A Homily – The Ninth Sunday in Ordinary Time (Year B)

First Reading - Deuteronomy 5:12-15 ©

Responsorial Psalm 80(81): 3-8, 10-11

Second Reading – 2 Corinthians 4:6-11 ©

Gospel Acclamation – John 6:63, 68

Alternate Acclamation – John 17:17

The Gospel According to Mark 2:23-3.6 ©

 

(NJB)

 

Listen!

When you read the law concerning the sabbath remember Jesus’ teaching who instructs us that the sabbath was made for the benefit of human beings and for no other purpose.

It is right and good to keep the sabbath. It is right and good to take time out of your week to reflect on the providence of the divine, to look into the faces of your spouse and children, your mother and father, your sister and brother, your employer and your employees and see the face of God…you will find God looking back at you in the eyes of the homeless, the disenfranchised, the sick and the stranger.

Give to them as you can, help them to a place of rest if you are able, facilitate their experience of grace through the love you provide to them.

Know this!

There is strength in the knowledge of God, the creator of the universe. It is right to praise God and good to rejoice in life which God brought forth from the primordial chaos, to rejoice in human life and to celebrate in your life…in all of its your uniqueness.

Consider how Jesus taught the law: love God, and demonstrate this not through words but through actions, by loving your neighbor even as you love yourself.

Do not believe in the old lies and misconstruals of the law, do not blindly accept the will of human being as representing the will of the divine.

Remember.

God does not interfere with the choices we make. What we accomplish, or fail to accomplish, happens due to the choices we make, not because God has a stake in those things. God did not rescue the Jews from Egypt, God did not give them Israel for an inheritance. They freed themselves and waged war on the land of Canaan. They took the possessions of Canaan at the point of the sword, through murder, fire and blood.

Know this.

It was not God’s will. God has no enemies.

God leads us to the knowledge of the divine in the subtle ways. Through the seed of the Word that dwells within us, which is to say: by virtue of the fact that we are created in the divine image, that we are gifted with reason so that we are able to know and understand the truth.

Meditate on the law, it is written in your heart, it is the same law that was written in Jesus’ heart:

Love God with all your strength and all your heart and all your mind, and love your neighbor as yourself…do this in fulfillment of the law.

Consider the teaching of the apostle and know that faith should not be taught as a mode of mysteries. It is not forbidden to speculate about the eternal and the invisible, but what can we know of those things, conditioned as we are by time and space. It is not the eternal and the invisible that should concern us in this life, it is the people we encounter every day, the people we can see and feel and touch.

Our eternal home is waiting for us, as it waits for all of God’s children, even as it waits for those who work against God’s will; even they are loved by God…do not reject them or turn them away, for they are also the objects of God’s love.

Do speak of the glory of God, or the glory of Jesus, or the glory of the promise. Speak instead of the ordinary and humble way of life that God calls us to.

That is the way Jesus called on us to follow.

Be mindful.

The Gospel provides many examples of where the early church began to deviate from the teaching of Jesus, as when Peter suggests that he received from Jesus a secret concerning the path to eternal life. Peter would have us believe that the purpose of believing in the gospel, of believing that Jesus is the “Holy One of God” is the key to receiving the gift of salvation.

Peter’s scheme suggests that God parcels out access to Jesus, to the truth, to the reality of life everlasting, allowing some to come to it while refusing others; this scheme is false.

Here is the gospel: God loves you, and you are saved.

You are not saved for anything that you have done, you did not earn it, you are saved because God loves you. The promise of salvation is not that you will be spared from suffering and torment in hell, or that when you are judged God will forgive you; God has already forgiven you, you are saved already.

God has prepared you, and everyone for eternal life.

Believe it!

Let the goodness of this promise flow through you, live your life as if you know that it is true…even if you doubt…especially when you doubt.

We are not called to believe in the idea that Jesus is this or that, the Holy One of God, we are called to act on the principles of his faith, his trust in divine providence, we are called to live lives of charity and service to each other, to walk humbly, do could and serve justice all the days of our lives.

Remember.

You cannot lie and serve God at one and the same time.

Consider the Gospel reading for today, it is a cautionary tale.

On the one hand today’s reading serves as an indictment of the people who plotted against Jesus, of those who desired to see an end to his ministry and who plotted his murder.

On the other hand it serves to separate the ministry of Jesus, who was himself a Pharisee, from the establishment of Pharisaic Judaism, which in the period of the early Church, had not converted to Christianity, and whose membership was extremely hostile to it.

However, the most important aspect of the narrative is that the ordinances of God, the laws and customs of the people, exist to serve humankind, not the other way around.

Jesus is a good theologian, he makes the argument first on the basis of tradition and scripture, and then on the grounds of justice.

The miracle that is described need not be taken literally; it is a metaphor, as a metaphor it serves to put the exclamation point on the rest of the narrative.

The power to heal comes from God, from God would not have granted such power in contravention of God’s law, giving the proof that Jesus has correctly interpreted the law, and that stands in divine favor.

First Reading - Deuteronomy 5:12-15 ©

Remember that You were A Servant in the Land of Egypt

The Lord says this:

 

‘Observe the sabbath day and keep it holy, as the Lord your God has commanded you. For six days you shall labour and do all your work, but the seventh day is a sabbath for the Lord your God. You shall do no work that day, neither you nor your son nor your daughter nor your servants, men or women, nor your ox nor your donkey nor any of your animals, nor the stranger who lives with you. Thus your servant, man or woman, shall rest as you do. Remember that you were a servant in the land of Egypt, and that the Lord your God brought you out from there with mighty hand and outstretched arm; because of this, the Lord your God has commanded you to keep the sabbath day.’

 

Responsorial Psalm 80(81): 3-8, 10-11

Solemn Renewal of the Covenant

Ring Out Your Joy to God Our Strength.

Shout with joy to God our helper,

  rejoice in the God of Jacob.

Take up the song, sound the timbrel,

  play on the lyre and the harp.

At the start of the month, sound the trumpet,

  at the full moon, at our festival.

For this is the law for Israel,

  the decree of the God of Jacob.

He gave it to Joseph, for a witness,

  when he went out of the land of Egypt;

  with words that had never been heard:

“I freed his back from burdens;

  his hands were freed from heavy loads.

In your tribulation you called on me and I freed you,

  I heard you from the heart of the storm,

  I tested you at the waters of Meribah.

Listen, my people, and I will put my case –

  Israel, if you would only hear me!

You shall not have any strange god,

  you shall not worship the gods of foreigners.

For I am the Lord, your God,

  who led you out of the land of Egypt.

  Open wide your mouth and I shall fill it.

But my people did not hear my voice:

  Israel did not turn to me.

So I let them go on in the hardness of their hearts,

  and follow their own counsels.

If my people had heard me,

  if only they had walked in my ways –

I would swiftly have crushed their enemies,

  stretched my hand over those who persecuted them.

The enemies of the Lord would be overcome with weakness,

  Israel’s would be the good fortune, for ever:

  I would feed them full of richest wheat

and give them honey from the rock,

  to their heart’s content.

 

Second Reading – 2 Corinthians 4:6-11 ©

In Our Mortal Flesh the Life of Jesus is Openly Shown

It is the same God that said, ‘Let there be light shining out of darkness’, who has shone in our minds to radiate the light of the knowledge of God’s glory, the glory on the face of Christ.

  We are only the earthenware jars that hold this treasure, to make it clear that such an overwhelming power comes from God and not from us. We are in difficulties on all sides, but never cornered; we see no answer to our problems, but never despair; we have been persecuted, but never deserted; knocked down, but never killed; always, wherever we may be, we carry with us in our body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus, too, may always be seen in our body. Indeed, while we are still alive, we are consigned to our death every day, for the sake of Jesus, so that in our mortal flesh the life of Jesus, too, may be openly shown.

 

Gospel Acclamation – John 6:63, 68

Alleluia, alleluia!

Your words are spirit, Lord, and they are life; you have the message of eternal life.

Alleluia!

 

Alternate Acclamation – John 17:17

Alleluia, alleluia!

Your word is truth, O Lord: Consecrate us in the truth.

Alleluia!

 

The Gospel According to Mark 2:23-3.6 ©

The Son of Man is Master Even of the Sabbath

One sabbath day, Jesus happened to be taking a walk through the cornfields, and his disciples began to pick ears of corn as they went along. And the Pharisees said to him, ‘Look, why are they doing something on the sabbath day that is forbidden?’ And he replied, ‘Did you never read what David did in his time of need when he and his followers were hungry – how he went into the house of God when Abiathar was high priest, and ate the loaves of offering which only the priests are allowed to eat, and how he also gave some to the men with him?’

And he said to them, ‘The sabbath was made for man, not man for the sabbath; the Son of Man is master even of the sabbath.’

He went again into a synagogue, and there was a man there who had a withered hand. And they were watching him to see if he would cure him on the sabbath day, hoping for something to use against him. He said to the man with the withered hand, ‘Stand up out in the middle!’ Then he said to them, ‘Is it against the law on the sabbath day to do good, or to do evil; to save life, or to kill?’ But they said nothing. Then, grieved to find them so obstinate, he looked angrily round at them, and said to the man, ‘Stretch out your hand.’ He stretched it out and his hand was better. The Pharisees went out and at once began to plot with the Herodians against him, discussing how to destroy him.

 

A Homily – The Ninth Sunday in Ordinary Time (Year B)

 

The Feast of Saint Justin the Martyr, Christian Philosopher

Today is the feast of Saint Justin the Martyr, a Christian philosopher from the second century, who was put to death, together with his students, at the very beginning of the Christian era, around the year 165 CE.

 Few of his writings have survived, but the work we do have demonstrates the broad influence Saint Justin had in shaping our understanding of Jesus as the second person of the trinity, the Son of God, an incarnation of the divine logos.

 Justin established the theology that Jesus of Nazareth, Joshua bin Joseph, was the embodied manifestation of God’s rational aspect, the principle of divine reason alive in the world.

 His work established the notion that all people carry a seed of the Word within them, insofar as all people are created in the divine image and share in the being of God. This doctrine is referred to as the Logos Spermatikos and it stands in stark distinction to the much more pessimistic theology of Saint Augustine of Hippo developed three hundred and fifty years later, at the beginning of the Church’s imperial era.[1]

 Justin’s theology of suggests that when God breathed life into Adam, God imparted to his creature God’s own self, like a seed of the divine, planting within Adam and the descendants of Adam (humanity writ large) a yearning for the truth and the ability to become transformed in our encounter with the truth, through the agency of the divine logos, making humankind into the creatures that Aristotle referred to as “the rational animal,” unlike every other species of animal on Earth.

 Justin taught that the divine is indivisible.

 In other words: he taught that where God exists, God exists fully, and that human beings, who bear a seed of the word within themselves, must therefore bear the fullness of God within themselves.

 Justin held to the nations that by Adam’s sin our connection to the divine within us became corrupted, occluding our experience of grace causing the seed within us to go dormant, like grain buried in a dry field. The reality of sin functions as an existential barrier cutting us off from our inherent potential and the ability to live our lives in the fullness of God’s promise. Sin undermines our capacity to understand the truth, perceive beauty and do good, it interferes with our desire for justice and capacity for mercy. Sin does not obviate our connection to the divine, rather, it enters a stage of latency.

 Justin taught that the water of baptism is to the divine dormant seed with us, lying dormant, what ordinary water is to ordinary seed, it actuates our potential. Baptism confers grace, and the real presence of God, which had always been there, germinates within us.

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[1] Augustine devised the doctrine of original sin, arguing that humanity does not share in the being of God (individually or corporately) because we are created ex nihilo, out of nothing.

Memorial Day – A Reflection

Memorial Day is meant to be a day for reflection, a day set aside from the normal flow of life so that we may honor those who fell in service to our country, and all of our honored dead.

 The meaning of this day has changed a great-deal since it was founded.

 Memorial Day was established with the specific intention of honoring the African-American soldiers who fought and died during the Civil War, those women and men who were born-free, as well as those who had been enslaved; men and women, mothers and fathers, sons and daughters who gave everything to keep the United States whole, and to make it free.

 Memorial Day was established for them, for those who died hoping for an America that was more the stuff of dreams than anything else. They died for these United States, for a vision of it that they prayed for, hoped for, wanted desperately for themselves and for their children and their children’s children…we got something different.

 We got this reality, this imperfect union, we got an America still in a state of becoming, one in which the quality of life that a person experiences depends more or less on where they are born and what color their skin is, or what class they belong to, rather than on the principles which govern our system of justice, such as equal treatment before the law.

 Those women and men we honor today, for good or ill they died for us; they died for promises that went un-realized, for dreams that have been deferred, as our great poet Langston Hughes wrote in Harlem[i]:

 What happens to a dream deferred?

Does it dry up

like a raisin in the sun?

Or fester like a sore—

And then run?

Does it stink like rotten meat?

Or crust and sugar over—

like a syrupy sweet?

Maybe it just sags

like a heavy load.

Or does it explode?

 We have yet to repay those good people for whom Memorial Day was founded; we have yet to see the hopes they cherished realized for the America of their dreams:

 America, daughter of liberty…America the true and the good…America the arbiter of justice, the best possible version of ourselves living in an America that could be…but only will be if, we pursue the dream of her, and not allow it to be deferred

 In the modern era, Memorial Day is meant to honor all of our dead: our soldiers and sailors and airmen, our police and firefighters; we honor them.

 We honor them and their sacrifice as we must, we honor all of them who died upholding our values and ideals; we honor them in recognition of the fact that we are one people descended from many ethnicities, from different nationalities, and that together we are committed to the central-truth of our political system, which is to say that for as long as we draw breath, we have an absolute right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, and that all other rights are subordinate to these. 

 We are called upon to honor everyone who has given their life in public service.

 We honor our teachers and the good works of ordinary people, the essential workers, our friends and neighbors, we honor the sacrifice of everyone, known to us and unknown…immigrant, resident or citizen.

 On this day of all days, I ask you not to make the mistake of thinking that it is our service women and men who keep us free. It has been at least sixty years since America faced an “existential” threat from a foreign power. We are not kept free through armed conflict, not right now; we are not realistically threatened by Iran or North Korea, neither Russia nor China poses a military threat to us. The real threat we face is from ourselves, today we face an existential threat manifested by ignorance, short-sightedness and greed.

 Year after year it is the same old story, we stand in our own way; it is we, and we alone who can protect us from ourselves. Our apathy and selfishness, our disinterest and ignorance, our prejudice and hatred, our gluttony and cowardice, these are the most dangerous forces aligned against us, these are the forces that threaten our freedom…and there is no greater peril.

 These malign influences are more deadly than any other power; these forces, having gone unchecked by our elected representatives, encouraged by the traitor Donald Trump and his treasonous cohort, their nihilistic apathy and will to power is the most deadly force our democracy has ever faced. Here in America their grip is tightening. 

Listen!

 If you wish to honor our fallen dead, you must do your part to keep us free. You must participate in our democracy: vote, stay informed, organize, build alliances and collaborate.

 Our collective failure as citizens of the Unites States allowed a criminal, autocratic, demagogue to hold power in the White House, and nearly seize it from the people when he lost his bid for re-election.

 He is running again and this time he is clear about his desire to rule with unchecked authority, promising to establish a dictatorship on his first day in office should he win re-election. He has promised to censor the media and destroy the fourth estate, he has argued for absolute immunity from criminal prosecution as a sitting president, even to the extent of being able to assassinate his political opponents…he will do it if we let him.  

 All around the country his right-wing cronies are cooking up laws to make such a power grab easier. They do not intend to give power up if it comes back into their hands; this cannot be allowed to happen.

 This rank cynicism regarding America and our future is more dangerous to our lives and freedoms than any rag tag group of militants halfway around the world, more dangerous than immigrants looking for a better life for their families on our side of the border…it is the most dangerous threat we have ever faced.

 Honor our fallen dead. Not with cards and flowers and barbeques (but do those things because they are good to do in and of themselves), honor the fallen by standing up to racism and bigotry, by challenging religious zealotry, by setting limits to corporate greed, by teaching science and shunning xenophobia.

 Honer our fallen dead by standing up to defend the republic and our democratic way of life, participate in public discourse; do not lose heart and do not give up.

 Stand and be counted!

 The task in front of us is to rebuild America and reform our institutions; we must do this for the sake of all Americans and all future generations of Americans. We must take responsibility for our freedom, protect it and pass it down to our children, and their children, we must broaden the franchise of citizenship and promote human rights around the world.

 Take up the work and participate, do it everyday, remember the fallen and carry on with the struggle!

 There is not time like the present.

  

Veteran, U.S.N., Hospital Corps, 1990 – 1994

 

[i] Langston Hughes, "Harlem" from The Collected Works of Langston Hughes. Copyright © 2002 by Langston Hughes. Reprinted by permission of Harold Ober Associates, Inc.

A Homily – Most Holy Trinity (Year B), A Holy Day of Obligation

First Reading – Deuteronomy 4:32-34,39-40 ©

Responsorial Psalm 32(33):4-6,9,18-20,22

Second Reading – Romans 8:14-17 ©

Gospel Acclamation – Revelations 1:8

The Gospel According to Matthew 28:16-20 ©

 

(NJB)

 

Listen!

 The Law, as it was written is not the law of God, it is the law of human beings. God does not distribute land among the people, parceling out lots like a county surveyor, God does not play favorites among nations, tribes or families. God, is not a God of battles and anything predicated on such a notion should be rejected out of hand.

 Consider the wisdom of the psalmist, who is correct when he demonstrates how fitting it is to praise God.

 It is wise to trust in the counsel of God, to have faith in God’s mercy, but it is foolishness to expect that God will rescue you from the dangers of this world.

 God will not. God does not intervene in our world. It is folly to believe that God will do so, and nonsense to believe that God’s loves any one of God’s children more than any other.

 Be mindful.

 God knows all things; God understands all things. You have heard this said and it is true, but God’s knowledge is not an abstract knowledge of the particular details of individual events, their precedents and consequences. God understands our person, the choices we make in the context of our lived experience; God understand us even as we understand ourselves, though God’s understanding is conditioned by divine clarity.

 Therefore, do as the psalmist says and trust in God’s plan for you, in God’s plan for creation, but do not wait for salvation, because salvation was promised to you the moment you came into world.

 Go out and share the good news.

 Consider the teaching of the apostle, who misconstrues many things.

 It is true that we are free to live spiritual lives, we are called to live our lives governed by our most altruistic hopes,

 Though we are merely animals, we do not have to live as animals do, governed by appetite and predation.

 Know this.

 Everyone is a child of God; from the most disciplined and devout, to the most reckless and devilish, destructive and demonic.

 Be mindful.

 No one has need to fear God, we are united with God…by God, who is the source of all being, and who created us in the divine image.

 Understand this:

 Some of us may suffer more than others, but everyone suffers.

 Jesus suffered, and we honor what he taught us through his suffering.

 Remember.

 Jesus is not a king or a ruler, he is not a priest but a prophet; Jesus is a friend, a comforter and healer, he came to show us the way…follow him.

 Consider the gospel reading for today.

 This passage is commonly known as the “Great Commission,” it purports to grant authority to the disciples that survived Jesus’ arrest and execution. It is a piece of propaganda. The event described never happened, but the writers of Matthew’s Gospel, writing more than one hundred years after Jesus was killed, thought it was necessary to establish their authority to speak and act in Jesus’ name (exclusively) into the sacred text.

 Apart from the false narrative, which cannot be condoned, the message is reasonable, it articulates the basic mission of the church: to turn all people of all nations into followers of the way, to be seekers of justice and servants of truth, to foster the type of community that cares for the stranger, the widow and the orphan, and the marginalized among them.

 

First Reading – Deuteronomy 4:32-34,39-40 ©

The Lord is God Indeed: He and No Other

Moses said to the people: ‘Put this question to the ages that are past, that went before you, from the time God created man on earth: Was there ever a word so majestic, from one end of heaven to the other? Was anything ever heard? Did ever a people hear the voice of the living God speaking from the heart of the fire, as you heard it, and remain alive? Has any god ventured to take to himself one nation from the midst of another by ordeals, signs, wonders, war with mighty hand and outstretched arm, by fearsome terrors – all this that the Lord your God did for you before your eyes in Egypt?

  ‘Understand this today, therefore, and take it to heart: the Lord is God indeed, in heaven above as on earth beneath, he and no other. Keep his laws and commandments as I give them to you today, so that you and your children may prosper and live long in the land that the Lord your God gives you for ever.’

 

Responsorial Psalm 32(33):4-6,9,18-20,22

The Lord Provides

Praise is fitting for loyal hearts.

Rejoice in the Lord, you just:

  it is good for the upright to praise him.

Proclaim the Lord on the lyre,

  play his song on the ten-stringed harp.

Sing a new song to the Lord,

  sing out your cries of triumph,

for the word of the Lord is truly just,

  and all his actions are faithful.

The Lord loves justice and right judgement;

  the earth is full of his loving kindness.

By the Lord’s word the heavens were made,

  and all their array by the breath of his mouth.

He gathered the seas as if in a bag,

  he stored up the depths in his treasury.

Let every land fear the Lord,

  let all the world be awed at his presence.

For he spoke, and they came into being;

  he commanded, and they were made.

The Lord confounds the counsel of the nations,

  throws the thoughts of the peoples into confusion.

But the Lord’s own counsel stands firm for ever,

  his thoughts last for all generations.

Happy the nation whose lord is God,

  the people he has chosen as his inheritance.

The Lord looks down from the heavens

  and sees all the children of men.

From his dwelling-place he looks

  upon all who inhabit the earth.

He moulded each one of their hearts,

  he understands all that they do.

The king will not be saved by his forces;

  the abundance of his strength will not set the strong man free.

Do not trust a horse to save you,

  whatever its swiftness and strength.

For see, the eyes of the Lord are on those who fear him,

  upon those who trust in his mercy,

hoping he will save their souls from death

  and their bodies from hunger.

Our souls praise the Lord,

  for he is our help and our protector,

for our hearts rejoice in him,

  and we trust in his holy name.

Lord, show us your loving kindness,

  just as we put our hope in you.

The Lord Provides

 

Second Reading – Romans 8:14-17 ©

The Spirit Himself and Our Spirit Bear United Witness that We Are Children of God

Everyone moved by the Spirit is a son of God. The spirit you received is not the spirit of slaves bringing fear into your lives again; it is the spirit of sons, and it makes us cry out, ‘Abba, Father!’ The Spirit himself and our spirit bear united witness that we are children of God. And if we are children we are heirs as well: heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ, sharing his sufferings so as to share his glory.

 

Gospel Acclamation – Revelations 1:8

Alleluia, alleluia!

Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit; the God who is, who was, and who is to come.

Alleluia!

 

The Gospel According to Matthew 28:16-20 ©

Go and Make Disciples of All Nations

The eleven disciples set out for Galilee, to the mountain where Jesus had arranged to meet them. When they saw him they fell down before him, though some hesitated. Jesus came up and spoke to them. He said, ‘All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go, therefore, make disciples of all the nations; baptise them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teach them to observe all the commands I gave you. And know that I am with you always; yes, to the end of time.

 

A Homily – Most Holy Trinity (Year B), A Holy Day of Obligation