Homily for the Twenty-Third Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year C

Hate What The World Tells You To Love

Rev. Marcel Divine Emeka Okwara, CSsR

Homily for the Twenty-Third Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year C

St. Alphonsus Catholic Church, Brooklyn Center, MN

Sunday, September 4, 2022

Many people including Christians will find today’s Gospel (Luke 14:25-33) quite  intolerable and difficult to comprehend. But as tough as this passage is, it is worth pondering over because it is about the life of discipleship. Luke says “great crowds were traveling with Jesus,” and in a dramatic fashion Jesus drops a kind of spiritual atomic bomb on them: “If anyone comes to me without hating his father and mother, his wife and children, brothers and sisters, and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple.” These people have been fascinated by the personality of the Lord. They have been intrigued by the authority of his word. The great miracles that followed him have driven them to walk along with him. They have heard his long sermons on the Mount and have accepted them. Then Jesus drops the bomb: unless you hate your father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters and even your own life, you cannot be my disciple. I can imagine many of them scratching their heads and wondering, isn’t he the one that spoke about love including loving one’s enemies? Isn’t he the one who said, bless those who curse you and pray for those who mistreat you? (Luke 6:28) I can imagine many uttering inaudibly: I have to hate everyone I love in order to follow you? I can imagine some in the crowd kicking and fuming and questioning: Why is he telling us to hate those who are dearest and nearest to us? I imagine many left him and went away. 

Sisters and brothers, let me ask a very important question: deep down are you happy? Do you know a lot of happy people? By happy, I mean people who are deeply content and satisfied, who are right with themselves and God. One thing my pastoral ministry has taught me is that a lot of people are sadder than they appear in the public. In the public view, they smile and come across as happy. But in reality they are not. Permit me to ask another important question: do you think our understanding of happiness and what constitutes happiness is right and accurate? Is it not possible that our understanding of happiness has made us slaves of an illusion? What is the illusion? The illusion that says you will be happy when you get enough pleasure; the illusion that says you will be happy when you have power and wield lots of power; the illusion that says you will be happy when people adore and admire you a lot; the illusion that says you will be happy when you have abundant material wealth. If you think you will be happy once you get all you need or want, you are chasing an illusion.

The two tough spiritual truths are, one, everyone is a victim of this great illusion. Two, none of the aforementioned worldly goods can make us happy. Yes, when pleasure is obtained, when power is attained, when honor and wealth are acquired, we experience a rush of excitement. But sooner or later, all that excitement fades away. We become bored and restless again and find ourselves wanting more and more and more. If we don’t turn to God and surrender totally to him, our whole life becomes the terrible desire to fill up our ego with these goods of the world— money, power, fame, sex etc. If you are wondering why we are not happy, this is it! It is an illusion and a great one for that matter to believe that the acquisition and procurement of power, wealth, pleasure and esteem of others will guarantee true and lasting happiness, peace and rest of mind. What’s the secret to being happy? Right now, right before you, you have everything you need to be happy. Regardless of the state of your life or what your pain is or how many attachments you have, right now, you have everything you need to be happy. The holy grail to happiness is right in front of you at every moment.

Remember the book, MAN’S SEARCH FOR MEANING by Viktore E. Frankl. In that book Viktore shows there were happy people at Auschwitz. Auschwitz is hell on earth. It was the largest concentration camp of death located in southern Poland. Those locked up there were deprived of everything we try to fill up our life with. They were deprived of freedom, money, wealth, pleasure, power, honor, status, fame etc. Yet, Viktore Frankl says there were happy people at Auschwitz. Remember St. Edith Stein? She was a Carmelite nun. Her life ended at Auschwitz. She and her fellow nuns were dragged out of the convent and put in a train that was heading to Auschwitz. A few days after they arrived, they were killed. But some people who were in the train with them and who survived the war talked about what they saw. According to them, St. Edith Stein and her sisters were so calm, so peaceful that they were ministering to those around them. How can they be calm in the train going to Auschwitz? How can they be calm in the concentration camp of death? All the things we think make happiness possible were taken away from them, yet they had peace and serenity, even ministered to those around them and became bearers of God’s presence. How’s this possible? Listen again to the words of Jesus: “If anyone comes to me without hating his father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple.” In other words, hate all these things and all these people in the measure that they have become gods to you. If you are filling your ego with all these things and with all these people, you must hate them. Hate the very things that the world has convinced you you need to be happy. Hate the attachments and possessions the world has convinced you you need to be happy. And when you detach from them, you will discover something miraculous. You will realize that the holy grail of happiness is right in front of you. Even in Auschwitz, even on a train taking you to Auschwitz, you can find peace. Original sin has darkened our mind and fuddled our will. Due to it, we choose things in the wrong way. So, the spiritual bomb that Jesus drops today is meant to break us into a new consciousness. Consider Jesus crucified. Naked! Humiliated! Stripped of all that the world holds as good. Yet, he is the most blessed. Hate what the world tells you to love. Love what God tells you to do. That’s how you become truly happy. 

Homily for the Twenty-Second Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year C

Bend The Stick The Other Way

Rev. Marcel Divine Emeka Okwara, CSsR

Homily for the Twenty-Second Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year C

St. Bridget Catholic Church, Brooklyn Center, MN

Sunday, August 28, 2022

The central message of the Bible is that there is one true Good, God alone. For this reason, the Bible beckons, “You shall worship the Lord your God, and him alone shall you serve” (Luke 4:8). This command to worship and serve the one true God is at the heart of the Christian enterprise. It means that God alone should be the center of our life. It means that other things that take our attention away from God are finally idols and false gods. So, to make them the center of our life is to commit idolatry and engage in false worship. Sadly, there are people who are in love not with God, but with money. To acquire money, they will do anything, break any law and hurt any person. Why? Because they made money (wealth) their god and the center of their lives. Others love power. To attain it and retain it, they will do almost anything— break any law, hurt any person because they have made power their god and center of their concern. We also have people who love pleasure— pleasure of the body. To obtain it in its various forms they will do almost anything, break any law, hurt any person. Why? Because they’ve  made pleasure, one of the classic alternatives to the true Good, their god and the center of their lives. Now there are some people who care less about money and wealth. They care less about power. Power is not their thing. They also care less about pleasure. In fact they are willing to give up all kinds of pleasure. But what they want, what they are hungry for, the center of their life is honor. They want to be admired. They want all the attention, everyone looking at them and hailing them. They want to be in the spotlight. For a lot of people, this is an intoxicating good. For honor, they are willing to break any law, hurt any person just to attain and remain in the spotlight. They have made honor or fame their god. You see these people all over the place. Look at the politicians. Of great importance to them and other famous people is the hunger for fame and glory. Like wealth, power, and pleasure, honor is also a false god. But it is not the ultimate good. 

But the truth is that those who are addicted to honor are hardly free. How come? You can be doing the best thing and achieving the best thing, but if the crowd does not like you you are not happy. On the other hand, you can be doing the worst thing that is damaging to you and others, but if the crowd likes you, you are alright. Is the crowd very good at honoring the right people? Once in a while they might honor the right persons, like Mother Teresa of Calcutta. In her case, the crowd showed good taste and good judgment. But most of the time, people who get honored and admired are the worst kind of people. People who are truly good, truly righteous, truly full of love etc. are often ignored by the crowd. So when you put your life in the hands of the admiring crowd, you flush authentic goodness down the toilet. You put your life in the hands of very dubious people. According to St. Thomas Aquinas, honor in itself does not add one bit to your life. When you are honored and admired by the crowd, when you are in the spotlight, does it add one ounce to the substance of your life? Does it add to your own goodness, to your own truthfulness, to your own righteousness and integrity? Heck no! It does not add one drop to it. Honor is simply a kind of indication. It’s pointing to something worth looking at. That’s why the Church honors the saints. The Church points to the saints and asks us to admire them because there is something in them that is worth imitating. But in itself, honor, admiration and glory adds nothing substantial to you. 

Look at it this way! If you are quietly reading a good book at home and savoring the truth contained in it without anyone noticing you, there is more value in that than in the applause of a million people. If you are engaging in one of the corporal works of mercy or helping a child do his homework and no one sees you and admires you, there is more truth, more substance in being in that than in the cheers of a million people. Honor adds nothing substantial to your reality. If you are looking at a beautiful sunset, admiring the countryside and admiring God’s beauty, and no one notices you, there is more truth, more value in that simple act than in the admiration of a million people. There is more value in the simple act of reading a book at home and taking its truth. If the whole world knows about you and admires you, so what?

What’s the antidote to this false god? What do we do if we are addicted to honor and fame and admiration? Our today’s readings tell us what to do. The first reading from the Book of Sirach says, “conduct your affairs with humility and you will be loved more than a giver of gifts. Humble yourself the more, the greater you are and you will find favor with God.” The watchword, everybody is humility. When St. Augustine was asked to name the three most important things in spiritual life, he said the first is humility, the second is humility, and the third is humility. To be humble is to be connected to reality. What’s that reality? That you are not God, rather a mere mortal. Forget about vainglory, and be in touch with the simple reality. If your temptation is to be great in the eyes of the world, bend the stick back the other way. The more you are honored, the more you should become humble. In the Gospel, Jesus urges that we not sit in the place of honor when we are invited to a wedding party or else when someone greater arrives, the host might ask that we vacate our position for him. What you should do when you are invited is to sit in the lowest place. People who are in love with honor will definitely hijack the high places of honor. In the workplace, they will hijack the highest positions. Why? So as to be noticed and admired by the crowd. If honor is your problem and temptation, just do the opposite. Bend the stick the other way. Move in the opposite direction. Strive instead not to be noticed. I know doing this is not easy, especially if you are addicted to honor. But you must strive to wrestle your soul from this addiction. Without humility, it is impossible to please God.  

Homily for the Twenty-First Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year C

Strive To Enter Through The Narrow Gate

Rev. Marcel Divine Emeka Okwara, CSsR

Homily for the Twenty-First Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year C

St. Alphonsus Catholic Church, Brooklyn Center, MN

Sunday, August 21, 2022

From time immemorial people have been asking the question just as they ask it today: “Lord, will only a few people be saved?” Who is going to make it to heaven? Who is going to be saved? If sometimes you wonder about it you are not alone. The early disciples of Jesus were interested in knowing the number of people that will be saved. In today's Gospel (Luke 13:22-30), someone asked Jesus, “Lord, will only a few people be saved?” But why was the question not “Lord, will a lot of people be saved?” Why a few? My guess is that after listening to Jesus and realizing what he is requiring of us, he started to think, “I don’t know if a lot of people could do this.” And you know, left to us, no one can ransom himself or herself. But with the help of God, we can all attain eternal life in heaven. We can all be saved. However, it is not going to be on our terms. If you turn on your television today or listen to the radio or go on to the internet or you read newspapers, you would think that all you need to do to get to heaven is just to be nice. And it is not even being nice at a higher level, but just being as nice as you can be. Being as nice as you can be is now taken as one’s heavenly certificate. But that’s not what the Bible says. 

Our Gospel for today has both good news and bad news. The good news is that you can have eternal life; you can be saved. The bad news is that not everyone will go down this path, meaning, not everyone will eventually be saved. When Jesus was asked, “Lord, will only a few people be saved?” his response is: “Strive to enter through the narrow gate, for many, I tell you, will attempt to enter but will not be strong enough. After the master of the house has arisen and locked the door, then will you stand outside knocking and saying, ‘Lord, open the door for us.’ He will say to you in reply, ‘I do not know where you are from.’ Depart from me, all you evildoers!’ And there will be wailing and grinding of teeth when you see Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob and all the prophets in the Kingdom of God and you yourself cast out.” 

Sisters and brothers, the scariest moment in eternity is actually to see the great patriarchs of our faith and at the same time to be thrust out. I don’t know about you, but I don’t want to be one of those who will be cast out. Jesus is the Rabbi here. He is our Master. He is saying to us that there will be those who will make it and those who won’t make it. The goal of every Christian is to obey him and put into practice what he is teaching us. We cannot be his disciples unless we obey him. Obeying Jesus is what we are called to do. His injunction today is “strive to enter through the narrow gate…” What is the narrow gate? The Catechism of the Catholic Church says the narrow gate is responding and obeying the teachings of Jesus Christ so that when our earthly life is completed, we may merit to enter with him into the marriage feast and be numbered among the blessed. So, the easiest way to ensure salvation in our lives is, first, know what Jesus taught; secondly, entrust yourself to him; and thirdly, obey him on a daily basis. That’s what he is calling us to do. Those who are pushed away are those who do not know him and who do not obey him. 

I am not the judge and you are not the judge. Jesus is. But in today’s Gospel, he is giving us a good insight into the future that some people will grind their teeth and be filled with anguish and torment as a result of the choices they have made here on earth. Eternity is so valuable. Eternal life is so valuable. Being with Jesus forever is so valuable that there is nothing on earth that is worth sacrificing that. Nothing on earth worth giving up eternal life for. We have resolved to obey Jesus, but in the course of life there will be times we miss the mark. That’s where the sacrament of confession, reconciliation, and penance comes in. Throughout this week, meditate on entering the narrow door. If you are going through tough times presently, it might be that God is disciplining you and bringing you back to that narrow door. Certainly, it does not feel good. There is no fun in being disciplined, but in the end, Scripture tells us there will be the joy of righteousness when we share in the Lord’s glory. When someone asked Jesus, “Lord, will only a few people be saved?” He pointed to that narrow gate. Your goal, my goal is to strive to enter through the narrow gate of responding to the invitation of the Lord and obeying him.

God bless you!  

Homily for the Twentieth Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year C

Allow Jesus To Interrupt And Disrupt Your Life

Rev. Marcel Divine Emeka Okwara, CSsR

Homily for the Twentieth Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year C

St. Alphonsus Catholic Church, Brooklyn Center, MN

Sunday, August 14, 2022

In today’s Gospel, Jesus said, “I have come to set the earth on fire and how I wish it were already blazing.” What’s the Lord saying? Since the Second Vatican Council, there has been this tendency in the Catholic circles to play down the challenging aspects of the biblical revelation. The notion of God as kind, merciful and loving has become the overriding theme in our preaching and evangelization. Don’t get me wrong. The biblical God of both the Old and New Testaments is kind, merciful, and compassionate, but he is also fierce, demanding, frightening and judgmental. In our contemporary culture, being judgmental is one vice a vast majority of people consider unacceptable. But whether we like it or not, whether our contemporary culture accepts it or not, whether being judgmental fits our present sensibility or not, the fact is that the true and living God is extremely judgmental. Even though our culture is against being judgmental, it is not so in the Bible. In Jesus’ statement in today’s Gospel: “I have come to set the earth on fire and how I wish it were already blazing,” we see the judgmentalism of God. He has not come to light a gentle and cozy fire in the fireplace. He is throwing fire down. Just like the God who in the Old Testament destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah and sent down fire to consume the enemies of prophet Elijah, Jesus is embodying in flesh Yahweh.  

Add to it Jesus said, “Do you think that I have come to establish peace on the earth? No, I tell you, but rather division. From now on a household of five will be divided, three against two and two against three.” Interesting! I thought prophet Isaiah announced that Jesus would be called “Prince of peace?” How come he is now bringing not peace but a sword? How come he is bringing division? How come he is dividing households? How do we make sense of these different dimensions of who God is? How do we connect together the harsh and frightful images with the gentle and lenient ones? In the context of a corrupt world, what does God’s love look like? Love is what God is. God never changes. However, God’s love is received by us in the context of the fallen world and perceived by our fallen mind. According to the principle that St. Thomas Aquinas adopted from the great ancient Greek philosopher, Aristotle, “Whatever is received is received according to the mode of the recipient.” What does that mean? We receive things not as they are but as we are. Whatever is taken in is taken in according to the capacity of the recipient. If you recite Shakespeare to a three year old, he is not going to take it in because he is not yet able to do so. If you teach theoretical physics to someone who has no background in it, he will hear you but it will be received as a gibberish. God’s love is unchanging, but when it breaks into a world and a life messed up by sin, it will sometimes appear as fierce, judgmental, harsh and demanding. Look at it this way: when you are in a grumpy mood, who is the most obnoxious person to have around you? It’s not going to be a fellow grumpy person. A grumpy person will most definitely appreciate a company. The most annoying person to have around when you are moody is someone who is in a good mood, who is full of sunshine and light. That’s the person you find obnoxious. But is the person objectively obnoxious? Not at all! But you receive the person as you are. You receive that person as annoying. If you are stuck in a cave in absolute darkness, what’s your greatest enemy after being rescued? Light! But light in itself is good, beautiful, and illuminating. But to you who have been stuck in a cave for quite sometime in total darkness, the light will be a torture. Whatever is received is received according to the mode of the recipient. God’s love is like a good world class soccer coach who is hired to manage a football club. Once he resumes work, how would lazy players perceive him? Obnoxious, mean, fierce, unpleasant.

Sisters and brothers, the world is like a dysfunctional family. G. K. Chesterton said “we are all in the same boat and we are all seasick.” Therefore, when Jesus comes, he necessarily comes as a troublemaker, as an interruptor, as a breaker of peace. In a dysfunctional family, there is some kind of phony peace. Everyone finds a way to get along even though they know there is a deep problem. But that’s not peace! Such families need someone who can come in and break up the phony peace. This is what Jesus means when he says I have not come for peace rather for division. Jesus comes as God’s own order, and because the mode of the receiver is dysfunctional, he will be received as judgment, as fierce. A good soccer coach will not select third grade players and lazy players for competitive matches. If he tries to set things right and they are not going along, he will not select them for matches. In fact, he will start offering those players to lower teams to buy. To those players, the coach is mean and ruthless. But he has a job to do. Jesus has come to light the fire. As the consuming fire, he has come to burn everything in us that is opposed to God’s desire and purpose. He has to clear the threshing floor.

As you can now see, there is no contradiction between God’s gentleness and God’s fierceness. There is no contradiction between the God of the Old Testament and the God of the New Testament. There is no contradiction between the God who is kind and God who is fierce and demanding. Whatever is received is received according to the mode of the receiver. If you are in a good spiritual place, how would God’s love break into your life? As something gentle, kind and pleasant. But if your spiritual life has gone off kilter, you will perceive God’s love as judging fire. Do you want God’s love to gently break into your life? Then consider the words of our today’s second reading: “Brothers and sisters: since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us rid ourselves of every burden and sin that clings to us and persevere in running the race that lies before us while keeping our eyes fixed on Jesus, the leader and perfecter of faith.” If someone is preparing for a relay race, he has to get rid of those things that make running smoothly hard and impossible. He has to lose weight, change his form, adjust his style, change his diet and rid himself of certain things. Finally, he has to have a clear sense of  goal. This is also true in spiritual life.

Homily for the Nineteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year C

Faith Is Reasonable

Rev. Marcel Divine Emeka Okwara, CSsR

Homily for the Nineteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year C

St. Alphonsus Catholic Church, Brooklyn Center, Minnesota

Sunday, August 7, 2022

In the Bible, the theme of faith is littered everywhere, but the classic chapter that pointedly speaks about faith is in Hebrews 11, which is the second reading for this weekend. Today, faith is one of the most controversial subjects. On TV and on the web, new atheists describe faith as naïveté, superstition, unintelligence, acceptance of pre-scientific nonsense etc. They say faith is sub-rational and unworthy of mature people. Before his death in 2011, Christopher Hitchens, a leading proponent of new atheism, delighted in mocking faith and people of faith. Echoing Immanuel Kant, an Enlightenment philosopher’s dictum, “Sapere aude,” which means, “Dare to know,” Hitchens argued that people should dare to know, and not settle for someone’s else point of view or accept strange stories from ancient times. He also said it is time for people of faith to grow up and cast aside their childish preoccupations. But check this out! Some of the great figures of our faith include St. Paul, St. Augustine, St. Thomas Aquinas, St. Bonaventure, St. Alphonsus Liguori, St. Ignatius of Loyola, St. John Henry Newman, G. K. Chesterton, St. Pope John Paul II etc. You can say what you want about each of them, but one thing you cannot say is that they were unintelligent. They expose the lie of those who characterize faith as something meant for the unintelligent. Are there unintelligent people of faith? Absolutely! There are many of them around. But to describe faith as unintelligent is a big lie. Faith is not identical to lack of intelligence. In my years of study and in ministry, I have encountered plenty of intelligent people who are believers. 

New atheists are urging people to exercise their minds and to dare to know. I get that! But the problem with their advocacy is insisting that only modern analytical science is the model and paradigm of knowledge. Is science a good thing? No doubt! Science has given us a lot. However, it is not the be all and end all of knowledge. Science is like a bright light that shines on an object. It is analytical form of reason where the scientist asks the question, puts the object of his observation under a bright light, on a table, and tears it apart. Is this important? Yes! This kind of method will give you a certain kind of knowledge. But God cannot be analyzed scientifically the way one would analyze the things of the world. God is not a being in the world. The creator of the universe is not one object within the universe that can be known through analytical scientific observation. If you are asking for God’s existence know this now: no experiment can be performed that can reveal God’s existence. God is not the Bigfoot. He is not one of the items in the world. There are rational ways to approach God, however, they are not scientific. Why? Because God does not correspond to that kind of analysis. 

So, what’s the right approach to God? Faith! Does faith means stupidity and irrationality? Not at all. Faith is the proper rational way of approaching God. According to St. John Henry Newman, faith is the reasoning of the religious mind. A religious mind is the one that is preoccupied with God. The way the religious mind reasons is by faith, because God cannot be placed on the table, torn apart under a bright light of analytical reason. Faith is a questing and searching reason. That’s why prophet Isaiah describes God as a hidden God. That’s why God told Moses that you cannot see me and live. It is not because God is mean or punitive. It means that in this life you cannot see God as an object. So the proper response to God is faith, which is, the reasoning of the religious mind. 

With this background, let’s look at the second reading for today. Hebrews 11 talks about how the great figures in Israelite history related to God, how that relationship had to be one of faith and not controlled. It says, “By faith Abraham obeyed when he was called to go out to a place that he was to receive as an inheritance; he went out, not knowing where he was to go.” There are two things here: first of all, Abraham is not dealing with some rival tribal chieftain, not with a family member, not with some elder. He is dealing with God. Second point, God is not a force or principle. God is a person. God acts how he wants to act. Therefore, Abraham’s relationship to God has to be one of faith, which means trust. Not irrationality! Not superstition! Not lack of sophistication! The only proper response to God who is a free person is trust. Abraham went out not knowing where he was to go. Continuing, Hebrews says, “By faith he (Abraham) received power to generate, even though he was past the normal age— Sarah (his wife) was sterile— for he though that the one who had made the promise was trustworthy.” At their old age, they were promised that they will have their own child. Is this reasonable going by the method of science? No! But Abraham knew the one who made the promise was trustworthy. So, he believed him and believed in him. He had faith. Did Abraham acted irrationally and stupidly? Not at all. It was the proper reasoning of the religious mind. It is the act of trust in God’s providence and it gives rise to life. If you trust in God, what you will find is life in abundance, life you never dreamed possible. 

Finally, Hebrews says, “By faith Abraham, when put to the test, offered up Isaac… he was ready to offer his only son…” This is becoming very dramatic. It is not just a matter of believing in God. That’s just the first step. A lot of people will tell you they believe in God or believe in the existence of God. It is also not a matter of saying I will trust in God.   If God makes an impossible demand, what would you do? God told Abraham that even at old age he and his sterile wife, Sarah will have a child. Abraham believed. After the birth of Isaac, their only son, God promised Abraham that through Isaac descendants will bear his name. Abraham believed God. God turned around and demands that Abraham sacrifice his son, Isaac. Abraham still believed God. How come? The answer is in the last line of today’s reading: “He (Abraham) reasoned that God was able to raise even from the dead…” It was the great philosopher, Soren Kierkegaard who said, “Faith is a passion for the impossible.” Faith is hoping against hope. It is trusting even when there is no ground to trust. Faith is radically turning your life over to God. It is an act of surrender to a mystery that we cannot in principle control, to the providential mercy and direction of God. Keep your faith in God alive and thriving. Ignore naysayers and those who mock you and call you stupid. On the last day, you will realize you made the best choice when your crown of glory and victory is given to you. 

Homily for the Nineteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year C, 2022

Faith: The Most Proper Response To God

Rev. Marcel Divine Emeka Okwara, CSsR

Homily for the Nineteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year C

St. Alphonsus Catholic Church, Brooklyn Center, Minnesota

Sunday, August 7, 2022

For a thousand years, the ancient Israelites longed for the Kingdom of God. They dreamed of the day God will reign as the righteous King of the world and set things right. In the face of trials, injustices, oppression, enslavement and sufferings, Israel yearned for the arrival of the Messiah, the advent of God. As they suffer under corrupt kings, foreign kings, oppressive and repressive kings and reckless emperors, they hoped and prayed for the day Yahweh, the God of Israel himself will arrive to establish his Kingdom, reign as a righteous King, set things right so that justice will ring, and peace attained. During that period of dry season or what prophet Ezekiel called “dry bones,” Israel’s prophets preached and urged them incessantly to keep God’s commandments and to stay faithful. Although ancient Israelites moved from one pole to another, from one direction to another, from serving Yahweh to serving man-made gods, the central message of the prophets was, stay faithful, Israel. Your God will come. The Messiah will come. The reign of God will definitely dawn. In 30 AD, a young man from Nazareth, the Son of Mary and Joseph, emerged at the scene in a most extraordinary way. On the hills of Galilee, he began to preach with unprecedented and unnerving boldness the message of the Kingdom: “the Kingdom of God is at hand,” meaning that kingdom that your ancestors longed for, waited for, died for, prayed for has finally arrived. After announcing the arrival of the Kingdom, he adds, “Repent and believe in the good news.” What is the good news? God is now here! To demonstrate that he is indeed the real deal, that he is the Messiah, the autobasileia— the kingdom in person, that he is not like any other rabbi, or teacher or any other prophet like Jeremiah, Isaiah, Elijah, Amos etc., that he is actually the very incarnation of Yahweh, that in him God has finally come in human flesh to establish his kingdom, he performed great miracles of healing and demonstrated a mastery over the forces of nature. Through extraordinary preaching, extravagant show of mercy, and outreach to those on the margins of the society, he separates himself, sets himself apart and announces with clarity and distinction that Yahweh has indeed come. More to it, he claimed personal authority over the Torah itself, which was the divine law and considered the court of final appeal for every faithful Jew.

In the course of his ministry, he declares “I am the Way, the Truth and the Life.” To say “I am the Way,” is different from I am a way. To say “I am the Truth” is not the same as I am a truth. And to say “I am the Life” is not the same as I am a life. If someone says he is a way, it means there are other ways. If someone says I am the truth, it means there are other truths and I happen to be one of them. If he says I am a life, it would mean there are other life out there. I just happened to be one of them. What Jesus said is, “I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life,” which means, the only Way and access to God, the only Truth that must be known and lived for, and the only life that deserves giving our entire life for. As I said previously, no other religious figure ever focused on himself. Buddha, Mohammad, Confucius never focused on themselves. Buddha said there is a way I discovered and want you to know it. Muhammad said there is a revelation I received and want you to know it. Confucius said there is a path, a way that I discovered and want to show you. Then there is Jesus. He said, I am the Way, the Truth and the Life. The only person who can say such a thing has to be God himself. If Jesus is not Lord, he would be a liar and a madman, so said, C. S. Lewis.

With this background, let’s look at today’s readings. What’s the central theme in the three readings? Faith! What is faith? New atheists describe faith as naïveté, superstition, unintelligence, acceptance of pre-scientific nonsense etc. They say faith is sub-rational and unworthy of mature people. Before his death in 2011, Christopher Hitchens, a leading proponent of new atheism, delighted in mocking faith and people of faith. He argued that people should stop settling for someone else's point of view or accept strange stories from ancient times. He also said it is time for people of faith to grow up and cast aside their childish preoccupations. But what exposes the lie of those who characterize faith as something meant for the unintelligent is the stubborn fact that some of the great figures of our faith include St. Paul, St. Augustine, St. Thomas Aquinas, St. Bonaventure, St. Alphonsus Liguori, St. Ignatius of Loyola, St. John Henry Newman, G. K. Chesterton, St. Pope John Paul II etc. You can say what you want about each of them, but one thing you cannot say is that they were unintelligent. Are there unintelligent people of faith? Absolutely! There are many of them around. But to describe faith as unintelligent is a big lie. Faith is not identical to lack of intelligence. In my years of study and in ministry, I have encountered plenty of intelligent people who are believers. For St. John Henry Newman, faith is the reasoning of the religious mind. A religious mind is the one that is preoccupied with God. Faith is the right approach to God because God cannot be placed on the table, torn apart under a bright light of analytical reason. Faith is a searching reason. In this life you cannot see God as an object but all the objects in the universe announce his reality and existence. So faith is the proper response to God. 

In the Gospel, Jesus appropriately calls us the “little flock.” But before that, he says, “Do not be afraid any longer.” That means, have faith in God. Have faith in him. Abraham, our father in faith gives us a true example of how to follow God. It is not just a matter of believing in God. That’s just the first step. A lot of people will tell you they believe in God or believe in the existence of God. It is also not a matter of saying I will trust in God. If God makes an impossible demand, what would you do? God told Abraham that even at old age he and his sterile wife, Sarah will have a child. Abraham believed. After the birth of Isaac, their only son, God promised Abraham that through Isaac descendants will bear his name. Abraham believed God. God turned around and demanded that Abraham sacrifice his son, Isaac. Abraham still believed God. Why? The answer is in the last line of today’s second reading: “He (Abraham) reasoned that God was able to raise even from the dead…” He believed that the one who made the promise is trustworthy. He believed him and believed in him. It was the great philosopher, Soren Kierkegaard who said, “Faith is a passion for the impossible.” Faith is hoping against hope. It is trusting even when there is no ground to trust. Faith is radically turning your life over to God. It is an act of surrender to a mystery that we cannot in principle control, to the providential mercy and direction of God. Keep your faith in God alive and thriving. Ignore naysayers and those who mock you and call you stupid. On the last day, you will realize you made the best choice when your crown of glory and victory is given to you.