. And following him isn't always a parade. He tells the disciples what will happen to him: “The Son of Man must suffer greatly and be rejected by the [religious leaders] and be killed and on the third day be raised.” If they follow him, they can expect the same. And so can we. Knowing this, expecting this: who do you say that Jesus is? Not just “who is Jesus to you” but who is he really, truly? If he is the Christ, deny yourself, take up your cross, and follow him. Daily. Daily, seek to spend your life living as a child of God clothed with Christ. You belong to Christ. You are Abraham’s descendants, and heirs according to the promise. 

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B16 to America!

Full-text of Pope Benedict's "Message to the American People":

Dear Brothers and Sisters in the United States of America,

The grace and peace of God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ be with all of you! In just a few days from now, I shall begin my apostolic visit to your beloved country. Before setting off, I would like to offer you a heartfelt greeting and an invitation to prayer. As you know, I shall only be able to visit two cities: Washington and New York. The intention behind my visit, though, is to reach out spiritually to all Catholics in the United States. At the same time, I earnestly hope that my presence among you will be seen as a fraternal gesture towards every ecclesial community, and a sign of friendship for members of other religious traditions and all men and women of good will. The risen Lord entrusted the Apostles and the Church with his Gospel of love and peace, and his intention in doing so was that the message should be passed on to all peoples.

At this point I should like to add some words of thanks, because I am conscious that many people have been working hard for a long time, both in Church circles and in the public services, to prepare for my journey. I am especially grateful to all who have been praying for the success of the visit, since prayer is the most important element of all. Dear friends, I say this because I am convinced that without the power of prayer, without that intimate union with the Lord, our human endeavours would achieve very little. Indeed this is what our faith teaches us. It is God who saves us, he saves the world, and all of history. He is the Shepherd of his people. I am coming, sent by Jesus Christ, to bring you his word of life.

Together with your Bishops, I have chosen as the theme of my journey three simple but essential words: "Christ our hope". Following in the footsteps of my venerable predecessors, Paul VI and John Paul II, I shall come to United States of America as Pope for the first time, to proclaim this great truth: Jesus Christ is hope for men and women of every language, race, culture and social condition. Yes, Christ is the face of God present among us. Through him, our lives reach fullness, and together, both as individuals and peoples, we can become a family united by fraternal love, according to the eternal plan of God the Father. I know how deeply rooted this Gospel message is in your country. I am coming to share it with you, in a series of celebrations and gatherings. I shall also bring the message of Christian hope to the great Assembly of the United Nations, to the representatives of all the peoples of the world. Indeed, the world has greater need of hope than ever: hope for peace, for justice, and for freedom, but this hope can never be fulfilled without obedience to the law of God, which Christ brought to fulfilment in the commandment to love one another. Do to others as you would have them do to you, and avoid doing what you would not want them to do. This "golden rule" is given in the Bible, but it is valid for all people, including non-believers. It is the law written on the human heart; on this we can all agree, so that when we come to address other matters we can do so in a positive and constructive manner for the entire human community.

Dirijo un cordial saludo a los católicos de lengua española y les manifiesto mi cercanía espiritual, en particular a los jóvenes, a los enfermos, a los ancianos y a los que pasan por dificultades o se sienten más necesitados. Les expreso mi vivo deseo de poder estar pronto con Ustedes en esa querida Nación. Mientras tanto, les aliento a orar intensamente por los frutos pastorales de mi inminente Viaje Apostólico y a mantener en alto la llama de la esperanza en Cristo Resucitado.

[I cordially greet Spanish-speaking Catholics and manifest to you my spiritual closeness, especially to the young, to the sick, the elderly and those experiencing difficulties or who are most in need. I express my great wish to be present with you in this dear nation. In the meantime, I ask you to pray intensely for the pastoral fruits of my imminent Apostolic Voyage and to keep high the call of hope in the Risen Christ.]

Dear brothers and sisters, dear friends in the United States, I am very much looking forward to being with you. I want you to know that, even if my itinerary is short, with just a few engagements, my heart is close to all of you, especially to the sick, the weak, and the lonely. I thank you once again for your prayerful support of my mission. I reach out to every one of you with affection, and I invoke upon you the maternal protection of the Blessed Virgin Mary.

Que la Virgen María les acompañe y proteja. Que Dios les bendiga.

May God bless you all.

Text Source: Whispers