Homily - The Fifth Sunday of Easter - 15 May 2022

The Fifth Sunday of Easter (C)

Dear brothers and sisters,

At first hearing, it may seem as though we receive two contradictory statements in the Scriptures today. First, Saints Paul and Barnabas tell us – curiously enough, by way of encouragement – that “it is necessary for us to undergo many hardships to enter the kingdom of God” (Acts 14:22). Second, Saint John tells us that God “will wipe away every tear from their eyes” (Revelation 21:4). The first saying is disarming and striking; the second saying is comforting and desirous. Can it be that the Beloved Disciple contradicts what the Apostle to the Gentiles says?

When considering such a question, it is good for us to remember that the Sacred Scriptures do not compete against each other. Rather, taken in their entirety, the Sacred Scriptures form a great harmony. It is for us to attune our ears to their hymn so that we might hear it properly.

When Saints Paul and Barnabas remind us that it is necessary for us to undergo many hardships to enter the kingdom of God, they say this as a matter of fact. This is a central fact of the Christian life. Even so, the centrality of the Cross in each of our lives is often either rejected or denied – whether implicitly or explicitly – by many Christians today. This rejection of a tenet of discipleship is, in part, what hinders our efforts to evangelize our culture and society that drifts further and further away from Christian life.

If we are to find the harmony between what Paul and Barnabas and John say, we have to consider who the they are to whom Saint John refers. Looking at his words in their full context, we see that they are those found in the holy city, in the new Jerusalem, those who names are found in the book of life at the Last Judgment. Their tears will be wiped away precisely because they endured the time of tribulation, because they underwent hardship, because they remained faithful to Christ Jesus, and for this reason they now live with God. We have the relics of two of these here in this very Cathedral Basilica.

What Paul and Barnabas say, then, about the necessity of hardship and what John says about the final and enduring comfort are not contradictory statements at all, but are instead part of a whole, two sides of the same coin, if you will; both are the fruits of an authentic discipleship. Both are to be found in the faithful adherence to Jesus’ command: “As I have loved you, so you should love one another” (John 13:34).

It should come as no real surprise that our society does not understand what love is. True love is always a willingness to suffer for the beloved; true love always entails a willingness to sacrifice for the beloved; true love always entails a renunciation of self in favor of the beloved. If there is no wiliness to suffer, if there is no willingness to sacrifice, whatever else it may be, it is not love.

Is this not what made the ministry of Saint Damien, of Saint Marianne, and of the Servant of God Joseph Dutton so very fruitful compelling? Did they not each in their own choose to suffer for those they loved, to sacrifice for those entrusted to their care, to renounce themselves in favor of those who needed their assistance? They did not choose the easy way out because they knew “it is necessary for us to undergo many hardships to enter the kingdom of God.” Their lives were fruitful because they lived and loved like Jesus; they willingly suffered for others and made heroic sacrifices for their benefit.

Some today might think that this aspect of love is difficult to discover because so few of us seem to recognize it. But there are always examples of authentic love to be found, and hints of love can be found in perhaps surprising places. We can find one such hint in the Hawaiian language in a word we all know well, though it is famously difficult to translate in English terms.

The word aloha, so I understand, has something of a kaleidoscope of meanings. While its best known meaning is love, it is not simply a romantic or rosy love; it is instead a love that also connotes compassion and patience, which is to say a love that involves suffering, hardships, and sacrifices. It is a love as we encounter and receive in Christ Jesus.

Father Damien, Mother Marianne, and Joseph Dutton each understand this, even if each in their own unique way. Saint Damien famously said, “I make myself a leper with the lepers.”

Saint Damien of Moloka'i

Saint Marianne said, “I am hungry for the work.”

Saint Marianne Cope

And Joseph went to Kalawao on his own accord as a personal penance to atone for his past sins. This heroic trio show us as if through a prism what it means to undergo hardships so as to enter the kingdom of God. They show us what it means to love others as Jesus love them and as he loves each one of us. And in the joy they exhibited in their care of the lepers, they received a foretaste of God wiping away their tears from their eyes; they were comforted by the Lord Jesus because they united themselves to him and loved like him. 

They did so in the extremes of the leper settlement, but you and I do not have to go so far. Joseph Dutton once said to a correspondent who lamented he could join Joseph at Kalaupapa, “One’s Molokai can be anywhere.”

The Servant of God Joseph Dutton

It remains then for us to undergo hardships wherever they come to us out of love for Jesus Christ and out of love for others. It remains for us to unite ourselves to the Lord Jesus and to love like him so to suffer for those we love, to sacrifice for those entrusted to our care, and to renounce ourselves in favor of those who need our assistance. For if we live and love in this way, being united to Christ Jesus, on the last day he will wipe away every tear from our eyes and welcome us into his kingdom. Amen.

Ascending the keep

While away on the Kairos retreat earlier this week with the senior boys from St. Anthony's, I gave a talk on the love of God. In the course of the talk, I shared with them how I came to know God's love through the deaths of my parents.

I said to them,

Those castles I had built with Legos were somehow quickly built of my own emotions. It seemed as though all of the people I loved were being taken away from me, so now I would be very careful whom I loved so that I would not be so deeply and profoundly hurt again. This was a necessary thing for an eight-year-old boy to do, but very unfortunate as well, because it kept me from experiencing the love of countless people – as it continues to do today - and it stopped me from sharing so much of the love that is within me, struggling to be set free.

I did, however, notice something slowly changing inside of me: someone was trying to break through my defenses and it seemed the intruder was successful. I began to feel, ever so slowly, a little bit more at peace.

This undetected intruder was Jesus Christ. I do not remember explicitly inviting him in, but I also did not refuse him. His all but sudden appearance in my keep was the best thing to ever happen to me.

Others were allowed - ever so slowly - to enter into the castle, as it were. The closer the friend the farther they were allowed to enter. This remains largely true to this day, though I am trying, with God's grace, to chip away at the walls I have constructed.

The next day another adult on the retreat gave a talk on obstacles to God's love and used Simon and Garfunkle's song, "I am a rock" to introduce his talk:



Not being one to get out very much I'm not sure I'd heard the song before. If I had, I certainly never paid it any attention.

Before the song ended, one of the boys leaned over to me and said, "It sounds like the song was written for you."

Since the retreat I've listened to the song several times and it has grown on me. With the exception of the line, "I have no need of friendship; friendship causes pain. It's laughing and it's loving I disdain," I think I agree with him; the song suits me well.

I've always known I have a need of friendship - as does everyone - and that friendship causes pain because it entails love (which always is a willingness to suffer), but I've never disdained laughter or love.

I've always been aware of the contradiction - perhaps paradox is a better word - of both retreating into the interior castle and of yearning to love and be loved; the two move in opposite directions. The walls are built up for proctection, yet these very walls cause pain because, as Rich Mullins sang, "There's a lot of love locked up inside me I'm learning to give."

For those who have suffered the loss of a great love, allowing oneself to be vulnerable again to love and be loved can be a great difficulty. For one reason or another, this has been the topic of several conversations with people lately, not simply in my own life but in theirs, as well.

If we consider the life of Christ Jesus we see two principle ways in which he made himself vulnerable to love: the Incarnation and the Crucifixion.

In taking flesh and being born of the Virgin Mary, the Second Person of the Trinity risked being vulnerable for us. He risked our rejection of his love.

In suffering death for us, the heart of the Savior was pierced, signifying his overflowing love that could not be contained, so fully did he give himself for us.

As we follow after him we, too, are called to make ourselves vulnerable to be loved by him and by others. We, too, must allow our hearts to be wounded so that the love of God may flow out from us to those we meet each day.

To do so requires abandoning ourselves to him, trusting in his love for us. It requires a union with the Cross of Christ and a willingness to suffer with and for him.

Naturally, some days are easier than others. For some, being a rock and an island may be a necessary thing. Now if we can only allow ourselves to be a maleable rock and an island that does not kick off the visitors.

These are just a few thoughts on my mind lately; I hope they may be helpful to a few of you.

The simplicity of life

I received an e-mail from a dear friend whose sister is in the hospital and could very much use your prayers.

My friend updated us on her sister and as she said how good it was simply to stand by her bed and watch her breathe. She then asked,

Did you take the time today to watch someone you love breathe...or blink an eye...or stretch....or smile? Life is so simple, and God is so good.

A very good question, indeed. Thank you.

The contemplation of Christ

During the Angelus address earlier this week the Holy Father offered for the faithful yet another brilliant, dazzling gem for prayerful reflection:

Contemplating the Crucified with the eyes of faith, we can understand profoundly what sin is, its tragic gravity, and at the same time the incommensurable power of the Lord's forgiveness and mercy. During these days of Lent, let us not distance our hearts from this mystery of profound humanity and lofty spirituality.

On contemplating Christ, let us feel at the same time that we are contemplated by him. He whom we ourselves have pierced with our faults does not cease to shed over the world an inexhaustible torrent of merciful love. May humanity understand that only from this source is it possible to draw the spiritual energy indisepensable to build that peace and happiness for which every human being is ceaselessly searching.

His Holiness has a unique gift for offering profound truth in just a few sentences. May the Lord bless him with many years to come!

Lord I am not worthy

This evening during a Holy Hour I delivered a talk that I titled, "Lord, I Am Not Worthy: Tried and True Methods to Experience the Eucharist More Profoundly." Thirty minutes of private adoration took place prior to the Holy Hour which ended up being really more a Holy Forty-five Minutes. I suppose my sense of time is not quite as good as I should like to think.

I was surprised and delighted to see fifty to sixty people present when the servers and I entered at the beginning of the Holy Hour.

I have posted the more interesting first half of my talk below:

So often in our lives we feel distracted at Mass, preoccupied and busy elsewhere. We have a difficult time keeping our focus and concentration on the “here and now” of the Eucharistic Celebration and thus we do not feel that we “get anything” out of the Mass. In reality, we receive the greatest gift that could be given us: Jesus Christ himself. We receive the pledge and foretaste of everlasting life. The trouble is this: we do not recognize his presence, more often than not because we have not prepared ourselves to welcome him into hearts with love.

Just before we receive Holy Communion, we repeat the words of the Centurion: “Lord, I am not worthy to have you enter under my roof; only say the word and my servant shall be healed” (Matthew 8:8). We have adapted the words a bit in our English translation, but nonetheless the meaning is the same. The first step to experiencing the Holy Mass more profoundly, more deeply, is to recognize that we are, in fact, not worthy to be here, to be in the Lord’s presence. “Because of our own human sinfulness none of us is worthy of so great a gift. Yet Jesus comes to us in the Eucharist to give us a share in his divine life.”[1] Is this not the greatest wonder of them all? Christ Himself reminds us: “Those who are well do not need a physician, but the sick do. I did not come to call the righteous but sinners” (Mark 2:17). He Who love us first longs for our love in return (cf. John 4:10).

The Lord loves us so profoundly that he calls us to be with him forever. More than this, God himself has come to us in Jesus Christ. Pope Benedict XVI reminds us in his Message for Lent that “On the Cross, it is God Himself who begs the love of His creature: He is thirsty for the love of every one of us.”[2]

As we gaze upon the Eucharistic Lord here before us on the altar, He continually calls out, “I thirst” (John 19:28). “I thirst for your love.” What, then, will our response to His thirst be? In the Gospel this morning, Jesus said to the righteous sheep, “I was thirsty and you gave me drink” and to the sinful goats he said, “I was thirsty and you gave me no drink” (Matthew 25:35, 42). The drink that Christ Jesus so earnestly desires and for which He thirsts is none other than the cup of our love.

To James and John as they argued over the place of honor, Jesus asked, “Can you drink the cup that I drink” (Mark 10:38)? That cup is the cup of divine love, the love that offers itself completely, holding nothing back, the love that He shares with the entire world. This is the love that loves “to the end.”

It is this same cup that we are to take up ourselves and offer to the Lord and to our brothers and sisters in Christ, with whom we are one. The Holy Father put it this way:

The response that the Lord ardently desires of us is above all that we welcome His love and allow ourselves to be drawn to Him. Accepting His love, however, is not enough. We need to respond to such love and devote ourselves to communicating it to others. Christ “draws me to Himself” in order to unite Himself to me, so that I learn to love the brothers with His own love.[3]

We are called to be the source of love to quench the thirst of the Lord Himself and of our brothers and sisters. “Yet to become such a source, one must constantly drink anew from the original source [of love], which is Jesus Christ, from whose pierced heart flows the love of God (cf. John 19:34).”[4] How, then, are to take up this cup of love? How are we to allow this cup to overflow in every area of our lives? We must come to the Eucharist. “Above all, the Eucharist is the great school of love. When we participate regularly and with devotion in Holy Mass, when we spend a sustained time of adoration in the presence of Jesus in the Eucharist, it is easier to understand the length, breadth, height and depth of his love that goes beyond all knowledge (cf. Ephesians 3:17-18).”[5]

[1] United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, Happy Are Those Who Are Called to His Supper: On Preparing to Receive Christ Worthily in the Eucharist (14 November 2006).
[2] Pope Benedict XVI, Message for Lent 2007.
[3] Pope Benedict XVI, Message for Lent 2007.
[4] Pope Benedict XVI, Deus caritas est, 7).
[5] Pope Benedict XVI, Message to the Youth of the World on the Occasion of the 22nd World Youth Day, 2007.

Homily - 18 February 2007

With the Lenten season only days away – though the snow makes it seem more like Advent – Jesus exhorts us strongly to model our lives on His own. Today He is blunt, direct, and straight to the point: “Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful” (Luke 6:36).

Who among us lives up to this challenge? Who among us keeps faithfully this command? Although “merciful and gracious is the Lord,” we, all too often, are not (Psalm 103:8). We hold our grudges, we talk behind each other’s backs, we spread gossip, slander, lie and cheat. We murder each other in our hearts and think ourselves better than others.

We, like Abishai, too often whisper to our friends and to ourselves: “God has delivered your enemy into your grasp this day. Let me nail him to the ground with one thrust of the spear; I will not need a second thrust!” (I Samuel 26:8). But even as we think this thought the words of Jesus resound in our ears like a clanging gong: “To you who hear I say, love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who persecute you” (Luke 27-28).

We know that we are very much like Adam who did not truly love the Lord, and that we are not always like Jesus Christ, the second Adam. We also know, though, that Jesus Christ does not act as the first Adam does; He does not deal with us as we deal with those who do not love us, because He Himself is Love. Indeed, the words of the Psalmist are true: “As a father has compassion on his children, so the LORD has compassion on those who fear him” (Psalm 103:13).

The fullness of His compassion – of His great love for us and of His desire to suffer with us – is made manifest in Jesus Christ, “who gives flesh and blood to those concepts in an unprecedented realism” (Deus caritas est, 12).

The Holy Father Pope Benedict XVI recently wrote to the youth of the world:

The manifestation of divine love is total and perfect in the Cross where, we are told by Saint Paul, “God proves his love for us in that while we were still sinners Christ died for us” (Romans 5:8). Therefore, each one of us can truly say: “Christ loved me and gave himself up for me” (cf. Ephesians 5:2). Redeemed by His blood, no human life is useless or of little value, because each of us is loved personally by Him with a passionate and faithful love, a love without limits.

Today, Jesus offers to us an invitation to follow in His way of being, to follow in His way of loving, to love each other as He loves us.

In his Message for Lent, Pope Benedict XVI reminds everyone that through the extension of this gracious invitation,

the Almighty awaits the “yes” of His creatures as a bridegroom that of his bride. Unfortunately, from its very origins, mankind, seduced by the lies of the Evil One, rejected God’s love in the illusion of a self-sufficiency that is impossible (cf. Genesis 3:1-7). Turning in on himself, Adam withdrew from that source of life who is God Himself, and became the first of “those who through fear of death were subject to lifelong bondage” (Hebrews 2:15). God, however, did not give up. On the contrary, man’s “no” was the decisive impulse that moved Him to manifest His love in all its redeeming strength.

It is in the mystery of the Cross that the overwhelming power of the heavenly Father’s mercy is revealed in all of its fullness. In order to win back the love of His creature, He accepted to pay a very high price: the blood of His only begotten Son. Death, which for the first Adam was an extreme sign of loneliness and powerlessness, was thus transformed in the supreme act of love and freedom of the new Adam.

Through this transformation of death Christ has redeemed us and made us members of the household of God. Through His death, we are given the promise of eternal life, joy and peace. “Just as we have borne the image of the earthly one,” says Saint Paul, “we shall also bear the image of the heavenly one” (I Corinthians 15:49). We bear the image of Jesus Christ when we do as he has already done for us and as he continues to do for us: when we love to the point of death, when we forgive those who have wronged us and when we give to those in need.

This is why Holy Mother Church proposes for us the three-fold Lenten practices of increased prayer, fasting and alms giving. It is through prayer that we learn to love authentically and selflessly. It is through fasting that we learn to forgive and grow in love. It is through alms giving that we give to the poor and share the love of Christ.

The Holy Father is praying that the coming season of Lent “be for every Christian a renewed experience of God’s love given to us in Christ, a love that each day we, in turn, must “regive” to our neighbor, especially to the one who suffers most in need”.

As we reflect today, then, on the admonitions of the Savior, we must prayerfully consider these questions: First, do I know the transforming of his love? If not, am I willing to allow myself to experience it? Second, do I share the love of Christ with everyone around me? These two questions should be the springboard from which we choose our Lenten practices.

Whatever we choose to do this Lent should help to conform us ever more closely to Christ. Whatever penance we take up should help us to grow in faith, in hope and in love.

Ultimately it comes down to our response to the invitation of the Lord to love as he loves us. Will you accept his invitation? Will you politely decline until another day? Will you simply refuse his invitation to love?

The response the Lord ardently desires of us is above all that we welcome His love and allow ourselves to be drawn to Him. Accepting His love, however, is not enough. We need to respond to such love and devote ourselves to communicating it to others. Christ “draws me to Himself” in order to unite Himself to me, so that I learn to love the brothers with His own love (Message for Lent 2007).

In his Message to the youth of the world, the Holy Father said:

My dear young friends, I want to invite you to “dare to love.” Do not desire anything less for your life than a love that is strong and beautiful and that is capable of making the whole of your existence a joyful undertaking of giving yourselves as a gift to God and your brothers and sisters, in imitation of the One who vanquished hatred forever through love (cf. Revelation 5:13).

I, too, wish to extend this invitation, not only to the youth, but to every member of the Body of Christ.