St. Mark the Evangelist Catholic Church :. Homilies

Ordinary Time 16 - July 22, 2012 - Dcn. Jacobson

Even after 45 years as a priest, it is a constant challenge for me to prepare and enter this sacred space putting down any hint of feelings that this is a performance. I have come to understand that for great performers there is a similar experience. As long as they “act” they are not truly into the character or the scene. They must become the person they are presenting. They cannot simply “act like” that character. A truly discerning audience always knows the difference. It is, I suppose, what makes the difference between an amature and a truly great performer. Great performers spend months and months researching and studying in every way the character they are going to become on the stage or the screen. Amatures just learn the lines. Great performers learn to walk like them, talk like them, think like them, and often enough, they begin to look like them. I saw a stage play last fall in which the central character was Winston Churchill. It was a dramatic play about the three days leading up to a turning point in the early days of World War 2. When the play ended, I felt as though I had been in the very presence of that courageous leader. It was amazing.The same thing is going on in Mark’s Gospel. Apostles have spent a lot of time with Jesus. They have listened, learned, studied, eat, slept, and traveled with Jesus all preparing for the day when, in a sense, the curtain will go up and they will be out there on their own. Their success will be determined by how closely they can present the truth, the compassion, the vision, and the message of the one they are presenting, or the one who is now present in them.What troubles me with this Gospel considered in this way is that for every play or performance, and with every Celebration of a Sacrament, there are always the performers and spectators and this is where the difference comes between what happens in a theater and what happens in a church. There will always be spectators at the theater, but there must never be spectators in a church. My challenge comes when I walk down this aisle because there are obviously a lot of spectators here which then tempts me to perform: a bad plan and a bad experience for all of us. If you don’t believe me that there are specatators here, you need to sit in that chair and look around at the faces and the postures. Or, you can take a good look at the contribution pattern and see quite clearly that more than half of the people here are spectators they are not participating in the mission.Here is the problem and the challenge Mark sets out to the church today: the mission of passing on the faith is a vocation shared by everyone who has come to know, to listen to, and be inspired by Jesus Christ. There are no spectators. These verses are not a piece of history telling a story of some day in the past when Jesus sent out the twelve. It is the living Word of God revealing our vocation to us. Nowhere in here are we instructed to stand around and listen, or sit around and watch what happens. The qualifications are right here in the very words of Jesus Christ: live simply enough that you can discover how God provides for you, don’t hang around people who do not welcome who you are and what you present, and don’t be looking for a better a deal. There isn’t one. I often wonder how this gospel sounds to the folks who parish hop, or shop around for a church. The instruction here for all of us who embrace the vocation of our faith is to stay put - in one place, and there together we are to confront evil, encourage repenetance, reconcile, and bring about healing from all the sickness that surrounds us.The first reading today addresses that “who me?” response you may be feeling. There is no excuse accepted. The first reading today puts a stop to that. Amos the prophet was a shepherd - the lowest of positions in those times. That did not stop God from sending him. Every baptized person in this place has been anointed as Jesus Christ was anointed: as priest, prophet, and king. Those are the words spoken over you at your Baptism. The first vocation each of us has is to pass on the faith, and at some point in every one of our lives, we have to “get it.” We must wake up and realize that we’re not here as spectators to watch, or as an audience to sit around and listen.Children, you too must pass on the faith. You do it by repect and kindess; by honesty and truthfulness. You pass on the faith by being generous and helpful. Young people, in High School and College, you too pass on the faith by your courage in the face of evil, by the decisions you make and the company you keep, by your trust in God and commitment to prayer and worship before anything else. Your defense of the week and outcasts, the losers and the lost awakens in everyone the power of faith and grace. Parents, it is your vocation accepted at the Baptism of your children to bring them up as Christ has taught us. Yet year after year children show up in our programs ignorant of the most basic and fundamental elements of the faitih. How is this possible? How have the spectators become the majority?Hear this Gospel. Hear the Word of God. Get up. Get out. Get serious. Get your life in order. You don’t need anything more than what you get here: food for the journey, a companion, and the gifts of the Holy Spirit.

Last week the people were amazed. This week, Jesus is amazed.Last week it was the faith two people that were amazing.This week it is the lack of faith that leaves Jesus amazed, and it is amazing.It is amazing that in spite of all that he had done in signs and wonders, they remained incredulous and actually offended. While it might be interesting to get all theological about this, historical, and all very profound in discussing the relationship with faith and the power of Jesus to work signs, I think the point here is much more simple, and quite a bit more personal for all of us.For Mark, this story is very personal and very real in an on-going sense. First Jesus is rejected by the citizens of Nazareth. Astonishing. By the time Mark puts together his Gospel, the Gentiles all over the place are coming to believe, but the Jews, Jesus’ own are rejecting the Kingdom of God and Jesus. Astonishing. One of thier own is simply dismissed.The point of this gospel story is these people. I think their problem is not their lack of faith in Jesus. It is their lack of faith in themselves and in what God can do with someone - maybe anyone from Nazareth. Remember, Nazareth was looked down upon by everyone. “Can anything good come from Nazareth?” is a question proposed aloud that reveals the way these people were perceived, and sadly, I think this story tells us that they had come to believe that about themselves. When they cut Jesus down to their size, question how God could work through one of them, how anyone of them could share in the divine plan, heal, give life, defend and embrace the lost and lowly, speak with authority, and command evil spirits, it is not just a lack of faith in Jesus, it is a lack of faith, respect, and hope for themselves. It isn’t just that they didn’t believe in Jesus. They did not believe that one of them could be God’s servant. They thought they were just too poor, inadequate, and insignificant. That God could choose the week and make them strong was just beyond them, and so, there were no signs of the Kingdom of God, no miracles worked there.This story is still being told lived today, right here;and we’re right in the middle of it. How is it that people do not believe in Jesus Christ, in the Sacraments, in this Church? Perhaps it is because we live like those citizens of Nazareth: not believing that God could do something through us. Perhaps we think that the work of peace, of reconciliation, forgiveness, of feeding the hungry, and embracing the lonely and outcast is the work of someone else, some specialist or professional. I don’t think that’s working? Do you?There are not enough signs of that the Kingdom of God is at hand. The reason is not because Jesus is absent; but because we act like those Nazareans and fail to understand that God has chosen to use people like us to bring this Kingdom to life. Perhaps there is no faith in our Church, our religion, our sacraments becasue we have no faith in ourselves; no belief, no hope, no confidence that we can do anything that matters, or that God might choose someone like us to accomplish God’s plan.The people of Nazareth missed it because they did not think enough of themselves, find themselves worthy, and therefore be open to God’s work among them. The Jews missed it because they had an idea of a Messiah that was outside of their ordinary lives, and they could not imagine that God would save them with one of their own. Now what happens? How do we make this work and not miss it this time. The work and will of God is not something for someone else. The mission of the church to heal, to reconcile, to give life, to feed, to lead, to teach is not reserved to those with degrees in Theology, or to those ordained for service.This is astonishing, utterly astonishing that God would choose you and me to fulfill His plan and secure his Kingdom. When we get that right, there will be plenty of miracles and no absence of faith in Jesus Christ.

These Gospel verses have brought back some childhood memories over the past several days as I have sat with them. The sound of my mother’s voice came back to me and I sat and laughed one afternoon at how quick, how often, and sometimes how loudly she would say: “Don’t touch that!” It’s a wonder I have any feeling in my fingers; they were so sensory deprived as a child! Where ever we went, my sister and I were constantly warned: “Don’t touch anything”. From other people’s homes to the grocery store, the warning was the same: “Don’t touch!” Then off to school we would go hearing the same message: “Don’t touch anybody and don’t touch their stuff.” So, I can tell by looking at you that you have heard the same thing: “No touching!”That is exactly how people at the time of Jesus  grew up. They did not touch anything or anyone. Doing so made them “unclean” and there were serious consequences to that. The consequences were seperation from the community and loss of identity which was a very important thing. The whole identity of Israel was shaped by law, and much of that law was expressed in terms of touching. If you did not touch, you stayed in. If you touched you were out. Then along come Jesus.He must have had a different kind of mother than we did, because Jesus was a “toucher”. He not only touched, but people wanted to touch him; and we hear about that today. As we have come to understand, with Jesus everything gets turned around. Suddenly touching brings people in rather than putting people out. Now touching restores rather than excludes. Now touching makes clean rather than unclean. With Jesus, the entire law that so shaped and identified old Israel is finished. It is now reversed. In the new Israel, the Church, touching and being touched is what matters. What is announced by this Gospel is that our relationship with Jesus is the heart of our identity, not our relationship to the old law. Now it will be a matter of how strictly and how faithfully we follow Jesus that keeps us pure and makes us holy, not how strictly and carefully we follow ritual behavior and rules. We all know a lot of people who keep the rules and are far from Jesus. I am uncomfortable around those kind of people. What keeps us clean and holy is being touched by Jesus and touching Jesus. This Church that we have become is a people who marked, identified, and recognized as having been touched by Jesus and therefore as people willing to touch others.All touching is not a matter of hands and fingers. I can’t count the times that I have been touched by you, your kindness, your consideration and concern. Not a week goes by in my life that I do not hear someone tell me how they were touched by our liturgy, our prayer, the message of a homily, or by the presence of Christ in the Sacraments we celebrate. Our ministry and this work of Jesus we continue is still about touching: touching the poor, touching the lost, touching those who are sick and those who are tired of being alone looking to be recognized, respected, and honored.Think this week about these two powerful stories in Mark’s 5th Chapter. Those who witnessed these events must have been powerfully touched by them because they recall the details so clearly. Not often in the Gospel are the very words of Jesus remembered and recorded. The Gospels were written in Greek remember, not in the language Jesus spoke. But today we hear his very words: “Talitha koum”. “Little girl, get up.” There is a touching tenderness to the sound of the words that reaches deep into us and calls us to life.A synagoge official who has a name, and a woman without a one show us today how faith works, and what happens when you believe. In gospel terms you could hardly imagine any two people more opposite: the perfect pure accomplished and responsible official of a synagogue and an unclean woman who is bleeding! Yet inspite of their difference, they have something in common: Trust. They trust that Jesus Christ will break the rules and touch them with his mercy, and he does, then and still today.In spite of the old rule: “Don’t touch”, those of us who have been touched by Jesus Christ may and should touch and be touched so that we may be lifted up to life. This is who we are. This is why we are here. This is what it means to be a Catholic and be at Eucharist: a people touched by God through His only Son, a people willing to reach out and touch others. Believing is not just about doctirnes and dogmas, it is about trusting and being touched. It is about the kind of tenderness that reaches out to us today on a hot summer weekend and says “Get up little one.” And then he says that she should be given something to eat.Look at this altar table. In a few moments we will be given something to eat. Here we shall be touched and we shall dare to touch the divine. Just as it was then, so it is now: astonishing!

Nativity of Saint John the Baptist - June 24, 2012 - Dcn. Jacobson

To a church feeling threatened, insecure, uncertain, and disappointed that Christ had not come again exactly as they expected, Mark recalls these words of Jesus about a mustard seed. It is a story that both captures and illutrates the wonderful yet hidden mystery of little things. I wonder if Jesus was not even thinking of himself when he spoke of that little seed. He must have felt overwhelmed by the immensity of the suffering and the problems he encountered. I suspect that now and then when he withdrew from the crowds, as he so often does in Mark’s Gospel it wasn’t to wonder if he could really make a difference, if what he did was really going to matter, really fulfill God’s will and open this world to the wonder of God’s Kingdom. What else can this parable be except a reminder to us still that little things do matter?   In a world accustomed to and usually impressed by big dispalys of strength and power, little things do not seem to matter much. Yet, for all our might and all the roaring of guns and bombs, we don’t seem to be making much peace, and no matter how much money we throw at dictators and oppressive regeims people are still hungry, homeless, and out of work. As I was thinking through all of this with this parable in my heart, I remembered the violent and long civil war in Mozanbique that was finally resolved by a little community that meets in the heart of Rome every week to pray and talk about things that matter. It is called the Communio Sainte Egidio. Hardly anyone in this country knows about this group of Catholic Lay People, but the people of Mozambique know the story of how this little group with no guns and for that matter without any great amount of money managed to bring an end to senseless bloodshed that had gone on for almost two generations. That is a big tree from a little seed. I think of a little Armenian lady who hardly stood 5 feet tall who ended up with the Nobel Peace prize and on the cover of Time Magazeen. The whole world knows who she is, and a community of sisters continues her remarkable legacy in nearly every country where there are abandoned sick and poor. It’s a big tree from that little seed. We can look back in history and point to people like Francis Bernadone who lived in a town called Assisi. What a big tree from that little seed. Here in Okahoma we have some big trees from little seeds like Kate Barnard, and Stanley Rother who couldn’t make it through the first seminary he tried. There is a big tree in Guatamala because of that simple tiny seed of a life. I believe this Gospel first invited the community of Mark to take a second look at themselves in light of the one who was their messiah. I believe this Gospel now invites us, another community of Mark, to take another look at ourselves in light of the one is our Lord and our Savior. His life was short. When compared to Ceasar at the time, it didn’t mean much; but his life was the mustard seed, and from it has grown this great tree of a church whose branches shelter, comfort, and protect those who in need.  This image of the tiny seed that becomes the great tree makes our puny excuses for doing nothing, for keeping quiet, for thinking we can’t make any difference a little lame. We never know how much good can come from the most simple little gesture of kindness and love. I think of my own life as I stand here week after week with you. As a child I could never could have imagined being here. I never dreamed that I could do anything that might make a difference for anyone. That one little verse: “...he knows not how.” says so much in such a simple way. We never know what will happen or how our lives may unfold and what good can come from them. Neither did Jesus. He simply trusted that God could and would do something with what Jesus had to give. If we are going to be church, if we are going to gather at the foot of that big tree hanging the wall, we will have to trust that if we scatter some seeds on the ground they will sprout and grow, and there will be harvest. But there will only be a harvest if those seeds are sown. We also do well to remember that when we hang onto the seeds thinking they are too little or they might run out there will be nothing to harvest when harvest time comes. Too little is no excuse. There is nothing too little, not even a mustard seed. We are not too little, and the gifts we have are not too little. The Kingdom of God will come from the mustard seed of our lives and our simple good works or it won’t come at all.

The Prophet in me wants to announce that we are in trouble, and the Bishops of this country have raised an alarm calling for a Fortenight of Prayer to renew our national commitment to religious freedom. For any of us paying attention at all there is no surprise in this real or for some perceived threat. It is a natural consequence to the rising tide of secularization and the religious vauum in which we have suddenly found ourselves. There might be no better day to look at how we got here than this Feast of the Body and Blood of Christ. It is my opinion that we put ourselves into this situation slowly and steadily over the past few decades, and before we blame “government” we might take a look at ourselves and how we have set ourselves up for this conflict.  When by actual statistics less than half of all Catholics believe that what we consume in Communion is the real presence of Christ’s Body and Blood, we are already in trouble. In a culture that now recognizes that half the men and women living together and bearing children do not consecrate that relationship in the presence of the church we are in trouble. In a culture that no longer will bring the blessed remains of a loved one into the church for prayer and blessing prefering a “grave-side” or simpy a funeral home service as a way of “getting it overwith” we are in troulble. When parents think preparation for Confirmation means dropping their sons and daughters off for a class when there is no other schedule conflict while they walk the mall or catch up on their shopping, we’re in trouble. In a nation that flaunts the age old teaching of this church regarding justice and rights for workers, dismissing that teaching as something to be brushed aside because the economy can’t afford it tells us we are in trouble, and the trouble is not economic.  What is at issue presently is how we live and bear witness to our faith and its teaching and tradition. There is a viewpoint that says we have to stay in the church, and that worship is the only recognizable exercise of faith. This is a serious mis-understanding of Christ, His mission, and His message. If that were case, Christ would have only taught in the Temple or the Synagogue, and all He would have done was preach. But he didn’t stay in the Temple and Synagogue. He healed. He reconciled. He went everywhere he could and was found where ever there was need. It was the work of faith and it still is. The Word of God and the Work of God will not be confiend to these four walls; and when we carry out His mission, it will be our mission because of who we are as Catholics. But the trouble we have with making this credible started long ago and started within us. Because of that, we seem vulnerable to a secular world, and look as though we do not mean what we say, because too often we do not believe what we say. To put this in the context of this Feast of the Body and Blood of Christ, we must ask ourselves some questions. If you believe what is going on in here, and what you have been called to share, you would never leave early, and you would never come late. If you believe that this is the Blood of Christ, you could never pass by or be heard to say: “I don’t drink the wine.” If it were wine, I wouldn’t take it eather. If you really believed what was going on here, you would never stand around with your arms folded and your mouths tight shut while the rest of us sing and pray with a full voice, a full mind, and full glad heart. If it ever really dawned on you what was happening here, you would never dress better for a party, or a prom, or even work than you would for Mass. You would never be ready to support a different charity than you would your own parish family. We have 1000 families in this parish. Less than have make a serious deliberate offering in the collection. Less than 30% contributed to Catholic Charities. If 25% percent shared our financial burdens, there would be free tuition in our school for everyone. If you believed what is really happening here with the Body and Blood of Christ, no one would ever choose a sporting event for their children over attendance at Mass. Teen age children would always be with you in church and Mass would be a weekly routine for the entire family. I hear parents say they don’t want to fight with their children about going to Mass. Does the same argument hold for going to school? The parent says: “I am too tired to fight.” I say: “To fight the school battle and not the church battle says loudly and clearly, that school is important, Jesus Christ is not.” To any child who says: “No” to a parent, I say, “You got it backwards. Parents are the only ones who say, “NO. When you become a parent, you can use that word.”   So you see, the trouble we have these days has started within. Before we can convince anyone and any government that we stand for and continue the work of Jesus Christ in our hospitals, in our schools, and in any other institutions we establish to exercise our faith reaching out to everyone regardless of whether or not they are Catholic, we need to get it right in here becasue this is where it starts.  The Body of Christ is hungry, it is not just food on which we feast symobolically. The Blood of Christ is still being poured out for the forgivness of sins we refuse to forgive. We have been asked to a lot more in Christ’s memory than consecrate bread and wine. We have been asked and called to become his Body, his real presence in this world to continue his work until he comes again. We can’t do that on our own, by ourselves; but there is nothing we cannot do together as one Body, one Church, one Faith.  I shall not drink again the fruit of the vine until the day when I drink it new in the kingdom of God is an important and puzziling passage of this Gospel. What we celebrate here is not just a memorial, but an anticipation of what is to come. It is not just a memory of the Last Supper, but a promise of what we shall be sharing in hope as we proclaim his death until he comes again. Until we get it right, we can point no finger of blame for any misunderstanding of who we are and what we are about. When we do get this right, you’ll be coming here very early for Mass because the place will be so full, you’ll be left to stand outside.

Most Holy Trinity - June 3, 2012 - Dcn. Jacobson

That reading from Acts of the Apostles says that the apostles when filled with the spirit began to speak in “foreign tongues.” Another translation says they began to speak “strange languages.” We like the drama of this scene, and we easily want to imagine that there was some great wonder taking place as though I might stand here speaking Mandarin and you would suddenly clearly understand what I was saying to you. Ou peut-être si je parle français et ceux d'entre vous qui ne parlent pas français soudain sais ce que je veux dire .... O tal vez si hablo español y aquellos de ustedes que no hablan español repente sé lo que estoy diciendo ....  I am not at all certain that this is what Luke intends to suggest to us.  The thought occurs to me that what Luke might be suggesting is that apostles when filled with the spirit began to talk about things no one else was talking about; using words that no one was using; speaking of things no one had considered before. How many times have you sat and listened to someone speaking perfectly good English and wondered what in the world they were talking about.  It happens to me all the time. Imagine sitting in on an astro/physics lecture  most of us would not get one idea of what was going on even though the lecture might be in English. I want to suggest to you that perhaps words like grace, forgiveness, and mercy were just not words anyone was using in those days. Given all that had been going on in Jerusalem, we have reason to suspect that these things, these words, were not much thought about. The langauge of the day was: “crucify him”, “away with him”. Revenge was a word they understood, but mercy? I doubt think so. Perhaps what was really going on was that the apostles were suddenly using words these people simply did not use, and expressing ideas they simply never entertained. Once they got the idea across, it caused a lot of excitement: these words, these ideas about forgiveness, and grace, and mercy sound pretty good.  It puzzels me that today’s Pentecost atmosphere instead of being filled with excitment about something new is just another repetition of the same old thing. That old saying about familiarity breeding contempt might just as well say the familiarity breeds boredom. Our Christian vocabulay is worn out. We have heard these words before. We have heard these words so often that they hardly excite us, and we seem pretty sure we know what they mean.  But maybe we don’t. We use these words so often that they have lost their force, and we ought to be wondering how to restore their power to excite and draw people together. Perhaps one way is to use them less often and practice them more consistently. The word, “Peace” has become nothing but a cliche while peacemakers are wildly prophetic. “Combating poverty” is a slogan these days becasue poverty, just like combat has become an abstraction; something we don’t see. The Gospel never says much about “poverty” but it sure says a lot about the poor. In the end, the Gospel only makes sense to those who are committed to living it. To others, it is simply a curious piece of literature.  When you only read the words of the Gospel, it is like looking at the score of a Mozart Concerto instead of playing it or listening to it. That’s a lot better than just looking at notes on a piece of paper. The real wonder of Pentecost, and the surest sign of the Holy Spirit among us is a people doing the Word of God not just reading it. The most convincing sign of the Holy Spirit among us is a people who practice what they preach; who turn the word mercy into an experience never to be forgotten; who forgive as quickly as they seek forgiveness, whose lives are so full of grace that everyone wants to be around them. A long time ago there was a French worker priest preaching on a street to an indefferent crowd of workers near the docks of Marseilles. Someone in the crowd shouted that he wanted to hear less about Christianity but was very interesed in meeting a real Christian. That is the essence of evangelization. It is what happened in Jerusalem. The speach of the apostles was not nearly as important, as convincing, or as persuasive as was the apostles themselves. The work of the Spirit in us must make us into something new, change us into something exciting, give us credibility because we live the Gospel, not just quote, read it, and study it.

Ascension of the Lord - May 20, 2012 - Dcn. Jacobson

One of the wonderful things about being your pastor is that I can usually set aside time every week to just sit with the Gospel. I hide out from the phone and the computer, and I just sit and wonder, listen and read, study a little about the words, the culture of those ancient days, the language, and finally, imagine what it is God is saying to us. I know that for you it is very different in your lives. You race around from one thing to the next, from work to home, from games to appointments, feeding children, cleaning up, doing laundry, and now the yard work has started. At 70 years of age, I’m not very good a double-tasking any more; but I watch all of you and realize that these few minutes might be all you get this week with the word of God. With the last days of the School year upon us and summer looming out of nowhere, I want you hear three things today from the three readings. In the first Reading from Acts of the Apostles there is a Pentecost. There are several in the New Testament, not just the one in Jerusalem. The Holy Spirit “fell upon all who were listening to the word.”  That is you and me, sitting here listening to the Word. You are filled with the Holy Spirit. Don’t forget that this week. In the second reading the message is loud and clear: “You are loved.” We never can hear that wonderful news enough. You are loved, my friends. Everyone of us is loved and loveable. Feel it! Believe it! Live like it! In the third reading: John’s Gospel, we hear one more wonderful piece of news: “You are my friends”, says Jesus. Now granted in a techno world where young people seem to measure their status and image by how many friends they have on “facebook”, this may not seem too exciting; but we’re talking about Jesus Christ, Son of God --- who says to us: “You are my friends.” I don’t know about you, but I’ll just settle that one and not be too worried about the list of facebook. “You are filled with the Holy Spirit. You are Loved. You are my friend.” There is something to think about this week while you’re running around from one thing to the next. As you do you might also remember a movie I think many of you may have seen last year. Made from a book I thought was more interesting and more in depth than the movie; there is a powerful image for all of this that came to my mind while I was sitting and thinking about the difference between a serant and a friend. In many ways, they do the same things, but for very different reasons. The book and movie was, THE HELP. It is a story about servants and friends. One of those servants, Aibileen is a maid who raises Mae Mobley, a little girl whose mother is disappointed in her daughter’s plain looks and seemingly slow ways. As a result, her mother ignores her child. The maid shows genuine affection and encourages the child’s self-esteem and growth with messages like: “You is kind.” “You is smart.” “You is important.” When little Mae Mobley gets old enough to speak, she repeats the triple affirmation to the maid and adds: “You is my real Mama, Aibee!” It seems to me that the mother more the servant: someone who out of obligation  does only what they have to do. She provides food, clothing, and shelter for her child, and nothing more than a maid to do the chores. On the other hand, the maid is the friend who does the same things but not of out obligation or guilt but out of love and way more besides. As a friend of Jesus, we might reexamine what we do and why. No wonder it is so hard to be consistently faithful to Mass, when we’re just doing what we have to do or what someone said we “should” do. It would be a lot better if we were faithful out of love rather than out of duty. Realizing the friendship we have with Jesus Christ is sometimes the task of a lifetime, and sometimes it is the surest sign of the presence and work of the Holy Spirit.  We are filled with the Holy Spirit. We are loved. We are friends with Jesus Christ. What more do we need to know to live with Joy? What more do we need to know to live in Peace? What more do we need to know to begin to care for one another, affirm, encourage, build up hold up and lift up each other every single day?

In 1863 Edward Everett Hale publishsed a short story in The Atlantic. The story is an allegory about the upheaval of the American Civil War and was meant to promote the cause of the Union against the priority of individual states. In the story, an army lieutenant named Philip Nolan is tried for treason as an accomplice of Aaron Burr. In the trial during his testimony, he bitterly renounces his nation, cursing the nation, and wishing he would never hear of his country again. Upon his convition, the judge grants him that wish, and he spends the rest of his life aboard Navy warkships, in exile with no right ever again to set foot on U.S. soil and explicit orders that no one should ever mention his country to him again. The sentence is carried out to the letter. He is moved from ship to ship, and no one in charge of him speaks to him about the U.S. Even his newspapers are censord. Unrepentant at first, he becomse sadder and wiser over the years and desperate for news. Deprived of a homeland, he slowly and painfully learns the true worth of his country. He misses it more than friends and family, more than music or love or nature. Without it, he knows he is nothing. I think of that short-story when I hear Jesus saying: “Remain in me.” For as independent as we all like to think we are, as human beings we desperately need to belong. Broken families in disfunctional neighborhoods breed gangs. Desperate victims of injustice band together with others who are angry and helpless making terrorist cells. To this deep human need Jesus speaks. Over forty times in John’s Gospel this word appears. In English it appears in slightly different ways even though it is the same in the original language: “abide”, “stay”, “remain” are the mosts often used, but they all translate the same wish, the same desire, the same hope. “Stay”  is perhaps for us today the most powerful. “Stay.” says Jesus to us.  When the apostles first meet Jesus, he asks them: “What are you looking for?” They respond: “Where do you stay?” They were not asking for his address. They wanted to know where his roots were, what anchored him so solidly, what gave him such vision and peace, and how he came to have such confidence and purpose. With another story in John’s Gospel, people brought to Jesus by the Samaritan woman “stay” with him for two days. Discipleshhip in John’s Gospel means staying with Jesus, abiding in him, or as we hear it spoken today: “remaining” in him walking the walk of his life all ending in the symbol of the vine. There is a vine growing on a fence over at the rectory, and I took a close look at it as I was reflecting on this gospel. It is a curious thing. Unlike a tree with a trunk and obvious branches, there is not such a clear distinction between the vine and the branches. I could not distinguish one branch from the vine. The whole vine is the branhes at which point the symbol becomes obvious. The disciples become the master. The branches are the vine. The oneness he seeks with us is that complete. Take note that Jesus says: “I am the vine.”  He does not say: “I am like a vine.” There is something more essential being said here. There is something more to do with our very being, our identity, our purpose or calling. This is not about being “like” something, it is about actually “being” something. No imitation, no acting like, not even any “trying”. It is a call to a new kind of existence, a new identity, a new way of being, living, thinking, seeing, and believing! “Remain”, “Stay”, says Jesus to us today. It is a plea, and an invitation to enter into a relationship, a friendship, a bond that is life-giving, and lasting. As the text continues next week, we are drawn deeper into an understanding of what Jesus offers and asks of us: a loving friendship in which one is willing to die for the sake of the other. This is not a fanatical kind of self-martyrdom motivated out of anger or hatred for an enemy; but pure love that generates more pure love. Staying with, or remaining with Jesus is  both a personal experience and a communal one. Thos who know Jesus, those who have explored, accepted, and lived in an ongoing and real friendship with this risen one are then drawn together through that relationship to become what we have called: “Church.” I am coming to believe that those who do not remain as church have not yet found their identity and their made their frindship with Christ. Being “Spiritual”,  is not being “Church.” Being spiritual is a individual’s effort to find their identity outside the vine, and sooner or later, it fails or dies. The individualism of this day is but the latest way of trying to find life away from the vine, apart from Christ  who is revealed, living within and the very reality of “Church” itself: the Body of Christ. Hear him today speak to us all once more in this Easter Season: “Remain in me.” We cannot remain in this world and be of this world. We are the branches of this vine, and apart from this vine, we can do nothing, we will be nothing, and we will have nothing.

In the monestary where I studied to be a priest there is room where the monks gather to make decisions about the life of the community called: “The Chapter Room”. At that particular monestary, the Chapter Room has has some unique stained glass windows that illustrate some of the more important elements of the “Rule” written by Benedict which guide the life of the community. One of the windows has a human ear with the word: “Listen” written beside it. As a young student, I was often in that room because there the choir would wam up before important celebrations in the church. I was always fascinated by that window, and to this day whenever I am back there, I stop in to look at that window. I came to learn that the first word in the Rule of Saint Benedict, written in the sixth century, is “Listen”. “Listen with the ear of your heart” Benedict says.“ In all the readings today, there is a great concern brought to us about the need to listen. The sheep follow Jesus in this Gospel for one reason: they know his voice. All through John’s Gospel there is a distinction made between those who “know” and those who do not “know” the identity of Jesus. For instance, when the man born blind is interrogated by the Sanhedrin they claim that they “know” that God has spoken through Moses, but as for this man, they say: “We do not know where he is from.” It goes on an on in John’s Gospel, this need to know; and to those who are in the know (who listen) Jesus says directly: “I came from the Father and have come into the world”; and then he says: “I am leaving the world and going to my Father.” Remember that at the very beginning of John’s Gospel, Jesus is described as the “Word of God.” So the very identity of those who follow Jesus depends upon knowing what voice to listen to. Listening to the voice of the Shepherd is the way to know who you are. The same thing happens in the first reading from Acts of the Apostles. Peter stands up and speaks on that Pentecost day, and although they all speak many different languages, something happens when he says: “let this be known to you, and listen to what I say...let the entire house of Israel know with certainty that God has made him both Lord and Messiah, this Jesus whom you crucified.” It is by hearing Peter’s testimony and coming to know Jesus as the resurrected Messiah that thousands of persons came to be baptized on that Pentecost. The author of our second reading pushes us a little deeper by suggesting that listening and knowing is not an end in itself, but the foundation for a kind of endurance required to stay true to the Gospel. More and more, we are beginning to discover how hard it is and what it takes to hold fast to the Gospel and this Way of Life to which we are called as the culture in which we find ourselves living is less and less Christian. It is to people who have heard and have known that this epistle is addressed; a people who have been forced out of the synagogue, looked upon with suspicion, judged harshly, and even killed that this epistle is address. All becasue they have listened and known. What is revealed to us this Easter season Sunday is that by listening to the Word spoken to us in Jesus, the Word of God, and in words spoken to us by Jesus, we shall discover who we are and why. We shall come to know not only the identity of Jesus, but our own as well, and with this knowledge comes the clarity to know our mission with endurance to live in knowledge, confidence, and joy. Young people, you above all must come to understand this Gospel and learn to listen, to listen to the one voice that will lead you to safety within the flock. There are, as Jesus says, other voices calling and speaking to you. Today they text and they chat. Those voices have much to offer you that is shallow, false, and empty. They will suggest that a certain look will make you happy, that certain styles will make you appealing, that having a certain toy will make you respected and admired. Then the look is gone, the style changes before you know it, and the toy breaks leaving you with nothing. You will have listened to the wrong voice, and you will find yourself outsdie the flock, lost, alone, and in danger. “Listen and Know” says your church and your shephered, and your Lord. The rest of us must endure as the second reading insists. We must endure something those first believers suffered greatly: the seperation and the loss of people we thought were friends, the breaking of family bonds, the disappointment and confusion that comes from being judged by those who do not know. While I think we sometimes exaggerate the physical perscution and the violent martydom that also marked those years under the Romans, we must not neglect to recognize that there was another suffering they all endured by being expelled from the synagogues. That meant broken families, husbands or wives, children or parents coming together without one another, watching with sadness as loved ones refused to share, to listen, and know. Find comfort in these words and in companionship with these who have gone before us and still speak to us of the truth, the goodness, and the joy that comes from listening and from knowing who really has the words of everlasting life.

We have, for one reason or another begun to confuse “Peace” and “Security.” I am noticing this more and more in the rhetoric we hear from the  leaders in this world. When they talk of peace, they often say “peace-and-security” which too many people seem to think is the same thing. The gift of Jesus about which we hear a great deal on these Sundays after Easter is not “security”. It is something else. It is possible to have one without the other. It is preferable to have both, but if it is necessary to choose one or the other, the human family might be better off with peace. Security will follow, but no amount of security is going to bring peace.  Since the life-changing events of 9/11, we have, in this country, put into place an entire army with the name: “Homeland Security”. TSA agents now have more to do with our coming and going than traffic cops. It strikes me as ironic that this entire agency concerned with “Security” has accomplished nothing when it comes to peace: not even peace of mind. In my opinion, it has made us more anxious. We want to build walls and fences to “secure” our boaders. Why? I think it is because we have not figured out how to have, make, or establish “peace”; and so we settle for security which in the end is a poor substitute.  Those apostles after the death of Jesus had no security. They locked the doors where they were. So Jesus came again and again to suggest to them that what they needed was peace, and once they had it, received it, gave it, or found it, they could forget about secuirty. The truth is, they never did have security. The fact is, they did not need it after they found and made peace. Life was still full of threats and danger, conflcit and adversity, but they lived in the midst life with a spirit of peace, with courage and joy. A careful reading of Luke’s Gospel verses after the Death and Resurrection makes it perfectly clear that this gift of “peace” is the consequence or the reward that comes with forgiveness. I believe that what went on in that upper room to which they seemed to return so often was forgiveness: a healing experience that emerged from their memories of what Jesus had taught and said to them over and over again. I believe that first of all they forgave themselves for being such cowards and doubters. I believe that they forgave Jesus for leaving them: a process of grieving, and I believe that they forgave one another for not being there, for their easy ambitions, and their failure to grasp what was in front of them while it was there. I believe that they began to accept the forgiveness Christ offered them for having failed to understand and to act. That forgiveness gradually and steadily gave them peace. Another way of looking at this might allow us to say: that they were not living in harmony with their conscience. The inner conflict between what they knew was right, and what they did or failed to do kept them for being and living in peace. Once they came intouch with their conscience formed by the Word of God in Jesus, they had peace: the peace Jesus wished for them. I often think of Father Stan Rother in this regard. He left Guatamala because there was no security. He wasn’t safe. He came home, and over a period of weeks I think his time at home was much like the time the Apostles in that locked up room. He had security, but no peace. So, over time, I think he wanted peace more than security. He wanted the peace of being where he was called to be with the people he loved more than security. He went back with peace - guided by his conscience, at peace with his conscience, and in spite of the violence of his murder, I believe he died and now lives in peace. At the heart of it all is forgiveness, and without forgiveness, human kind has no hope and no future. Without forgiveness and the peace which follows, we shall destroy one another. Most of the time, when it comes to generations of hatred, anger and violence, no one can rememeber why it started, and if they do, they know in their hearts that it was some silly little thing. Anger has a way of taking over our lives, of possessing us, and making us mad/crazy/incoherent, and insecure. The gift Jesus would leave with us, the whole purpose of his incarnation was peace: reconciliation.  The novelist Mary Gordon after the break-up of the Soviet Union in the early stages of the conflict in Yugoslavia wrote these words: “The heavy topsoil of repressed injustice breeds anger better than any other medium. That anger rolls and rolls like a flaming boulder gaining mass and speed even when the original causes of the anger is forgotten. The only way to stop this kind of irrational anger is an equally irrational forgiveness.” The apostles learned that truth from Jesus. The question remains when shall we learn it and act upon the lesson seeking peace rather than security, since once there is peace, there will be no need for security. We must come to live in peace with our conscience, doing what is right rather than what is easy, living the right way even if it means living with some risk, and speaking the truth even if it means paying a price.

We live in a world of smoke and mirrors. Magicians have fascinated and drawn crowds forever. It’s always about tricking the eye. In today’s world, with all our technology and digital skills, we can never be sure of what we see. I was reminded of this Friday night when standing there with a couple after their wedding. I pulled this microphone off my ear and thought I had flipped it out of sight. Actually it just came to rest on my shoulder and someone reached up to finish the job when the photographer said: “Never mind, I can photo shop it away.” And of course she could. She could also photo shop me away! In this day of artificial sweeteners, faux finishes, cloning, and reproductions of just about anything; seeing is not at all close to believing. This wonderful passage from John which the church proclaims every year on the Second Sunday in Easter draws us deeper into the wonder of the Resurrection and proposes that we might question what we see, and perhaps consider what others see when they are here. The approach that Thomas brought to the Resurrection was and remains thoroughly modern. He was practical, pragmatic, experiential, and rational. While these qualities are in themselves admirable, they are not dependable when it comes to leading us to truth and to faith. There is nothing rational about God, about God’s love, or about God’s way of expressing love. There is nothing practical about dying on a cross, spending three days in a tomb, and coming out alive. Thomas wanted scientific evidence. There was none, and until he got over it, he couldn’t believe. The evidence of the resurrection was not to be found by handling or probing the wounds of a body. The evidence was there in that upper room, but obviously it was a bit unconvincing. There is a suggestion here that those who had seen the Lord were still afraid. The doors were locked. They were not yet Spirit-filled enough to get out of that room with any courage or vision of what the Resurrection meant to them. So perhaps the faith of Thomas depends upon the witness of others, and that witness was not there. They were timid and afraid. Had he seen a group of people who had been transformed from powerless, fearful, hopeless, filled with shame and guilt into believers who were clear-sighted, courageous and hope-filled; people who were forgiven and empowered to extend that forgiveness others, there would have been nothing to doubt. Wonder for a moment what someone finds when they walk into this church. I think there is a Thomas here every time we open the doors. What does that person find in this assembly? We have to get a grip on this Gospel and let John speak to us again. This is not a story about Thomas or doubt. It is about a group of people to whom God has entrusted a message and a mission. How anyone will ever believe in it depends upon how we behave more than on what we say. Reducing Faith and Religion to a bunch or rules and obligations is not inviting or convincing. Using the rules and obligations to shape, form, discipline, and identify who we are is a different thing. We do not impose those on others, we invite them to find in the obligation to love and forgive the experience of resurrection. We invite them to find in fulfilling our obligations, an experience of joy and discovery that comes from unity, peace, and patient, tollerant acceptance. There is one more thing about Thomas found in this story worth pondering. He was absent. He left the company of the apostles. He left the other struggling believers. He sought loneliness rather than togetherness. He went off on his own with his difficulties, whatever they were, and this moved him further from Christ. Thomas tried to become a Christian “Lone-Ranger” trying to live faith on his own. It did not lead him to the truth and to the risen Christ. I like to believe that the others went after him, supporting and encouraging, inviting, and maybe even pleading. They stayed with it and “I will not believe” went to “I will believe if....” and then “I will believe if....”became: “My Lord and My God.” It is important that we stay with the weak in faith in order to help them stay connected. It is important that they stay connected with the family of faith, the community of believers, with the parish. The Lone-Ranger Christian is at risk in any generation and especially in our own as we move from centuries of faith to uncertain secularism. In the Epistle “Hebrews” (10:25) the writer says: “We should not stay away from our assembly as is the custom of some.” To do so weakens faith and continues to make our witness to the resurrection less than believable. As I have said again and again: If we truly believed and lived all that we say and do here, no one would doubt the resurrection; and we will have become credible undeniable witnesses to the resurrection by our own coming to life and resurrection from all the tombs in which we hide and lay buried like the dead.