Blind from Birth

I watched a Mass telecast from Italy last year. The lector proclaimed the readings without looking down at the text. His eyes, filled with the light of joy, fixed on the assembly in an unbroken gaze. At first, I thought he had memorized the readings. But, when I noticed his fingers running over the page, I realized he was blind. What a powerful image to invite a blind person to lector on the Sunday we remember Jesus' healing of a blind man!

As I watched him read, I couldn't help but wonder what life must be like for someone born blind. All their life, they have to depend on others to pick their clothes for them and to help them along. Most of all, they have to believe that there is a world out there beyond the midnight of unending darkness that their life is. And so, trust must come naturally to the blind.

When Jesus approaches the blind man in today's gospel, it must have been very easy for the man to trust him. He had relied on other people his whole life. Now, he would put himself in Jesus' hands, allowing Jesus to cake his eyes with mud and obeying Him when He told him to wash in the pool of Siloam. This man had nothing to lose. And because he chose to trust, he gained everything - not only the ability to look out onto the world God created, but to see and believe in God made flesh in the person of Jesus.

In contrast, the religious leaders who see perfectly well and understand their religion perfectly well are the ones whose eyes are now covered over. They are scrambling to fit Jesus' miracle into their narrow categories. Unlike the blind man, they fear they have something to lose. They fear losing their standing with the people and their authority. They fear Rome will be displeased with Jesus' messianic claims and harshly surpress the people. Though they see perfectly well the miracles Jesus performs, their fear drives them into the darkness of denial and ignorance.

We all approach Jesus with a bit of faith and a bit of fear. We often see and believe. But, we just as often fear and flee. There are times when we rejoice in the gifts and insight Jesus so freely bestows on us. At other times, we are scared that by following Jesus we will lose something precious to us. There are times we choose to open our eyes, and there are times we choose to cover them over.

The blind have something to teach us about trust. They can teach us about what it's like to take another person's hand and allow them to lead us. They can teach us about believing that there's something out there beyond what we can see though we only hear whispers of it. They can teach us that we have less to lose than we fear and more to gain than we can ever imagine.

Should We Be Excluded?

The oldest political trick in the book is to get your opponent to talk about anything else except the issues. We have seen this many times over the past year. They bring up something a candidate's pastor once said. They question a candidate's commitment to his or her family. Rumors are started about possible shady business dealings. All this in hopes of getting the opponent to be on the defensive. Then the press will focus on the candidate's weaknesses rather than his or her strengths. Little by little, support for the candidate begins to diminish as he or she is required to talk about everything else except the issues.

This is a tactic which the enemies of Jesus tried often. In one famous episode from the gospel recorded by Matthew, Jesus is asked whether it is lawful to pay taxes to Caesar. By asking him whether or not Jews should pay taxes, they hoped to catch him in a trap. If Jesus said they should pay taxes, he would lose support among his followers who opposed the Roman occupation of Israel. If he said they shouldn't pay taxes, then the religious leaders would have cause to report him to the Roman authorities as an insurrectionist. Whichever way Jesus answered, his enemies hoped that he would have to keep explaining himself, digging himself into a deeper hole and losing support among the people.

As usual, though, Jesus is far more clever than his adversaries. His answer has become one of the most quoted verses from the Bible: "Give to Caesar what belongs to Caesar; but give to God what belongs to God."

When we hear Jesus' words, we have to ask ourselves: What exactly belongs to Caesar? What do we owe to our government and to our fellow citizens? We have a responsibility to pay taxes and follow the laws. Being blessed to live in a democracy, we also have a responsibility to vote and to voice our opinion. Along with that, we must study the issues facing our society and form our consciences so that our opinions are based on sound logic and good moral principles. All these elements go into being good and responsible citizens. God expects that of us, especially as he has blessed us with a country which values freedom so highly.

Too often, however, Jesus' words, "give to Caesar what is Caesar's and to God what is God's", are quoted by adversaries of the Church who try to tell us that religion has no place in political life. They are using that old political tactic of trying to keep us from talking about the issues. When they claim a wall of separation between Church and State, they hope that people of faith won't become involved in the national debate about abortion, homosexual marriage, the death penalty or stem cell research. They tell us that people of faith should keep their opinions to themselves. They dare to say that we have no right to voice our opinion because it is informed and motivated by faith. Sad to say, too often Christians have taken that criticism to heart and left their faith at the door when they entered the voting booth.

But, it is absolutely un-American to believe that someone has less of a freedom of speech because his or her ideas are informed and motivated by religious faith. As a country, we have fought to guarantee that each person have the freedom to voice their opinions no matter what their source or what their content. Should a person's beliefs and opinions be excluded because that person is a Catholic Christian? Why are the opinions of Catholics any different from the ideas proposed by environmentalists, animal rights supporters or business people? Like every other American, we have a right and a duty to witness to our faith even in the political arena.

And, the fact is that people of faith have always been a part of the political process in our country. In the last century, it was the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., a man of faith, who led the fight to guarantee civil rights for all people regardless of race. In the nineteenth century, people of faith were among those who stirred the conscience of our nation to recognize the evil of slavery. And, many of the drafters of the constitution and forefathers of the country were informed and motivated by their faith to make America a place of freedom and opportunity. In this century, it is up to us now to take up the cause of justice and to witness to the dignity of every human person no matter how weak or how vulnerable.

As a church, we must never endorse a political candidate or a political party. We can never fall into the trap of partisan politics. But, we do have a right and a duty to speak to the issues facing the society in which we live, work and raise our children. Because of our faith, we have much to offer. We have insights regarding the dignity of the human person, the sacredness of human life, the importance of the family and the role of government in protecting the most vulnerable of our citizens. As Pope John Paul II said so often, as a Church we do not seek to impose our views but to propose them to society, to enrich the debate through the witness of our faith.

Governments come and go. Political leaders come and go. But, God's word endures forever. The Church has survived numerous governments, both good and bad, from the Roman Empire, through the Middle Ages, through Nazism and Communism to the present day. As a community of faith we have a treasury of wisdom built up over those many centuries which we must share with the people of our day and use to strengthen our society. Let us pray that we will have the courage to speak the truth of the gospel even in the public arena and pray also for our leaders that they may be inspired by a vision of justice that will lead us to true peace.

The Sign of Jonah

The introduction Paul gives to his epistle to the Romans expresses the way he perceived his own vocation and the vocation of the community in Rome. Of himself he writes that he was "called to be an apostle" and "set apart to proclaim the gospel." Later he writes that he and those who assisted him in the work of evangelization were "favored with apostleship."

Paul was a man consumed - almost obsessed - with his task of converting the Gentiles to faith in Jesus Christ. Yet he looked upon it not as a burden - not as a penance laid upon him for the time he spent persecuting the Church - but as a grace, as a privilege bestowed upon him by Jesus Christ.

Who is this Jesus about whom Paul was commissioned to preach and who likewise favors us with the task of evangelization? Today's gospel reading reveals a Savior rejected by those he came to save. His ministry among his people was marked by a phenomenon which he called the "sign of Jonah." Whereas Jonah preached condemnation to Nineveh, and they repented and found salvation, Jesus preached salvation to Israel, but they would not accept him and so would be condemned. This Jesus brought salvation to those willing to accept him yet condemnation to those who opposed him. His message was good news to the poor but bad news to the rich.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer, in his classic work, The Cost of Discipleship, writes that the cross is primarily an experience of rejection and ridicule. Jesus faced rejection continually in his ministry. Paul and those who followed him in the task of evangelization likewise encountered rejection. Jesus in fact promised us that any integral preaching of the gospel will be opposed because many people regard the dawning of God's kingdom as bad news. But there is cause for rejoicing for us who have been favored with the ministry of evangelization because if we face rejection and ridicule for our faith in Jesus then we are being made similar to our crucified Lord.

Jesus failed to convert Israel. But he turned that failure into the means of salvation through the cross. We cannot presume to have any more success than our Savior had. Our lives as Christians and our ministry will likewise be marked by the same rejection, ridicule and failure that Jesus suffered. Yet, as was the case with Jesus, it will be our faithfulness not our success that God will use as a means of salvation for the world.

New England Haiku

Autumn's first brown leaves
parachute onto my deck.
My rake prepares for lift-off.

Another old homily from 1991

I preached this homily on last Sunday's readings (26th Sunday of Ordinary Time) way back on September 27, 1991. In the interest of full disclosure, I stole the opening story from one of the faculty members at the seminary.

I once overheard two ladies having a conversation at K-Mart a couple of years ago. One of them was saying how happy she was that their old pastor had retired beacuse all he did was tell the parishioners that they were all going to hell. Her friend then asked her if the new pastor was any better, and she answered, "Yes. He's a much nicer, friendlier guy." Her friend asked her again, "He doesn't tell you that you're all going to hell?" And she answered, "Well, yeah, he does. But he doesn't seem so happy about it."

Like the pastors in this story, it seems that the Bible loves to tell rich people that they are going to hell. Besides today's scathing second reading, there are many sayings of Jesus which suggest that having wealth makes one incapable of entering into heaven. What is the Bible's problem with rich people? Why are the authors of Sacred Scripture so quick to condemn them?

In today's reading, James' major complaint against the rich is that they did not pay their employees a just wage. These rich people gained their wealth by underpaying those who worked the land for them. They lived luxurious and comfortable lives while those who earned money for them worked long, hard hours with nothing to show for it. James warns them that God is not blind to such blatant injustice but will comfort the oppressed laborers by punishing thier wicked employers.

The conviction of early Christianity was that the rich person's plenty came at the expense of the poor. For example, Saint Augustine wrote in the fourth century that anyone who has more food, money or clothing than he or she needs has stolen it from the poor. What the early Christians could not understand was how anyone could eat too much or throw away food if they knew someone else was starving. Because they believed that the goods of the earth were given by God for everyone to enjoy no one had a right to horde if others were starving or in debt. Feeding the hungry and clothing the naked became the number one way of witnessing to their faith in God who loves and watches over the poor and those who are denied their rights.

As citizens of a country with many material blessings we have alot to be thankful for. Most people in this country never worry about having enough to eat. Most people have enough clothes to keep them warm and some kind of home or apartment to live in. But we cannot thank God for the blessings we enjoy without remembering those people in our country and in our world who do worry about how they will feed their families and who may have nowhere to live because they were evicted from their apartments so the landlord could turn them into condominiums.

The God who gave us all that we have and the plenty which we enjoy puts only one demand on us who receive them - that we show our appreciation by sharing those blessings with others, especially with those who are most in need.

Preaching to Mother Teresa

The second time I had an opportunity to preach as a deacon was at San Gregorio Church in Rome where the Sisters of Charity had a convent. As it turned out, Mother Teresa was there for the Mass. Of course, I should have been there to listen to her! Instead, with her characteristic humility, she listened attentively to me dare to preach God's word. As luck would have it, I found my homily notes among some old papers of mine. I don't know what the readings of the day were, but the date was May 21, 1991.

Whenever Jesus speaks with his disciples he is careful to bring them back to what is most basic and most important.

For instance, in yesterday's gospel when the disciples were bickering about who was the most important, Jesus reminds them that to be a disciple of his is not to be better than others but to serve others.

In this morning's gospel quite the same situation reoccurs.

The disciples felt that they were right to try to stop the man expelling demons in Jesus' name. After all, he was not an intimate friend of Jesus as they were. He had not traveled with Jesus witnessing his healings and hearing his words as they had. He had not seen Jesus transfigured as they had. What right did he have to use Jesus' name?

But Jesus sees through their pride and tells them the way things really are and should be: "Don't you realize what you have done? You almost stopped him from freeing a child of God from the grip of the Devil."

And in doing that, Jesus brings them back to what is most basic and most important about a life of discipleship - that Jesus' name be the source of freedom and salvation for all God's children.

What then, sisters and brothers, is most basic in our lives as disciples of Jesus? Does not he who has shown us so much love and forgiveness simply want us to show that same forgiving love to everyone we meet so that his name may be a source of freedom and salvation for them?

Enlightened by his word, nourished and strengthened by his body and blood, let us get back to basics, to what's most important.

Let us show the loving, forgiving, consoling face of Jesus to the poor, the needy and the sinners we meet today.