EASTER 2007

EASTER SUNDAY—2007 9AM
Sam and his wife were kneeling in church one day. The pastor came by and asked Sam, who was a general fix-it man, to do some rewiring in the confessionals. The only way to reach the wiring was to enter the attic over the altar and crawl over the ceiling by balancing on the rafters. Concerned for her husband’s safety, his wife, Christine, waited in the pew. Unbeknown to Christine, some other parishioners were gathering in the vestibule. Worried about her husband, Christine looked up at the ceiling and yelled, “Sam. Sam, are you up there? Did you make it okay?” There was quite an outburst from the vestibule when Sam’s booming voice yelled back, “Yes, I made it up here just fine.”
The resurrection of Jesus which we are celebrating today on Easter Sunday is our belief that we will make it up there just fine.
But there is more to Jesus’ resurrection than your afterlife. This afterlife mentality can lead to an exclusively otherworldly spirituality. A spirituality that is monumentally indifferent to the here and now and concerned only with the there and then.
The otherworldly kind of spirituality is intent on saving your own soul but disregards the injustices in this world. The savage cruelties that hundreds of thousands of people are suffering each and every day.
I’m a news junkie. I probably watch more news than most. The violence of arson, assaults, shootings, murders, bombings as well as harassment of blacks, Jews, Hispanics Asians, Arabs, homosexuals that make up the daily fare of our news broadcasts is often very depressing. And yet these horrific events are the stuff of my prayer, the hope of my zeal.
If you regard the resurrection of Jesus as only a guarantee that one day you will enter heaven, then here and now in your everyday life you may be involved in a popcorn spirituality that thinks of Jesus only as a dead memory instead of a living presence. A living presence within you.
You need to take into your heart the elegantly refreshing insight of theologian John Robinson. “The life the disciples had known and shared with Jesus was not buried with Jesus but is now alive in them.”
When you believe that Jesus the risen Lord is alive in you, then his resurrection challenges you to do all you can here and now to bring hope out of injustice, love out of emotional instability, help out of callousness, nobility out of manipulation, contentment out of perplexity, order out of chaos, peace out of confrontation.
In other words, you cannot celebrate Jesus’ resurrection here in your Eucharist and then go back into your daily life with a dreamy detachment or pleasant indifference or a nonchalant apathy toward those who are in need anymore than you can go from being a Doctor Jekyll to being a Mr. Hyde in a heartbeat.
This is why I always proclaim before the reception of Jesus in the Eucharist: Happy are we who are called to his table of loving service.
Remember it was the resurrected Jesus who told his disciples to leave the security of the upper room and to go out into the whole world. Go, that is, do something. Even if that something is only as small as the Widow’s Mite.
As Matthew Fox in his book, Compassion, reminds us, The resurrection does not mean rising up as much as it means exiting, going out and leaving behind the cloistered comfort of your ego as Jesus left behind his death.
The resurrection calls you to go out to those who are in need. Whether it’s a simple word of encouragement or a long drawn out session of listening and advising. Whether it’s helping a neighbor to move something in his yard or moving someone to embrace the gospel ideal.
The wonderful aspect of the resurrection is that the service you give to others is not a drudgery as though helping people were a mortal enemy or a slave-driving despot
The wonderful aspect of the resurrection is that there are always delightful surprises in giving loving service to others.
In fact, Joyce Rupp in her book, Fresh Bread and Other Gifts of Spiritual Nourishment, says that Easter tells you that the resurrected Jesus is always calling you to be surprised and amazed at the things that bring you joy, for example, love, care, concern, service, growth, beauty, friendship, mystery. All these bring you Easter joy.
In other words, Easter tells you to be surprised at how much hope simple events fill your heart with; to be surprised at how this hopeful God always reenters your life through the people around you, especially those who are in need of the enrichment you can give them.
Keep in mind that the resurrection is the symbol of your total fulfillment that comes from your total selflessness.
Thought: Use Jesus’ resurrection power throughout the year.

Good Friday 2007

GOOD FRIDAY 2007 The Doll and a White Rose – Story told by Jennifer McCall I hurried into the local department store to grab some last minute Christmas gifts. I looked at all the people and grumbled to myself. I would be in here forever and I just had so much to do. Christmas was beginning to become such a drag. I kinda wished that I could just sleep through Christmas. But I hurried the best I could through all the people to the toy department. Once again I kind of mumbled to myself at the prices of all these toys. And wondered if the grandkids would even play with them. I found myself in the doll aisle. Out of the corner of my eye I saw a little boy about 5 holding a lovely doll. He kept touching her hair and he held her so gently. I could not seem to help myself. I just kept looking over at the little boy and wondered who the doll was for. I watched him turn to a woman and he called his aunt by name and said, "Are you sure I don't have enough money" She replied a bit impatiently, "You know that you don't have enough money for it.” The aunt told the little boy not to go anywhere that she had to go get some other things and would be back in a few minutes. And then she left the aisle. The boy continued to hold the doll and a few dollars in his hand. After a bit I asked the boy who the doll was for. He said, "It is the doll my sister wanted so badly for Christmas. She just knew that Santa would bring it.” I told him that maybe Santa was going to bring it. He said "No, Santa can't go where my sister is...I have to give the doll to my Mamma to take it to her." I asked him where his sister was. He looked at me with the saddest eyes and said "She was gone to be with Jesus." My Daddy says that Mama is going to have to go to be with her. My heart nearly stopped beating. Then the boy looked at me again and said, "I told my Daddy to tell Mama not to go yet. I told him to tell her to wait till I got back from the store." I saw that the little boy had lowered his head and had grown so very quiet. While he was not looking I reached into my purse and pulled out a handful of bills. I asked the little boy, "Shall we count that money one more time?" He grew excited and said "Yes, I just know it has to be enough". So I slipped my money in with his and we began to count it. Of course it was plenty for the doll. He softly said, "Thank you Jesus for giving me enough money." Then the boy said "I just asked Jesus to give me enough money to buy this doll so Mama can take it with her to give to my sister. And he heard my prayer. I wanted to ask him for enough to buy my Mama a white rose, but I didn't ask him, but he gave me enough to buy the doll and a rose for my Mama." "She loves white roses so very, very much." In a few minutes the aunt came back and I wheeled my cart away. I could not keep from thinking about the little boy as I finished my shopping in a totally different spirit than when I had started. And I kept remembering a story I had seen in the newspaper several days earlier about a drunk driver hitting a car and killing a little girl and the Mother was in serious condition. The family was deciding on whether to remove the life support. Now surely this little boy did not belong with that story. Two days later I read in the paper where a family had disconnected the life support and the young woman had died. I could not forget the little boy and just kept wondering if the two were somehow connected. Later that day, I could not help myself and I went out and bought some white roses and took them to the funeral home.. And there she was in the casket holding a lovely white rose, the beautiful doll. The little boy ran over to me and wrapped his arms around my legs. His father followed. With a wan smile he simply said, “Thank you, thank you so very much.” I left there in tears, my life changed forever. The love that little boy had for his little sister and his mother was overwhelming. And in a split second a drunk driver had torn the life of that little boy to pieces. When you hear this story of the love the little boy had for his sister and mother, aren’t you inspired to use this story as a springboard into Jesus’ love which motivated Jesus to lay down his life for us his friends? As you approach Jesus’ cross on this Good Friday, keep in mind, like a mantra, Jesus’ words, There is no greater love than to lay down your life for your friends. You are Jesus’ friends. Jesus, the crucified, is your friend. Isn’t this the kind of love Jesus demonstrated on the cross? But to an infinite degree. A love as boundless as staring at an endless ocean, and yet not even coming close to the love Jesus has for you. Jesus’ love is a love that, sadly, is not too often found in adults as it is in the little boy in our story. Somewhere along the way adults have been socialized into a cautious, hesitant, measuring, maneuvering, poke-and-withdraw feinting, manipulating, wait-and-see untrusting, questioning and the suspicious, fearful withholding of love. If that can be called love at all. Brennan Manning, in his book, The Signature Of Jesus, wrote, “Christ on the Cross is God’s enduring Word to the world saying, ‘See how much I love you; see how much you must love one another.’” Jesus crucified is the ultimate answer to how far love will go, what measure of rejection love will endure, how much selfishness and betrayal love will withstand. On the cross Jesus discovered the outermost limit of faith and in doing so he located the exact boundary of despair –Why have you forsaken me? Over the almost 49 years of my priesthood, I have found that the severest cross I have to bear is not always bitter opposition but pleasant indifference. Most likely you have the same experience. Vatican II’s The Pastoral Constitution On The Church In The Modern World states as clearly as a church’s chimes, We must shoulder the cross inflicted on those who search after peace and justice. On the cross, Jesus revealed that God’s loving power is not to make you feel cozy. Rather on the cross, Jesus challenged you to become converted from lethargy to zeal, from indifference to involvement, from grudge-bearing to forgiveness, from hatred to love. The lowest ebb is the turn of the tide; so Jesus rises from his bloody sweat in the Garden with shoulders courageously squared for the bloody cross. On the cross, minutes passed in agonizing slow motion as Jesus made love real. The crowd was an emotional kaleidoscope, one minute singing Hosannas and the next screaming, Crucify him. Jesus’ stories had leaped over the heads of the religious leaders but found a home in the hearts of the common people; but in the darkness of Calvary, ordinary people could no longer see the point of the stories so they repeated their shout for the death of the Storyteller: Crucify him! Jesus hung on the cross in the darkness as if evil had sucked all the light out of the universe On Good Friday in a very special way you enter into the sufferings of Jesus crucified. The cross of Jesus reveals that God enters the pain, suffering and misery of human cruelty to one another and the butchery of war, especially the mockery of making war for the sake of peace. Gregory Baum in his book, Religion and Alienation, says, The cross stands in the center of history revealing the cruel suffering inflicted on prophets. You as prophets are to come away from this Good Friday liturgy resolved to touch people where they are suffering, to be aware of what disturbs, exasperates and wounds them and to be sensitive to what is going on behind the masks they are wearing. John Shea in his book Stories of God says, The Cross of Christ reveals God’s self-giving love which frees us from self-serving apathy. The crosses we bear are for our triumph as problems are for solving, as mistakes are for growing. I ask you to respond today to Jesus’ self-sacrificing love with your sacrificial love of those in your life who need your forgiveness, compassion, inclusion and support Thought: Always have a living faith that is a loving faith.