Today is the Day: Homily for the Fourth Sunday in Ordinary Time (Year C)

The season of Ordinary Time, given that we are celebrating our everyday life together as people of faith, allows us the opportunity to take a deeper look at some of the things we know only superficially. In these days, I always like to look more closely at the readings from the Old Testament and see how God is speaking to me.

The passage we heard this morning from Jeremiah really functions to introduce us to the entire book of the prophet. For context, it may be helpful to be reminded that content in the book includes calls for repentance, announcements of judgment, reflections of personal laments, pronouncements against nations, and finally stunning announcements of hope, renewal, and recreation. Jeremiah is really a book for all seasons – even ordinary time!

The passage read today, the call of Jeremiah, shapes how we read the entire book because when we have the whole book in mind, we will not understand today’s passage as a reflection on “vocation” but rather something much more.

We are not urged to be like Jeremiah; rather, we are called to listen to Jeremiah. We are not enjoined to admire Jeremiah, nor are adolescent “youths” being encouraged to dream beyond their self-perceived deficiencies. We are challenged to heed his call!

Jeremiah spoke a commanded word, a word placed in his mouth. The metaphorical language however, cannot be understood as reducing Jeremiah to nothing more than a singing telegraph or a piece of audio equipment playing recordings of God’s words. Jeremiah is not a dispassionate instrument. The words he will be commanded to speak will have an impact on him too. In particular, he is not exempt from the dark message he is compelled to speak against his neighbors.

Before I formed you … before you were born, I appointed you a prophet to the nations

(Jeremiah 1:5).

Today I appoint you over nations and kingdoms (1:10).

The temporal span from before birth (the first passage) to the time when Jeremiah was a “boy” (the second passage) underscores the decisiveness of God’s call to Jeremiah.

Functionally, the call commences when it is declared to Jeremiah. It starts with the “today” of this call narrative, the day when Jeremiah says he is too inarticulate and young. But God responds with “go,” “speak,” and “do not be afraid.” Each day of Jeremiah’s prophetic work is a “today-I-appoint-you” day. That appointment is his only authorization and God bears the responsibility for it.

The word “today” appears a number of times in the writing. To the original audience, it heightens the importance of what is said. The message is not a general truism or something that may have applicability at some future point. The “today” pushes beyond the language of moral principles and doctrine. Rather, it has particularity and urgency; there is a present tense “now” at work. The recipient of the message needs to respond immediately, not merely take the message under advisement.

At the same time, each future moment is also a “now.” Thus, in the case of Jeremiah, “today” covers each day within the span of his life. Finally, it encompasses subsequent readers centuries later, readers like you and me to heed the message today and every day. The book of Jeremiah is a continual present tense proclamation. It is not merely an archival record of past proclamation from which we might derive a few still useful nuggets.

Where do we enter the historical story?

First, we enter at the point of the captivity of Jerusalem. This captivity is not a momentary relenting of the sunshine; or a bad day; and it’s not just a simple bit of pain. As readers, we know that any call to repentance was not accepted and calls for repentance classically lay out alternative futures:

If you repent, then the future will be good; if you do not repent, then the future will not be good.

Did you hear the inherent threat (“or else”) contained in the warnings? We know that calls for repentance and warnings went unheeded because later on in the story we read of the captivity of Jerusalem.

Second, we enter the story being told the purpose for which Jeremiah was appointed – to deliver the message, as uncomfortable and challenging as that may be. As readers almost 3,000 years later, who are also addressees of the book of Jeremiah, he is speaking to us, to you and me here in Summit, NJ. We are those:

· who are plucked up and pulled down;

· who are destroyed and overthrown,

· and who are built and planted.

All who want to be faithful to God’s call, to God’s promise, to live in conformity with God’s plan share in the effects of those verbs – plucked up, pulled down, destroyed, overthrown, but thanks to the gift of God’s son Jesus, we are also re-built, and re-planted – given a chance to start anew.

Like many people then, surely people now, will vehemently resist any suggestion that their projects and personal plans will be shut down and disassembled. Many people fight against, and reject a message of judgment, a message to re-form their lives, to start to live as God would have us live.

Many cannot imagine “build” and “plant” as anything but a ratification of their own prestige and virtues. But in the book of Jeremiah such thinking belonged to Hananiah and other false prophets. Let’s not be like them!

Six verbs are used to summarize the authorized the word of God in the book of Jeremiah. Our task today as contemporary believers, is to discern how those verbs apply to our lives here and now. As in the prophetic book, different moments will need to hear different commanded words.

1. Where do we need to be plucked up from? What’s dragging us down?

2. Or pulled down from? What has us arrogantly raised above the rest?

3. What in our life needs to be destroyed and overthrown? Are there people, or habits, or material things that are holding us back from being the authentic people God wants us to be?

4. How do we rebuild and replant?

Pauls’ letter to the Corinthians answers the question in one word – L.O.V.E. To measure how well we’re doing with re-building and re-planting, try substituting your name for the word love in the passage:

Bob is patient, Bob is kind.

Bob is not jealous, Bob is not pompous,

Bob is not inflated, Bob is not rude,

Bob does not seek his own interests,

Bob is not quick-tempered, nor brood over injury,

Bob does not rejoice over wrongdoing

but Bob rejoices with the truth.

How does that little test work for you? Where we cannot honestly replace our name with LOVE, then there we see where we start our work.

And the change, the rebuilding and replanting will take effort, work, patience, and persistence, not only because of our own shortcomings, but because no prophet is accepted in his own native place … that is, our friends and family will sometimes challenge and ridicule us for wanting to be more like Jesus. But let’s go back to the beginning, remembering:

If you repent, then the future will be good; if you do not repent, then the future will not be good.

And let’s never forget, TODAY is the day!

RSM

January 30, 2022

Baptism of the Lord

It’s very unusual for me to take the time to go to the movies. But this week, in a midst of a few days off, I was able to break away … and yup, just like the reported 1.1 million other people, I watched Spider-Man.

While I must confess that my childhood superhero was really to Batman, I think because back then I had a crush on Batgirl, Spider-man is a pretty good runner-up. The latest film, Spider-Man: No Way Home, is breaking all kinds of box office records and resonating with fans young and old. I think I know why …

Tom Holland’s consistently charming portrayal of Peter Parker picks up right where we left him in Far from Home. Doctored footage from a battle overseas exposed his identity as Spider-Man, and Peter must navigate finishing his senior year of high school with the eyes of every smartphone on him and every media outlet at his doorstep.

His friends suffer from their mere association with Peter, and the negative consequences befall his only living family member, Aunt May, played by Marisa Tomei. Aunt May, as both Peter’s legal guardian and director of the local homeless shelter, is Peter’s moral compass. She instructs him to always do good, even while carrying the burden of being misunderstood and facing the ire of others. “This is what we do,” she tells Peter, “We help people.”

In the movie, Peter takes on the daunting task of attempting to rehabilitate each adversary of their evil compulsions. No one is too far past atonement: “Everyone deserves a second chance,” Peter asserts.

… That brings us today to the Baptism of our Lord ... the reminder that everyone deserves a second chance … and when our ancestors turned their back on God … Jesus comes to save us.

Today we celebrate that even Jesus, like us in all things except sin, was baptized. The familiar story is a reminder in these first days of the new year that joining our baptism to Jesus always gives us a new beginning … if we are open and willing to work for it.

Deception, division, diversion, and discouragement are four strategies of Satan as he tries to prize us away from God … but baptism gives us goodness, grace, gathering and graciousness to live up to our prophetic calling.

There is a scene in the movie when despairing and humbled, Peter Parker’s comfort comes from the rallying of his friends who meet him in his sorrow. They call him out of himself and back to his mission of being a bringer of the good. “You have a gift. You have power,” … “And with great power, there must also come great responsibility.”

Most of our generation know this Spider-Man motto by heart. It sums up the entire ethos of who Spider-Man is. We all resonate with this call to step forward into greatness because we are literally made for such a task, to go out of ourselves and love responsibly, as a gift for others.

It’s the theme that I used in writing to our Confirmation candidates for this coming year. And it’s the theme that we focus on today … with great power comes great responsibility. We have been given great power, and now we have to live up to our responsibility.

Because … baptism is just the beginning of the story … it’s the realization of promises, God’s promise to us and our promise to God. That’s why when a family presents a child for baptism there is a process, because it’s the reminder and the assurance that this is not a 30-minute, magical ceremony ... one and done, No! Rather, it’s the public testimony that parents will do all in their power to raise the little one presented to know, love, model and serve Jesus in this world so as to prepare to meet him in the next.

The bulletin this week contains an interesting story about the important role of godparents. In fact, it reports that in one Italian diocese the bishop has suspended it because people presented for the role were not qualified, that is, not measuring up to the important role that a godparent plays in the life of faith of the little one. It serves as a good reminder to us all … we have to mean what we say and say what we mean, especially when we do so in faith.

As Peter Parker recommits himself to the good that Spider-Man will always work toward, so should we also “not grow weary in doing what is right” … our promise to God, even in the face of disappointment and failure. Jesus implored us not to despair in the face of earthly evil: “I am with you always, to the end of the age” God’s promise to us.

Spider-Man continues to resonate with each new generation because, just as with the Gospel challenge of Christ, we are all called, despite our faults and flaws, to be bringers of the good—to practice great love, coupled with great responsibility.

Let’s use this feast of the Baptism of the Lord to recommit ourselves to that. If we can be inspired from the themes of a movie, imagine how much more we can do for one another in real life …

Blessings!

RSM

Second Sunday of ADVENT 2021

This weekend we hear from the prophetic book of Baruch, which was written for three reasons:

1. to explain the Babylonian exile as God's judgment;

2. to praise the wisdom of God's Law;

3. and to foretell the restoration of Jerusalem.

Today's passage is the final chapter of the book. It speaks of hope in God's mercy and justice.

We have heard many times the phrase, “to act in justice” or to wear the "cloak of justice". I think it means being self-integrated, honest, and humble so as to give true worship, that is, worship that is free of corruption and full of compassion.

Baruch links worship and acts of justice in the face of a corrupt Temple bureaucracy. We see that even in the year 586 BC or so, there were challenges to worship because there was, one the one hand, the call to worship God, but on the other hand, that call usually happened in a system that was governed by humans, sometimes, not so good humans. Sometimes the leadership of the Temple was not the best example of the God they worshipped.

That’s not a hard concept to grasp because we know that even now, here in our day, our desire to worship God, here in this “temple”, our parish and our Church, we can sometimes be distracted by clergy or staff or volunteers associated with the institution who are less than stellar examples of faith who are called inspire us. In fact, they might cause the opposite reaction. We might call that our struggle with witnessing hypocrisy. But just as in the time of Baruch, so too in our time, bad ministers, who distract us are not an excuse for us to forego our obligation to worship our God. While hypocrisy is a hard pill to swallow, it does not absolve you and I of our obligation to rise above and be the better person.

Christian hypocrisy occurs when we make ourselves the priority over God. Often hypocrisy is an accusation against a person, but as we have also seen, churches too can become hypocritical and cultivate a culture of hypocrisy. And that culture can blind us not only to the worship we are called to participate in, but blind us to the God we are called to worship in the first place.

While there are many ways that this can happen, here are a few:

1. When the church becomes fixated on external preferences, not internal devotion.

2. When church leaders seek religious prominence instead of humble service.

3. When the church hides double standards with artificial rules.

4. When the church adds to the Gospel in ways that burden people.

I’m sure that you can name some of your own!

In the days of Baruch, the Temple was called to be a beacon for God's glory … a place where both Jews and non-Jews alike could see that glory shine. And that glory came from listening to and trying to emulate God's word.

That’s the reputation that our Church, our parish is called to have, that it be a place where believers and non-believers alike could know, that in that place, there are people who have chosen to live their lives differently. People, who each in their own way give God glory primarily through acts of justice and mercy.

When people tell the story of St Teresa of Avila, what do they say? Do they talk about me? About you? Or about us and what we are trying to accomplish together? What do they say? Because the Church is a reflection of all of us … and how brightly that light of glory shines depends on every person … those who come all the time, and those who will be back just in time for Christmas.

I know that on this side of heaven, a perfect Church is not possible. We would ruin it the moment we joined. We don’t need a perfect Church, we need and have a perfect Savior, but the Church, that is you and I, are called to be authentic … authentic Catholics … each doing the best we can … every day … being perfected by the love of Jesus … who challenges those who are comfortable and comforts those who are challenged.

We work on our own, in our families and together in our parish, so that the One who began the good work in us will bring it to completion.

So, this week, let’s do an authenticity check!

Each of us, looking into our hearts and honestly assessing where we are strong, and where we need some work …

Everyone of us thinking about how we can better prepare the way of the Lord …

We do so not that our light may shine, but that his light, and his kingdom will … !

Blessings!

RSM##