Homily - 7 November 2010

The Thirty-second Sunday of the Year (C)

Dear brothers and sisters,

It seems the gossip mongers are once again at work among us, spreading their lies and falsehoods to all who will listen. Their wicked and forked tongue “is a grub which taints the most beautiful of the flowers and upon them leaves behind it the disgusting trace of its own slime" [Saint John Vianney, in Sermons of the Cure of Ars, Una Morrisy, trans. (Rockford, Illinois: Tan Books and Publishers, Inc., 1995), 37].

Perhaps you have heard the latest word that someone heard from someone who works in the Chancery. In case you have not, the rumor is that St. Patrick Parish in Girard will soon be closed. This is a bold-faced lie and those who spread this rumor are gossips and liars themselves.

I do not know what possesses someone to begin such a lie. Nor do I understand how someone could hear such a tale – without any real evidence and having heard nothing from their Pastor or from their Bishop – could, first, believe such a rumor and, second, themselves spread it further about.

Saint John Vianney, that great model of priestly zeal and ministry, once wisely observed this about such gossips:

…the great bulk of malicious talk is done by people who are simply irresponsible, who have an itch to chatter about others without feeling any need to discover whether what they are saying is true or false. They just have to talk. Yet, although these are less guilty that the others – that is to say, than those who slander and backbite through hatred or envy or revenge – yet they are not free from sin. Whatever the motive that prompts them, they should not sully the reputation of their neighbor (ibid., 30).

Perhaps those who have such ample time on their hands – or, as the case may be, on their tongues – ought to devote themselves instead to more prayer and greater works of penance.

Some will say, “But I heard it from my very good friend.” I ask you, Do you really want to keep among your friends a gossip and scandalmonger? How good is a friend who lies to your face? Such a one is not worthy of your friendship. We are taught in the pages of Scripture, “He who goes about gossiping reveals secrets; therefore do not associate with one who speaks foolishly” (Proverbs 20:19)

What good comes from gossip? Does it really benefit anyone? It is my firm belief that the fastest road to hell – to “the resurrection of condemnation” – is paved with gossip (John 5:29). Listen again to the words of the heavenly patron of priests:

It is my belief that the sin of scandalmongering includes all that is most evil and wicked. Yes, my dear brethren, this sin includes the poison of all the vices – the meanness of vanity, the venom of jealousy, the bitterness of anger, the malice of hatred, the flightiness and irresponsibility so unworthy of a Christian . . . . Is it not, in fact, scandalmongering that sows almost all discord and disunity, which breaks up friendships and hinders enemies from reconciling their quarrels, which disturbs the peace of homes…? How many united households have been turned upside down by one evil tongue, so that their members could not bear to see or speak to one another? And one malicious tongue, belonging to a neighbor, man or woman, can be the cause of all this misery (ibid., 30-31).

This is why, dear friends, we must avoid gossip and scandalmongering lest we hear or speak it, for the Lord hears the prayers of those who cry out to him “from lips without deceit” (Psalm 17:1).

Indeed, if one goes about spreading gossip, lies and deceit, can one really claim to be a child of the Most High God? The Lord Jesus Christ – “the way and the truth and the life” (John 14:6) – came among us to gather us together again into the joy of God’s kingdom. It is Satan – “the father of lies” (John 8:44) – who comes among us to scatter and divide.

Pope Saint Gregory the Great encouraged priests to admonish those who sow seed of discord in these words:

…surely those who disturb [the peace] are the children of Satan. All those who by discord cut themselves off from the sap of love, become withered branches… Therefore, let the sowers of discord weigh well how manifold are the sins they commit. In perpetrating one single iniquity, they root out all virtues from the human heart. And since nothing is more esteemed by God than the virtue of charity, nothing is more desired by the Devil than its extinction. He, then, who sows discord and thus destroys charity in the neighbor, serves God’s enemy, as if he were his familiar friend. For he takes away from the hearts he wounds that virtue by the loss of which the Devil fell, and cuts from them the path by which they rise up.

The evil of gossip is insidious and immensely poisonous to the soul [Pope Saint Gregory the Great, Pastoral Care, in Ancient Christian Writers, Vol. 11, Henry Davis, trans. (New York: New York, Newman Press, 1950), III, Chapter 23, Admonition 24].

You know as well as I do how prevalent it is in this community and it is not simply because “this is a small town.” Gossip has no place in the Christian life because it violates love and spreads lies. It betrays a certain arrogance and pride of both the one who speaks and the one who listens to it. Gossip encompasses a great many sins.

Gossip must stop and in order for it to stop each of us must first recognize that we all do it from time to time, though some more frequently than others. With this in mind, I suggest three simple ways to know if one is a gossip:

1. If you have ever begun a sentence saying, “I’m not a gossip but…” you are indeed a gossip.
2. If you find that you talk about other people more than your family and close friends, you are a gossip.
3. If you talk with people about things that have nothing to do with either of you, you are a gossip.

If we do not know the facts, we should nothing. If it only concerns someone’s faults, we should say nothing. If a person does not have a right to certain information, we should say nothing. If it does not concern us, we should say nothing.

Before we open our mouths, we ought to ask this question: “Will what I am about to say be helpful in the journey to heaven?” If it will, good, say it. If not, keep your mouth closed and you will not hinder someone from attaining to “the resurrection to life” (John 5:29).

Why do we gossip and talk about each other in such ways? Why do we hold our grudges so tightly and close to us? Why do we so enjoy focusing on the faults of others and shy away from examining our own faults? It can only be because we do not fully believe in the resurrection of the dead or in eternal life. If we did, we would seek to avoid all that keeps us from the resurrection to life.

Rather than condemning each other and spreading such gossip, rumors and lies, we ought to help each other follow Jesus Christ. Love should flow out of our lips, not hate and deceit.

For this to happen, it may well be necessary to show their sin to our brothers and sisters. Sometimes we have to reprimand them and help them turn from their sin. When someone gossips in your presence, do you correct them and remind them of the commandment against lying and against murder? What good does your silence do them? It surely will not lead them a conversion of heart. By our silence we only allow greater evil to be done.

If we truly love our brothers and sisters we will want only what is good for them. And if what truly want only what is good for them, we will seek to lead them from the darkness of sin to the luminous glory of Christ Jesus.

“May the Lord direct [our] hearts to the love of God and to the endurance of Christ” that we may live forever with him (II Thessalonians 3:5)! Amen.

The chicken and the feathers

A parish priest in Scotland posted the following humorous and poignant story on Facebook:

Many years ago, during the time of the Protestant Reformation, there was a great saint living in Italy called Philip Neri. He was a wonderful priest and he helped many people to be good Catholics, during that time, when so many Catholics were losing their faith.

One day a woman came to see St. Philip Neri. She was known for her wicked tongue and she used to gossip about other people, telling all the bad things they had done. This indeed was very wrong because when she talked to someone about the faults and sins of another person, that person would many times be looked upon as a bad person, by other people!

St. Philip gave the woman some money and asked her to go to the market and buy a chicken that had just been killed and to pluck all the feathers off, as she walked home with the chicken.

The woman was proud of the fact that St. Philip had asked her to do something for him. She went to the market, bought the chicken, and on her way home she picked off every single feather and made that chicken as clean as a whistle! Then with a smile she handed the chicken to St. Philip Neri.

He thanked the woman and then said, "Now go back once more, and gather up all the feathers of the chicken you just plucked!"

The poor woman didn't smile anymore. She said, "But that is impossible, Father! The wind has scattered the feathers in every direction!"

Then St. Philip scolded her, "Let this be a lesson to you, for it is exactly the same with your wicked words. Just as the chicken feathers have been scattered by the wind in every direction, so have your wicked words been scattered in every direction by other people, repeating your stories!"

I was going to try to incorporate this story into my homily this weekend, but doing so would make my homily rather lengthy.

Homily - 25 February 2007

Says Moses to the people of Israel: “The priest shall receive the basket from you and shall set it in front of the altar of the LORD, your God” (Deuteronomy 26:4). As we hear these words we recall the words of Jesus: “If you bring your gift to the altar, and there recall that your brother has anything against you, go first and be reconciled with your brother, and then come and offer your gift” (Matthew 5:23-24).

Saint Jerome notes that Jesus “did not say, ‘If you have anything against your brother’ but ‘If your brother has anything against you,’ so that a greater need for reconciliation is imposed on you.”[1] We must, then, do all that we can to be reconciled with our brothers and sisters in Christ.

Notice here, if you will, that Jesus does not say to be reconciled after we make our offering, but before we offer the sacrifice.[2] Whenever we come to the Holy Mass, then, we should first strive to be reconciled with those who have grudges and hurt feelings toward us, otherwise our offering may be in vain and this is no small matter.

Do not counter with “He offended me; I didn’t offend him. He ought to square up with me, and not I with him.” If for the sake of your salvation the Lord orders you to make friends, though you are the one who has been more offended, you must apologize, that you may have double credit: first, because you have been offended and, second, because you were the first to apologize. For if you have offended someone and then ask pardon of him, the Lord will forgive you for your offense because you were the first to ask pardon. You will have no reward, however, if you are the guilty person and have asked pardon. But if one has done wrong by you and you are the first to apologize, you will have a great reward. Hurry therefore to be the first one to make friends. Otherwise, if you should delay, he may be the first to apologize and may snatch from your hands the reward of love.[3]

We ought to compete with each other not for place of rank or honor, not to outdo each other in athletic contests or the pursuit of money, but to outdo each other in love. The love we see in each other should spur us on to love all the more! How can we seek to be reconciled with our brothers and sisters? How can we grow in this love?

On Ash Wednesday I spoke briefly about keeping custody of the senses as a way to grow in love. We must keep custody of the eyes lest we see something that leads us to sin. We must keep custody of the ears lest we hear something that leads us to sin. We must keep custody of the mouth lest we lead others to sin. The well-known phrase, “See no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil” is quite poignant, even today. Those monkeys know what they are doing.

Keeping custody of the tongue is, perhaps, the most difficult of the senses to control, but at the same time it is the one that does the most harm. When we are tempted to gossip about someone or some situation – as each of us is - we would do well to remember the words of Jesus: “What comes out of a person, that is what defiles” (Mark 7:20).

Very often it happens that our brother has something against us not so much because of what we have done, but because of what we have said. If we love with the love of Christ Jesus – as indeed we are called to do – we should desire to remove all possible reasons for our brothers and sisters to hold anything against us, either in act or speech.

We all know the childhood line: “Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me.” Nothing could be farther from the truth, and the evil of gossip is perhaps the most damaging and hurtful of all words. Let me illustrate my point.

Shortly after I arrived at this parish twenty months ago, a friend told me a rumor was circulating concerning my parents. Apparently someone heard that my parents are both deceased having died when I was a young boy, but apparently the circumstances concerning their deaths were not being told. Instead, someone decided that my parents must have died in a car accident – what other reason could there be? - and began telling others this as fact, or at least it was heard as fact.

When this gossip was first brought to my attention I was very offended, angry and deeply hurt. Not only did this gossip demonstrate a clear lack of love, but it also demonstrated a lack of respect because not one person spreading this gossip had the decency to inquire about my parents. They did not die in a car accident. My father died of alcoholism twenty-one years last week ago and my mother died of a brain tumor nineteen years ago last month.

The evil of gossip is insidious and immensely poisonous to the soul. You know as well as I do how prevalent it is in this community and it is not simply because Effingham “is a small town”. Gossip has no place in the Christian life because it violates love and spreads lies. Gossip betrays a certain arrogance and pride of both the one who speaks and the one who listens to it. Gossip encompasses a great many sins.

Gossip must stop and in order for it to stop each of us must first recognize that we all gossip, although some of us more frequently than others. With this in mind, I suggest three ways to know if one is a gossip:

1. If you have ever begun a sentence saying, “I’m not a gossip but…” you are indeed a gossip. If you were not one there would be no reason to preface your sentence.

2. If you find that you talk about other people more than your family and dear friends, you are a gossip.

3. If you talk with people about things that have nothing to do with either of you, you are a gossip.

If we do not know the facts we should not speculate because someone will think we are speaking the facts. Before we open our mouths, we ought to ask this question: “Will what I am about to say be helpful in the journey to heaven?” If it will, good, say it. If not, keep your mouth closed and your brother will not have anything to hold against you and you will not have to be reconciled to him.

Why do we gossip and talk about each other in such ways? Why do we hold our grudges so tightly and close to us? Why do we so enjoy focusing on the faults of others and shy away from examining our own faults?

None of us wakes up in the morning thinking, “Who’s life can I make miserable today? What can I say to so-and-so to make her mad today?” Each of us wakes up with the desire to do good, but because of sin we fall short of our goals and we fail to love as we should. Each of us does; anyone who says otherwise is a liar.

Rather than condemning each other and spreading such gossip, rumors and lies, we ought to help each other follow after Jesus Christ. Love should flow out of our lips, not hate and deceit. Let us, then, be reconciled with each other this Lenten season so that coming before the Lord, we can offer the gift of our lives in faith and love and “bow down in his presence” (Deuteronomy 26:10). Amen.

[1] Saint Jerome, CCL 77:28.
[2] Saint John Chrysostom, PG 57:250.
[3] Anonymous, Incomplete Work on Matthew, Homily 11.

A Lenten challenge

During his homily this weekend my pastor challenged his parishioners to put one dollar in the rice bowl every time they found themselves gossiping, judging others or failing to forgive others.

One parishioner said, "We'll either stop gossiping or all be broke." Another parishioner said, "Father, I don't think the rice bowl is big enough."

Even so, it's a magnificent idea.