Seventh Sunday in Ordinary Time

Seventh Sunday in Ordinary Time

Back in 1983, a movie was made called “The Scarlet and the Black”.  It tells the true story of Monsignor Hugh O’Flaherty, an Irish priest who worked at the Vatican during World War II.  Monsignor O’Flaherty (played by Gregory Peck) leads a group priests, nuns and lay people who help
downed allied pilots and prisoners of war escape from Nazi occupied Rome to the allied lines.  Colonel Herbert Kappler (played by Christopher Plummer) is the commanding officer of the Gestapo in Rome and has been put in charge of finding out how all those POW’s are getting out.  He soon suspects that the Monsignor has something to do with it, but because Ireland was neutral, and because O’Flaherty lives and works in the Vatican City which was also neutral, the Germans can’t arrest him.  Colonel Kappler even gives orders to shoot Monsignor O’Flaherty if he is spotted outside of Vatican City.  Despite the danger the priest responds by coming up with fantastic disguises so that he can continue to get people to safe houses and to check on others.  The are other ways in which he shows his courage as well.

In a memorable scene, Monsignor is dressed in his usual cassock and is out in the middle of St. Peter’s square.  He knows that there are German snipers watching him and he walks right up to a white line that the Nazis had painted to show the border of Vatican City.  A German soldier come up and stands opposite him on the other side of the line.  Monsignor O’Flaherty then slowly walks right on the edge of the line, just tempting the Germans to do something.  He walks for awhile, then stops and slowly turns so that his leg is out over the line like he’s going to step over and then slowly continues to walk in the opposite direction.  The German soldier follows him.  Colonel Kappler is standing next to one of the snipers, some distance away and sees this.  He grabs the rifle and looks through the scope.  The crosshairs rest on the priest’s head. O’Flaherty sees the Colonel aim at him and he stops again and looks back at him through the scope.  They stare, and the Colonel’s finger is on the trigger, but he can’t shoot him.  He can’t break that neutrality.

Word eventually comes to Kappler that the allies on marching towards Rome.  The troops are moving out, but before he leaves he arranges one last meeting with Monsignor O’Flaherty in the ruins of the Coliseum.  Monsignor bravely shows up.  Kappler admits that nothing would give him greater pleasure than to shoot him right there, but he has one last request of the priest.  His wife and two children had moved to Rome with him.  Now he is afraid of what might happen if the Italian resistance finds them.  He wants the priest to get his family out of Rome the same way he sneaked the POW’s out.  O’Flaherty can’t believe what he hears.  After all the evil that he has done in the name “following orders”: terrorizing innocent people in the city; killing many people, including priests and others associated with Monsignor’s work; forcing Jews to pay exorbitant amounts of money to avoid being deported.  “You’ve turned the city into a concentration camp!” the priest says.  “It’s what you
believe”, Kappler says.  “That’s what I want from you, priest”.  In disgust, the Monsignor leaves, without saying whether he would do it or not.  “No! You’re no different than anyone else,” Kappler yells. 

In the final scene, we see that the Colonel has been captured and is being interrogated.  They ask him how he got his family out of Rome.  He says he doesn’t know what they are talking about.  “You’re playing games Colonel!  Your wife and children disappeared.  They were smuggled into Switzerland, as you well know.  How was it done?  Who helped them?”  As they say this, a look of realization and relief comes on the Colonel’s face.  “I do not know” he says. 

The film’s epilogue informs us that Kappler was sentenced to life in prison for war crimes.  While in the Italian prison he had only one visitor.  “Every month, year in and year out, O’Flaherty came to visit him.  In 1959, the former head of the dreaded Gestapo in Rome was baptized into the Catholic faith at the hand of the Irish priest.

Our readings today focus on how we are to be holy as God is holy.  The Gospel tells us to be perfect as our Heavenly Father is perfect.  What does that even mean?  How can we hope to be as holy as the Most High God?  How can we hope to be as perfect as God who is the most perfect?  I myself am a perfectionist.  I am reminded multiple times a day of how far from perfect I really am.  But this call
to perfection and to holiness is not as impossible as it might seem.  Perfection in this case is not about never doing anything wrong or never coming up short on our goal or expectations.  It’s about learning to love as God loves.

After telling us to be holy, Leviticus tells us to not bear hatred for our brother or sister; to not incur sin because of another; do not take revenge.  Rather, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself”.  To be holy is to love, because God loves infinitely.  The Gospel takes this a step further and tells us that God loves perfectly and we are called to love like Him.  Jesus asks us, “If you love those who love you, what recompense will you have? Do not the tax collectors do the same?”  Anyone can love those who love you back, but God loves everyone, even those who do not love Him back, even those who hate Him.  He is calling us to do the same.  And no, this is no easy task.

That is why I brought up the movie “The Scarlet and the Black”.  It is a great example of loving someone who clearly does not love us back.  If you have never seen the movie, I encourage you to do so.  Gregory Peck as the priest clearly does not want to love his enemy.  He would have rather turned away and let him suffer, and no one would have blamed him for it.  But at some point after he stormed away from that meeting, he realized what he needed to do.  Notice that these two friends do not become friends over night.  The one simply starts out by caring for the other in his time of need.

To love our enemies is not easy.  But if it helps, remember that God is the one asking us to do it.  He never asks us to do the impossible.  We simply start by caring and doing what is right.  Ask God.   He will help with the rest.

Sixth Sunday in Ordinary Time

Sixth Sunday in Ordinary Time
A big focus on many people’s minds at this time is the Winter Olympic
Games going on in Sochi, Russia right now. I like the pageantry, I
like the fact that countries can compete with each other with games,
and I like the sportsmanship that the athletes show each other. Even
athletes who were just fighting hard to beat each other to the finish
line can be seen congratulating each other later on. 


It is hard for me to choose my favorite sport in the Winter Olympics.
In fact, I’ve given up trying to pick one: I enjoy too many of
them. But I have to admit, I especially enjoy watching the sports
where the individual athletes get several chances to improve their
score or their time on an event before it’s all over. In some
sports they only get one chance to get the gold, and if they make one
mistake or they trip or they happen to blink at the wrong time they
are done and there is no way they can get a second chance, even if it
is through no fault of their own. Something about that seems unfair
to me. Other sports, however, allow you a chance to improve. In the
bobsled and luge, for example, the athletes get four chances down the
track to try to improve their time. All the times are added
together, so a slow time can be canceled out by being quicker later
on. If you have ever watched the snowboarding or the free-style
skiing, where they go on jumps and do flips and spins in the air,
you’ll see that they get a couple of runs to qualify and then two
more final runs. These athletes never do all their fanciest moves on
the opening run. They start out simple and then they do harder and
harder trick with each run. The idea is that they want to improve
with each run so that they can end with the top score. They’ve
already done a great job with their early runs. Now they’re just
improving on a good thing.


The readings for today focus on taking what is good and improving on it.
From the days in which the Israelites were encamped around Mt. Sinai,
and Moses received the tablets with the Ten Commandments, God has
expected those who follow Him to follow His laws. Now, of course,
God is perfect and His law is perfect: He doesn't need to improve
anything. The improvement in this case is from us. Jesus is asking
us to take the commandments we have learned and take it a step
further as we work towards holiness.


We started the Liturgy of the Word with the reading from Sirach. This
book was written by a wise man who lived in Jerusalem a little over a
century before Christ. He starts out this passage with some strong
encouragement for us: “If you choose you can keep the commandments,
they will save you; if you trust in God, you too shall live.” Yes,
there are many different temptations out there to go against God's
commandments, but no matter how much we may want to argue that “the
Devil made me do it” it is still our choice to either obey or
disobey. We can either choose eternal life or everlasting death.
Sirach is not saying that any of this is easy; there are many
challenges that a person has to face in following God. We know that
God is just, however, and He will never ask us to do what is wrong.
“No one does He command to act unjustly, to none does He give
license to sin.” We cannot go wrong with God.


The psalm for today gives us an even higher incentive for following the
commandments. As we sang just a little bit ago, “Blessed
are they who follow the law of the Lord!” The psalm writer clearly
saw how blessings are given to those who follow the law. The
psalmist also understands that we cannot do anything without the help
of God. “Open my eyes, that I may consider the wonders of your law.” This and
other lines ask for God's help to keep us on the right path. Without
those blessings, we cannot hope to follow those commandments. 


In short, we need the wisdom of God to help us, as St. Paul talks about
in his first letter to the Corinthians. Not everybody has this
wisdom, the Apostle says, particularly those who crucified Christ.
God reveals His Wisdom through the Spirit to those who love Him,
however. May we be blessed with that Wisdom.


Our Gospel today is a particularly long one and as I mentioned before,
includes an invitation from Christ to take things a step further.
The passage today comes from an early section of the Sermon on the
Mount, in which Jesus gives many different teachings. He knows that
there will be people who think He is trying to change the laws that
are in the Jewish religion, so He starts out this section by saying,
“Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets.
I have come not to abolish but to fulfill.” Many people even today
assume that Christ really made huge changes for the Jewish religion.
Yes, He did change things, but not by getting rid of anything. He
simply asked those who believed to take the next step; to improve on
what they were already doing.


Many of the Jews in Jesus' time, especially the Pharisees, were so focused
on following every letter of the law, that they had forgotten that
the point of the entire law was to help us to love God and neighbor
better. Jesus is trying to help us win heavenly gold, if you will,
by teaching us how to love better.


He calls to mind several commandments. He's basically saying, “Look!
You know you're not supposed to kill. You have that part down. What
I'm telling you now is, don't even get angry people. Don't even call
people names; reconcile differences with your brothers and sisters.
You know you shouldn't commit adultery. Don't even look at another
person with lust.” He goes on to talk about how marriage is meant
for life and that we shouldn't swear or make any oaths, but actually
mean what we say. With all of these Jesus hasn't changed a single
law or commandment. People had been following those commandments for
centuries before Christ was even born. Now He's asking us to set the
bar. Don't obey the law, but love your God and your neighbor. Then
we will be truly blessed.

Fifth Sunday in Ordinary Time

Fifth Sunday in Ordinary Time


Today's readings, particularly the first reading and the Gospel reading, draw
our attention to the images of light and darkness. You may recall
that last Sunday for the feast of the Presentation of the Lord, I
talked about how Christ came as one of us to be a light to all the
nations of the world. This week, Christ turns the focus on us. We
as the Church are called to be the light of the world, letting the
world know of the love that Christ has for us. 


Before getting into what this means for us, let's take a moment to consider

what Jesus means when He says “You are the light of the world”.
Whenever we want to figure out what Jesus means in a particular
Sunday Gospel passage, it is good idea to look at the other readings
that the Church pairs with that passage. In our first reading from
Isaiah, we are told that if we do good things for others like feeding
the hungry and sheltering the homeless and clothing the naked, “Then
your light shall break forth like the dawn”. Later on we are told
that, “Light shall rise for you in the darkness and the gloom shall
become for you like midday”. Notice that each of these images talk
about going from darkness to light. Even that image of breaking
forth “like the dawn” conjures a picture in our minds of the end
of night and the start of a new day. We are given the stark contrast
of the gloom of night and the bright light of midday. The Psalm
continues this by giving us the refrain, “The just man is a light
in darkness to the upright”. The overall theme is quite clear, by
being a just human being, by being kind and loving to those in need,
we are bringing light to an otherwise dark place. That is what Jesus
is getting at when He tells us that we are “the light of the
world”.


Sometimes I think we get this image in our minds

of light and darkness being two opposing forces who are going at each
other for dominance. But that's not what the difference between
light and darkness really is. Light is actually made up of particles
called photons and travels in waves. Light is actually something.
Darkness, however, isn't made up of anything: it is the absence of
light. So when we turn off a light in a room, darkness doesn't come
in or take over the room. The light simply ceases and the darkness
remains.


We are so used to being in places that have some

sort of light to help us know what is around us. We have windows in
buildings that let in the sun light, and even at night street lights
or yard lights usually give at least some light that comes in through
the windows. Even when we go into a windowless room there is
typically a source of light from an electric light or the glow from
indicators on electric appliances. But have you even been in a place
where there was no natural light whatsoever and you turned off any
other artificial lights so that you were in complete darkness? I
once visited a set of natural underground caves in southern Indiana
called Marengo Caves. Because they are underground, sunlight never
makes is into the caves, so electric lights are strung throughout to
that people can see while they take the tour. At one point in the
tour, the tour guide will make sure everyone in the group is together
and then will turn off the lights for a minute or so. They call
this, “total darkness”: not a single photon in sight. It is a
very weird feeling to hear everyone around you, but to see absolutely
nothing. When the lights are turned back on, it's amazing how much
of a difference light makes in a dark place. It is that contrast,
between total darkness and the light of a clear, sunny day that Jesus
is getting at when He calls us the light of the world. 


Jesus wants us to be a light in a world that has

otherwise experienced only darkness. The light that we are giving to
the world is the love that God has for us all; the love and care that
God wants to give to those who have no one to love and care for them.
The darkness that the light is taking away is the absence of love.
Another way to describe it would be the despair that often
accompanies those who have lost all hope. If we do not love, my
brothers and sisters, if we do not show compassion and mercy to those
who are in need, if we do not offer some way to provide for those
needs, then it is going to lead to a lack of love, a lack of
compassion, a lack of hope, and a lack of joy in the world. This
leaves only hate and despair. Again, this is like the contrast of
light and darkness. But unlike darkness, which I said earlier cannot
spread or grow (it is simply nothingness), this “darkness” of
hate and despair can spread and it can grow. It leads
to bitterness in one's heart and can prompt a otherwise good person
to be uncharitable, cynical, and jaded. I think it is safe to say we
have all experienced some of this in our lives: when are treated in
an unjust way or taken advantage of or used by another. We feel that
darkness creep in and those feelings of cynicism and sarcasm towards
others and are all the more tempted to sin in various ways. For me
personally it snowballs, because I feel guilty for the sins I
committed and the darkness and those feelings associated with the
darkness keep growing. What Jesus is saying and what Isaiah the
prophet is saying and what the psalmist is saying is that we need the
light of Christ in this world to make a positive difference in the
world.


So how do we do that? How do we be a light to

the world? There are many things we can do. First off, we don't
stop praying. It's become a cliché to say, “I'll pray for you”,
but prayer is one of the most powerful tools we have as a Christian.
Pray for those in need, pray for those who help those is need, and
pray for the courage to help others as well.


We can also give in many different ways. We can

give of our time by volunteering at a charity that helps the poor.
Lent is coming soon and we'll be asked to give to Catholic Relief
Services and other organizations. We can be charitable to those
right around us as well: open a door, carry something, say a nice
word. These are just a ideas I brainstormed, but there is so much
more we can do to be a light to the world. Let us work to not let
our brothers and sisters in this world live in darkness.

Quick note: retreat time!

Hey everyone!  Thank you to all those who have been reading my posts!  I just wanted to let you know that I will be on retreat with many of the priests of my diocese until Friday the 7th.  So I won't be able to post and reflections for a few days.  Please pray for me.  Know of my prayers for you.  God Bless!

Feast of the Presentation of the Lord

Feast of the Presentation of the Lord


Today's Feast of the Presentation of the Lord only falls on a Sunday about

once every six years or so. So only the daily Mass goers normally
get a chance to celebrate this special feast, but when it falls on a
Sunday like this year it gives us an opportunity to reflect on what
this feast is all about. It's not just about taking the baby Jesus
to the Temple forty days after His birth. We're not just talking
about the day we see Simeon and Anna make brief appearance in the
Gospel. This Feast is a celebration of the day in which Jesus, who
is like us in every way but sin, is presented in the Temple to be a
light to the world.


The fact that Jesus is a human being just like us is something that we can

easily take for granted. However, it is good for us to be reminded
that in the time of the early Church, no one had ever considered that
a divine being would have an offspring who was totally human. What
I'm getting at are those stories where we read about the various gods
and goddesses of ancient Greece and Rome and other pagan deities.
These myths are filled with stories about gods who come to Earth
disguised as humans, and goddesses who fall in love with a human and
have a child who is half-god and half-human. Sometimes a god or
goddess is banished from the dwelling of the gods and is forced to
walk about Earth as punishment. Now of course these stories aren't
true: the ancient people came up with them because they knew there
was something divine out there, but they didn't know how to explain
it yet. But when our one true God sends His only Son to be born on
this Earth as a human, we suddenly have something that no mere human
being came up with. One God sends His only Son to Earth. He is not
disguised as a human; He is not a half-god / half-human “mixed
breed”; He is fully God and fully human. The fact that He is fully
human means He is one of us. He is not sent to Earth as a punishment
for something that He did, but He does come to redeem us and forgive
our sins. The world had never heard of anything like this before.


Our second reading from the Letter to the Hebrews reflects on the significance

of Jesus coming in human flesh. My favorite part of that passage is
when the author says, “Surely he did not help angels but
rather the descendants of Abraham; therefore, he had to become like
his brothers and sisters in every way”. The angels are pure
spirits. We on the other hand are flesh and spirit, with our bodies
and our souls. Jesus came to save us, not the angels, so He came
just like us: He came with a body in His human nature and as a spirit
in His divine nature. The author of the letter says, “He had to
become like His brothers and sisters in every way”. He needed to
become like us because He had to die in order to save us. It was
through the pain and suffering that He experienced in the flesh that
we were saved from sin and eternal death.


There are many days throughout the year that we

could reflect on the significance of Christ coming in the flesh to
save us. Why bring it up today with the Feast of the Presentation?
In Jesus' time, the Jewish religion required that parents bring their
first born child to the Temple in Jerusalem to be presented to God.
There, the child would be dedicated to God. It was a way of saying
thank you to God for giving them the joy of having children, and to
bring that child closer to God. Obviously Jesus is already very
close God; in all reality, He doesn't need to be presented to God.
What happens is that Jesus is presented to the whole world, as God
made flesh who will bring salvation to all people.


Our first reading from the Prophet Malachi gives

a prophesy about the coming of the Messiah. God is talking about a
messenger who will come first to prepare the way for this Messiah.
We Christians see this as John the Baptist. Soon after this
messenger, God Himself will appear in the Temple and will be present
among the people. Then God will make all things pure once more and
the sacrifices and prayers of the people will be made pure as well
and will be heard by God. We are talking about Jesus coming into the
world. Since Jesus was only a baby on the day He was presented, He
has just barely even gotten started, but still, this day marks the
beginning as He is presented to the world. 


Malachi says “the Lord whom you seek” will be

in the Temple. This of course can be directed at any of us. We all
desire happiness, and being with God is what will bring us the
greatest joy. So I believe we are all seeking to be with God. This
desire is shown fittingly well in the two people we are introduced to
in the Gospel for today. Simeon and Anna show true joy in being in
the presence of the Word made flesh. It is described that Simeon
will not die until he sees the Christ. This suggests that he is up
in years and has been waiting for a long time. No one can deny that
he is going to die a happy death! The words that he speaks as he
takes the Christ child into his arms show the immense joy that he
felt at seeing the child. Those words are called “The Canticle of
Simeon”. Priests and religious throughout the world pray these
words each night before we go to bed in our Night Prayer. “Now you
let your servant go in peace, your word has been fulfilled” is the
translation we say. We pray we may have a restful night of sleep and
a peaceful death when we do die. My point is, Simeon is saying that
his joy is now complete. He has seen this child who “is destined
for the rise and fall of many in Israel” and who will be “a light
for revelation to the Gentiles”. 


The prophetess Anna is also at the temple. Like

Simeon, she seems to be waiting and praying at the Temple expecting
this great day to come at any moment. We don't hear any specific
words from Anna, but she gives thanks to God for the child. Her joy
is complete as well. 


Simeon and Anna's words of joy show the great

importance of how Christ came as one of us to save us. Today we mark
this presentation to the world; a world in need of saving. May our
words and actions in every day of our lives thank God for that
awesome gift.