KEEP YOUR EYES ON THE PRIZE

Homily

Thirty-first Sunday in Ordinary Time

What a pathetic figure he is. How they must have laughed at Zacchaeus as he sought to catch a glimpse of the Lord. Didn’t he realize that he was unworthy of the presence of a Messiah?!

First of all, he was littler than everyone else. The kids probably called him shorty in grammar school, and its hard to imagine that any of them chose him to play on their team. And it must have been rather comical to see him jumping up and down behind the crowd on the road to Jericho, trying to see over all the big people as the Lord passed by.

But that didn’t stop him. No, the little guy shimmied up a Sycamore tree to catch a glimpse of Jesus as he passed by.

But how foolish! Didn’t he realize that such a famous rabbi would never associate with a tax collector. The little Zacceaus had, after all, betrayed his own people and his own religion by working for those filthy Romans, who abused the Jews and took the little they had to enrich their coffers. And Zacceaus was a tax collector for these foreigners! Didn’t he realize that the Lord would turn his face from such a sleazy good for nothing?

But that didn’t stop him. No. Nothing stopped him. And that’s why salvation, that’s why Jesus came to his house.

Because Zacchaeus kept his eyes on the prize.

How many times have we seen the fifty-five year old footage of those three hundred peaceful marchers, many of them old people and children, as they attempted to the cross the Edmund Pettus Bridge in peaceful protest of the lynching of a man for the color of his skin. They were met with dogs and tear gas, billy clubs and galloping horses and many were left bloodied and stunned.

Did you ever wonder what kept them going in the face of such violence? One old woman, when asked why she did not turn and run, recalled a sermon by Dr. Martin Luther King a few weeks before when he has urged them to keep their eyes on the prize. For when you keep your eyes on Jesus, he preached, who will lead you to the promised land, nothing can deter you...no tear gas, no violence, no dog’s pointy teeth....not even the roar of their hate can deter you, when you keep your eyes on the prize.

Dr. King was preaching, that day, on Saint Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians (9:24-25) “Do you not know that those who run the race all receive a prize? So run that you might obtain it.” Keep your eyes on the prize.

Like the runner in a marathon, keep your eyes on the prize...on Jesus, your only hope, your only goal, your only God. Keep your eyes on the prize. Not on where you’ve been or what’s around you, not on what somebody’s saying or doing, not on the gossipers and the doomsayers. No. Keep your eyes fixed firmly on Jesus, your hope and your prize. For only then can we win the race.

That’s the lesson of today’s liturgy for each of us who seek to preserve the life of the little baby in its mother’s womb.

• Don’t let the darkness distract you, or the politics gets you down: keep your eyes on the prize...on Jesus.

• Don’t let the temporary triumphs of the Culture of death distract you from the race: keep your eyes on the prize...on Jesus.

• Don’t let sectarian media struggles and idealogical battles frighten you or slow you down: keep your eyes on the prize...on Jesus.

For he is the only way, the only truth, and the source life. He is the light which no darkness can overcome, the truth no lie can destroy, and the life which defeats even death itself!

For, in the end, this is really not our battle our battle. It is the latest chapter in the primordial struggle between light and darkness, goodness and hate, life and death. And each of us, unworthy servants that we are, but play our role.

And the victory of the Gospel of Life, when it comes (and it surely will) will not be ours. It will be his.

The day when our country and our world finally embrace the Gospel of Life, when the lives of the littlest and the weakest are cherished and defended by every person, when the wisdom of the old is cherished as an heirloom and the fragility of the disabled is received as a grace....on that God’s will be the victory and we will give thanks to have a had some small part in helping his Kingdom to come...

And in the meantime, it is ours to pray...without allowing the distractions and discouragements of the world to keep us from falling regularly to our knees...we will pray for life, ever keeping our eyes on the prize, who is Jesus.

• in the meantime, we will march and we will declaim and we will stand for the truth...without allowing the sneers of the world to keep us from this most essential task...we will witness for life, ever keeping our eyes on the prize, who is Jesus.

• in the meantime, we will preach and we will proclaim the inalienable right to life of every human person from conception to natural death....without allowing the name calling and the stares and the harsh comments to deter us.... we will preach for life, ever keeping our eyes on the prize, who is Jesus.

• in the meantime, we will work to make our nation just and promote a government which preserves and cherishes human life in all its stages....without allowing the cold darkness of sin to frighten us away....we will work for life, ever keeping our eyes on the prize, who is Jesus.

We will each do our part, in the public and in the pew, kneeling in our rooms or marching on the street, proudly proclaiming the truth and ever keeping our eyes on Jesus.

For like that short little tax collector, the limitations really don’t matter. All we have to do is keep our eyes on the prize as he passes by. And the one through whom all life was made, will come to our house this day.

Monsignor James P. Moroney

Rector

Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us...

Through the kindness of a friend, I recently came across this lovely reflection on the Blessed Virgin Mary, which I hope you will enjoy.

I never met Mary until I was eleven years old traveling on a crowded train headed for Shanghai in a car so packed with people that my brother and I stood up all night. In the morning someone yielded their seat to me and I fell asleep instantly. I woke two or three hours later to find that I had been sleeping with my head on the shoulder of a young mother next to me. Knowing how tired I was, she had never moved all that time. I had never seen her before and I never saw her again, but years later in remembering this incident I began to have the strangest feeling that this young woman, this stranger, this lender of a shoulder, was actually Mary -the mother of God, the mother of us all, the one on whom we rest when we are too exhausted to go on. This was my introduction to Our Lady.

I met others who had met Mary - two Unitarians, one of whom chose to enter the ministry after a long meditation before her statue. The second was a colleague who worked as a chaplain at a Catholic hospital. Exhausted one night she entered the hospital chapel and dropped into a pew. She then looked up and saw Mary looking down at her from a fresco on the wall. My friend looked at the Lady as if seeing an old friend and thought, “She’s seen it all. She’s seen everything, and there she is - for me.” In describing this she told me, “When you’re as tired as I was, you don’t need an idea. You need a face.”

You know, when soldiers are wounded or dying on the battle field, whatever be their nation, tell me, whom do they call for? Their mother, and Mary is the mother of all mothers.

The gospels describe her as one who listens without question to the the angel Gabriel. And when she has heard the angel’s charge, Mary does not say “Yeah, right.” She says to the angel “Let it be done to me according to thy word.” And thus she says to God, “Thy will be done.”

It’s not surprising that Our Lord who learned to pray from his mother taught his disciples to pray “Thy will be done.” It’s not surprising that in the Garden he prayed, “Not my will but thine be done.”It’s not surprising there that we repeat this petition when we say the Our Father. For who is the Holy Mother but one whose prayer has been and is and always will be, “Thy will be done?”

She who prays this prayer is the one who bears Christ. She carried him in her womb. She carried him in her arms. She carried him in her teaching. And once he left her home she followed him and carried her in her heart.

-preached at All Saints Episcopal Church in Dorchester on the feast of the Assumption, 2010 by Reverend Carl Scovel

HOPE FOR A BETTER TOMORROW

ON ELECTING OUR CIVIC LEADERS

FROM THE CATHOLIC BISHOPS OF MASSACHUSETTS

One of the greatest blessings of our American democracy is the opportunity it affords to its citizens to step up and share their vision of a better society. Even in these difficult social and economic times, we continue to strive for a community in which all can benefit, and from which no one is excluded.

It was the same yearning for a better life for everyone that brought many of our ancestors to this country. So it is a deeply-rooted concern for the common good that has moved us throughout our history to participate in the election process. Our convictions about the importance of voting are bolstered by the innate sense of hope that has endowed this nation with such promise in good times and in bad. We go to the polls no matter the direction of the social and economic trends at the time.

As Catholics we also are a people of hope. Hope is the Christian virtue that confirms our belief that we are never abandoned, and that we are always loved by God. We express these truths every time we extend our love to others as part of one human family. This same hope guides our civic involvement.

Because the common good is at stake, it is imperative that we exercise our right and duty to vote. As recognized by Pope Benedict XVI, the laity should “participate in political life, in a manner consistently in accordance with the Church’s teaching, bringing their well-founded reasons and high ideals into the democratic debate[.]” Papal Address to the Pontifical Council for the Laity (May 21, 2010).

Particularly for us as Catholics, voting is an exercise of reason inspired by faith. The Holy Father has thus observed: “Just as every economic decision has a moral consequence, so too in the political field, the ethical dimension of policy has far-reaching consequences that no government can afford to ignore[.]” “This is why,” he continued, “the world of reason and the world of faith—the world of secular rationality and the world of religious belief—need one another and should not be afraid to enter into a profound and ongoing dialogue, for the good of our civilization.” Papal Address at Westminster Hall, England, Sept. 17, 2010.

Our participation as citizens in the electoral process allows us to propose our vision for this country and about our future as a democracy. Thus voting is above all an opportunity—an occasion for contributing our insights as Catholics to the civic discussion nationally and locally, thereby inspiring social change consistent with our country’s foundational values.

Deciding which candidate in any particular race offers the best opportunity to take us in the right direction is not an easy task. Yet there is a measuring rod by which all electoral choices must be evaluated: will my vote enhance human dignity?

Certain moral and social issues are fundamentally important, since human rights are at stake and must be protected to help democracy to flourish in a way that benefits every citizen. These include the defense of the sanctity of life, the family based on marriage between a man and a woman, religious freedom, and the well-being of the poor. As shifts in societal challenges are inevitable, it is also vital to determine from election to election which human rights face the greatest threat at the time of voting.

The opportunity to vote is a blessing. Taking advantage of this opportunity is an expression of hope. Go to the polls on Election Day and, through your choices at the ballot, act on your vision of a better society.

+ Cardinal Seán P. O’Malley, O.F.M. Cap. Archbishop of Boston

+ Bishop Robert J. McManus, Bishop of Worcester

+ Bishop Timothy A. McDonnell, Bishop of Springfield

+ Bishop George W. Coleman, Bishop of Fall River

MASSACHUSETTS CATHOLIC CONFERENCE, October 25, 2010

Comparisons

A very interesting thing is how many times in his stories Jesus makes comparisons.

He contrasts a man and a woman, a disciple and a soldier, a Jew and a Gentile, an individual and a crowd. We see how different they are and learn something vitally important about ourselves - something meant to save us.

And so, a leading holy man hosts a dinner for Jesus - but fails to welcome him with the usual hospitality. Also present is a sinful woman who washes the guest's feet and dries them with her hair. That night we learned who was really holy!

Or we see 3 men walking - the first two: a priest and a Levite - both respected - then a third, from Samaria, wherever that is. Who helps the fourth, the one lying half dead on the side of the road? You remember. The third, the foreigner.

There are wise and foolish virgins - five with oil in hand, waiting in vigil. Five distracted and shut out.

We hear of men with places of honor at banquets, now brought low - and of those sitting way back suddenly called up.

I think of a father with two sons - one dutiful, the other wasteful. The younger one wises up and becomes the father's joy. The older can't bear it and maybe never gets over it.

Comparisons - so often with a twist or a hook you don't see coming - all meant to teach holiness - the work of a Master Teacher.

Today, we hear another. On center stage at the Temple: a Pharisee and a tax collector. Both come to pray.

Now, we're probably so conditioned to think of the Pharisees as bad people that we think this one bad. He may not have been that bad! Let's not forget his goodness. That's a point Jesus makes.

On the other hand, we may be conditioned to think every tax collector convertible - like Matthew the tax collector. Don't be fooled. Tax collectors were terrible. Jesus knows that.

The Pharisee begins by thanking God. That's not a bad way to start your prayer, by thanking God. He thanks God for not being greedy, dishonest, or adulterous.

We have to take him at his word. He's telling the truth. Almost certainly he was generous, honest and monogamous.

He's probably done a lot of good. If we'd known him, we might even like him.

His problem was attitude. The wrong attitude.

Yes, he was generous, honest and monogamous. The Law dictates this.

But the whole the point of The Law is to draw him - and everyone else - closer to God - closer to others It provides the structure we need to get closer to God.

The good actions of the Pharisee, formed in The Law - should have tied him to others and especially to God.

You know, the word 'religion' comes from Latin, religere. It means "to tie back to." We have religion to tie us back to God and one another.

The Pharisee rejoices that it separates him from the other man. He's thinks he's better.

This is the key, the crux of the matter, the point Jesus is making. The Pharisee's slavish pursuit of law separates him from others.

He revels in the comparison between himself and the other. He's not tying himself to the other. And, his prayer is an act of self-love - not God-love.

That's a real problem.

The tax collector, on the other hand, is not a good man. Objectively, we'd say he was bad. He hurts people.

He's worked for the oppressive Romans against his own people. He's bilked everyone - probably even his own flesh and blood. They hate him.

It was only appropriate that he stand at a distance in the Temple, beat his breast and not look up to heaven. He's despicable - the worst gangster imaginable.

But his prayer is so good - so sincere - we use it as an act of contrition in that confessional box. "O God, be merciful to me a sinner."

He's not there to compare himself to anyone. He goes face to face with God; desperately seeks to tie himself to God, see God, and be moved by God - all in the spirit of true religion.

Jesus shines the spotlight on him.

What's the Lord teaching us?

The Law is good, very good. After all, he said he didn't come to abolish the rules.

Our religious practice is meant to form us - help us turn to God - never to make us feel superior. Its supposed to draw us together - draw us to God.

We who have fallen away from God and we alienated from one another need to be tied back.

Draw in The Law and draw in divine life.

Go face to face with God and say, humbly, "be merciful to me a sinner."

Monsignor Thomas J. Sullivan

Chancellor

People Will Always Have Need of God

Just a few days ago, Pope Benedict XVI wrote to the seminarians of the world, reflecting in a very personal way on the importance of their vocation. I hope you enjoy his reflections.

When in December 1944 I was drafted for military service, the company commander asked each of us what we planned to do in the future. I answered that I wanted to become a Catholic priest. The lieutenant replied: "Then you ought to look for something else. In the new Germany priests are no longer needed". I knew that this "new Germany" was already coming to an end, and that, after the enormous devastation which that madness had brought upon the country, priests would be needed more than ever.

Today the situation is completely changed. In different ways, though, many people nowadays also think that the Catholic priesthood is not a "job" for the future, but one that belongs more to the past. You, dear friends, have decided to enter the seminary and to prepare for priestly ministry in the Catholic Church in spite of such opinions and objections. You have done a good thing. Because people will always have need of God, even in an age marked by technical mastery of the world and globalization: they will always need the God who has revealed himself in Jesus Christ, the God who gathers us together in the

universal Church in order to learn with him and through him life’s true meaning and in order to uphold and apply the standards of true humanity.

Where people no longer perceive God, life grows empty; nothing is ever enough. People then seek escape in euphoria and violence; these are the very things that increasingly threaten young people. God is alive. He has created every one of us and he knows us all. He is so great that he has time for the little things in our lives: "Every hair of your head is numbered". God is alive, and he needs people to serve him and bring him to others. It does makes sense to become a priest: the world needs priests, pastors, today, tomorrow and always, until the end of time.

The seminary is a community journeying towards priestly ministry. I have said something very important here: one does not become a priest on one’s own. The "community of disciples" is essential, the fellowship of those who desire to serve the greater Church. In this letter I would like to point out – thinking back to my own time in the seminary – several elements which I consider important for these years of your journeying....

I have wanted to let you know how often I think of you, especially in these difficult times, and how close I am to you in prayer. Please pray for me, that I may exercise my ministry

well, as long as the Lord may wish. I entrust your journey of preparation for priesthood to the maternal protection of Mary Most Holy, whose home was a school of goodness and of grace. May Almighty God bless you all, the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.

From the Vatican, 18 October 2010, the Feast of Saint Luke the Evangelist.

Yours devotedly in the Lord,

BENEDICTUS PP. XVI

Cathedral Conference for Life

My dear brothers and sisters:

Did you happen to read the article in last week’s Time Magazine about the developing research in “fetal origins”? It tells the fascinating story of how many aspects of our lives seem to be greatly influenced by our first nine months of life in our mothers’ wombs.

I was particularly struck, however, by the author’s concluding paragraph:

As for me, the baby in my belly for these last nine months is now a sandy-haired toddler named Gus. Where did his particular qualities come from? Will he be strong or sickly, excitable or calm? What will his future hold? These are the questions parents have long pondered about their children. More and more, it looks as if many of the answers will be found in the womb.

I was struck by this paragraph because, when I read it, I had just come from chatting and praying with the folks who several days each week stand in front of the Planned Parenthood building on Pleasant Street, seeking to save the babies in the bellies of scores of mothers from being aborted.

It is hard for me to imagine how a woman can abort her child. But, then again, perhaps that is not altogether fair. For I do not know the pain, the anxiety and even the blind panic which can set in when a child has been conceived unexpectedly. Maybe the woman is young, or single, or lives on the street. Maybe the woman has emotional or psychological or even financial problems which cause extraordinary distress.

But no matter how tragic the pain the new mother may experience, it is never sufficient cause to take the life of the baby in her belly. Which is why we need to do everything we can to love each mother to the truth, to save her from a system which often forces people into a life of regret, and to bring about laws which protect the life and liberty of every human being from conception to natural death.

That’s why, with the great help of the Diocesan Pro-Life Office, the Cathedral is sponsoring a Conference for Life on October 30th. The brochure describing this day is included in this week’s bulletin. We will be privileged to have two of the best staffers from the Bishops’ Conference with us: Susan Wills, who directs all educational efforts on pro-life for the USCCB, and Richard Dorflinger, who is the USCCB expert on stem cell and end of life issues. Susan and Richard will present the keynotes, and Bishop McManus and another half-dozen advocates for life from across our community will lead workshops on a variety of life-related topics. The day will conclude with the regular 4:00pm Mass, celebrated by Bishop Reilly, at which I will preach.

Please consider joining us for this day. Details on registration are found in the enclosed brochure. It’s the least we can do for all the babies in the bellies of mothers everywhere.

In the Lord,

Monsignor James P. Moroney

Rectorsaintpauls@aol.com

Who's Plan is it Anyway?

Twenty-Ninth Sunday in Ordinary Time

Homily

It was an ordinary August morning in the Atacama desert when Omar Reygadas said goodbye to his wife Marcella and headed for work. As he left the house, he and his wife were talking about their fourth great-grandchild, who was expected any day now. Marcella had been talking to her son, Omar, Jr., and her daughters, Claudia, Marcella, and Humana, about the party they were going to have at their house after the Baptism.

When Omar arrived at work, he entered the San Esteban mine, as he always did, on a rail car, which descended 1,300 feet into the earth. It was then that he and his 32 co-workers heard a low rumble, like an earthquake. Then the mine lights went out and even the beams on their helmets were obscured by a suffocating cloud of dust. Three hours later, the dust settled and Omar realized the roof of the mine had collapsed on top of them.

The party, his expectant daughter, and everything he had planned...all had been momentarily shaken. He was not, it now appeared, really in control.

It was an ordinary August day and Dr. Mehmet Oz had decided to highlight the importance of colonoscopies on his TV show. So he decided to undergo the procedure with the cameras rolling in order to show that this life saving-test, while uncomfortable in s several ways, was really not as bad as most people imagined. He was in excellent health, exercised and ate a consistently healthy diet, and had no family history of colon cancer. Seemed like a piece of cake.

But then, in the middle of the procedure, with camera rolling, he was told they had found a polyp and then a second. And a few days later he was told that while the polyps were no longer dangerous, they were the type would most definitely turn to cancer....the kind that kills. And for the first time, this successful TV doctor, the picture of health, found out he could get cancer and die. The cameras caught the shocked look on his usually confident face, and the audio picked up the quake in his voice as he called his wife with the news, followed by a quick "we'll talk about this when I get home.” His plans of fame, health and perfect control...all his plans, had been momentarily shaken. He was not, it seemed, really in control.

It was an ordinary June day in the town of Stuart, although it could have been Worcester just as easily. Tim and Beth were waiting for Sarah, who at fourteen was coming home from the movies with her two friends. Her best friend’s uncle Ted went to pick them up in his Cadillac and they piled into the back seat and chatted and screamed and laughed as only fourteen year old friends can do. That is until Stephen, drunk and sixteen years old, ran that stop sign and Jennifer died.

I cannot imagine what that night did to Tim and Beth. Their dreams of seeing Jennifer graduate, walk down the aisle, hold their grandchild in her arms, and take care of them in their old age...all these dreams disappeared in a moment in the middle of the night. Just like that, it all changed.

It all changed. And it all changes. In the unfathomable will of God.

A God whose wisdom is unknowable, at the same time we know he is all wise. A God whose plan is but gradually unfolded, though always conceived in love. A God whom our little hearts sometimes see as cruel, remote, or even uncaring, but whose unbelievable love for me is the definition of what it means to love.

Which is so hard for me to take. For like a three year old, unwilling to obey, I do my darnedest to see that my will be done, to amass possessions and power as a tribute to my glory, to become all that I want to be and to to fill my life with all I need to have, ever striving to build a life which is a monument to my narcissism.

But then, over and over again, God reminds me, in harsh and sometimes gentle ways, that he is the author, the creator, who made me in love, to be love, to become each day conformed to his cross, to obliterate hate, to rejoice in littleness, and to conquer even death with sacrifice.

Pray

Which is why we pray. To beg God to give us understanding. Of why he put us here and what he wants us to do.

Our is the insistent prayer of Christ in the Garden before his Blessed Passion, sweating blood and crying tears, so often mixed with fear and pain. Father, we beg, take this cup of suffering away from me. But, in the end, not my will, but yours be done.

• In the good days, the summers of our lives, when the sun seems so bright, the world so beautiful and we’re just much in control: your will be done...

• And in the fearsome and wintry days, when nothing seems too certain, and each choice fills us with dread: your will be done...

For make no mistake about it, in good times and in bad, God is ever with us. He who died for us, and who will raise up on the last day is ever with us. He who ascended to the Father and sent us out to love others as he loved us is ever with us, even until the end.

Trust in him, then. Pray to him. Confide in him, in tears and in suffering, in joy and in hope. In good times and in bad, pray for his help, the discernment of his will, and a full measure of his love.

For we never know what tomorrow will bring. We only know, that when we are startled by what God has in store, that he who made us in love, will be with us to the end. And in his unfathomable wisdom, will lead us to eternal joy.

Cathedral For Life Conference on October 30th

Only One Returned to Give Thanks...

Twenty-Eighth Sunday in Ordinary Time

Homily

Timothy Dexter is one of the most colorful characters to walk the fields of Massachusetts in the decades following the American Revolution. Born in Malden, he made his first fortune by speculating in Continental currency. His continuing success was due to a combination of audacity and incredible luck.

Against all odds, he exported wool mittens to the West Indies, at just the time an exporter in that tropical climate began shipping to Siberia. Next, he literally sent coals to Newcastle, at just the moment a British coal miner’s strike made him a fortune there. He exported Bibles to the Muslim East Indies, stray cats to the Caribbean, and having hoarded a warehouse full of whalebone, by necessity invented the whalebone corset, which became all the rage in nineteenth century New England.

He was eccentric, but wise beyond his capacity, and never ceased to attribute his multiple successes to those who helped him along the way. Indeed, gratitude was, in his view, the most important of virtues.

“An ungrateful man,” he would frequently say, ‘is like a hog under a tree eating acorns, who never looks up to see where they came from.’

Nine of the ten lepers in today’s Gospel are just such narcissistic hogs. Cleansed of their disease, cured of their disability, they are now set on getting on with their life, with not a smidgen of gratitude and not a word of thanks to the Lord who cured them.

And we are not so different. Sadly, ingratitude is so rampant in our day and age that we often become surprised by folks who are habitually grateful.

On the day I received my last postgraduate degree I practically sprained my wrist patting myself on the back. But did I think of Miss Lucasak who first taught me cursive in third grade, or Miss Morin who encouraged us to write those one page essays with the pictures two years later. Did I think of the Priest who first inspired me with a love for the Liturgy, or my parents who put me through College, or the inspiring professors I had come to know along the way. Did I think of the scholars who had constructed that world of knowledge in which I had gained some proficiency, or those who built the institutions which had led me through those mysteries.

No, I thought of none of them, I never gave them a thought or a prayer. I never said thank-you. Just like the ungrateful lepers, I got on with my life and I never looked back.

I was like the cancer patient, who through the chemo and radiation begs God for just a few more years to see her daughter married or her grandchild graduate. Who prays with fervor, begging God in the early morning darkness to hear her prayers, bargaining and promising that God will be all that really matters in whatever years he might graciously give her...and when she’s cancer free, things get back to normal...minus the fervent prayer, the desperate search for God, and the repeated pledges to do his will. She gets back to living HER life, and gives God the hour on Sunday, as long as she doesn’t have something more important to do. She gets on with her life and never looks back.

It’s like the anger of the spouse who stands by the grave of the woman he has loved for sixty years and with bitterness blames God for taking her from him. His God at that moment is a cruel puppet master, who pulls the strings and makes us dance, and causes the dark evil of death and suffering in fulfillment of some perverse scheme of manipulation. And as he stands there he forgets the day that God brought together two young teens as the light of their lives in the dark days of the depression, skating at Elm Park and knowing that nothing could ever be this beautiful. He forgets the first time they wept with perfect joy, cradling their newborn baby in their arms, convinced no God could ever be this good, and no thing could ever be so beautiful. He forgets the infinite number of sacrifices, acts of mercy: tiny expressions of exquisite love all made possible by that same God’s unbelievably gracious love for him.

But right now, he is blinded by the pain, and all he can do is cling to the darkness...he has to get on with it and he can’t look back.

It’s like those who were Baptized in that font who seldom go to Church, say a prayer, feed the poor, forgive, or even seek to love others as they were loved. They go about living their lives, happy enough, but never full satisfied, getting along, but still uncertain about what it really means.

Sure they know joy, for a moment, in the money, in the power, in the successful career, in all the thousands of little reflections of God’s goodness which this wonderful world contains. But all they see are glimmers and reflections. Never the full face of him who waits for them, never the splendrous glory of his care for them, never the beauty of listening to him, never the strength of receiving him, never the joy of giving thanks.

For they have things to do, and they will continue to take, without looking back, and never say thank you.

And then there’s you and me. Fickle, self-absorbed, and sinful as we are, we still try to crane our necks to at least look back. To break the bread, to tell the story, and to give thanks as best we able.

For that is what this is called, what we do in this place: Eucharist, thanksgiving: a memorial of recollection and gratitude, in which we remember all that he has done for us, from our first breath to our last, the love, the mercy, the sacrifice....the faith which makes sense of the darkest days and the mystery which defeats the deadly with eternal joy and eternal life.

Which is why in just a few moments, speaking in the person of Christ himself, I call out to you: Lift up your hearts. And you will lift them up to the Lord.

And unlike ungrateful lepers or hogs, we will give thanks to the Lord our God. For it is right to give him thanks and praise.

Monsignor James P. Moroney

Rector

Cain, the King and the Pharoah

Homily

Twenty-Seventh Sunday in Ordinary Time

Destruction and violence are before me; there is strife, and clamorous discord," Habbakuk laments. 'But you, O Lord, do nothing to stop it...why must I gaze at this misery!?'

How often we make the lament of Habakuk our own! Violence and misery, wars and murders, suicides and betrayals, people stripped of their dignity and even their humanity...Its never been so bad, and it's as if God doesn't care!

Well it has been this bad, and it probably will be until the day we depart this valley of tears, but the reason for the violence, dear Habakuk is not the will of God, but the deeds of men, for as Pogo used to say, I have met the enemy, and he is us!

Whether we're Cain, the King or the Pharaoh, it is our sin which is the author of violence and our hardened hearts which incubate our own misery.

Cain

The primordial act of violence in the scriptures is raised in the heart of Cain. The scriptures tell us that Cain raised wheat, while his younger brother Abel raised sheep, one a cattleman, the other a farmer. And when they went to offer sacrifice to God, Abel's offering was seen as more pleasing. At which Cain grew jealous and killed his brother in a jealous rage!

Jealousy was and is is the green-eyed monster, ever longing for the greener grasses in the other fellow's yard. Jealousy is never satisfied and almost always leads to a violent rejection of the will of God. Uh, excuse me God, I think you must have made a mistake. This is the life you chose for me? But where's the yacht, or the private plane, or the awards for my stunning beauty, or the perfect children, or the Nobel prize, or the bit about being smarter or more powerful than everybody else? Where indeed, is al that stuff I know will make me happy? Well if you won't give it, I guess Ill just have to take it!

And so we make believe we know best, or at least better than God what's best for us, and so we plot and plan our destinies. And despite the fact that our schemes must be very amusing to God, we plug right on, for ours is the kingdom and the power and the glory...by hook or by crook. Jealousy is a miserable little wretch.

The King

And then there's the King, and his murderous lust for Bathsheba, which leads the great David to the deceitful slaughter of her husband Uriah. There were really two murders committed by King David that day...one of the virtue of Bathsheba, whom David turned from a person to a thing, and then the brutal killing of one of his most loyal soldiers. All out of a desire to possess the one who did not belong to him and his childish willingness to treat human persons like toy soldiers for the fulfillment of his own fantasies.

It's the same violence we embrace each time we seek to defraud another of their human dignity, to dehumanize the one God made in his image and likeness, ignoring who he made them to be.

It's the sin that drove a young freshman to the George Washington bridge this past week....it's the sin of every kind of pornography...whether the Internet kind that turns vulnerable young people into things we use for our selfish amusement or the political kind that turns all public servants and personalities into objects of ridicule and derision.

Such sins refuse to accord respect to anyone. Everyone is subject to our use and abuse, twisted and destroyed for our entertainment. Policemen or parents, jurists or presidents, priests or physicians, each are but another titillating opportunity to turn real people into jokes, to deride embarrass, and destroy...oh, how the mighty have fallen! So we revel in their misery! What fun for the giggling crowd!...the worst kind of character assassination, worthy neither of the fifth grade school yard, of twitter, TV or the blog. For if I have not love, I am nothing. And if I have not respect, I cannot love.

The Pharoah

And then there;s the genocide of Pharaoh. It started with the death of Joseph and his brothers, the last of the sons of Jacob. Exodus tells us why the genocide begins: “the Israelites were fruitful and prolific. They became so numerous and strong that the land was filled with them.” (Exodus 1:7).

It’s the fear of the stranger, then, that moves Pharaoh to enslave the people whom he knew not! So he does two things: First, he makes all the Israelites slaves, appointing cruel taskmasters over them. And then he calls in the Jewish midwives and commands them to kill every newborn Hebrew child.

Such hatred is as timeless as fear itself: fear of the unknown, fear of the stranger that grows into a desire to make those people just disappear. And while the fear has been the same in every human heart, the identity of those people changes with each generation in every land. For the Hutus, those people are the Tutsis, for the Nazis, they are the Jews....for the Jews they are the Palestinians....and even here in Worcester, for the Yankees they were the Irish, for the Irish they were the French, for the French, they were the Italians, for the Italians they were the Puerto Ricans, for the Puerto Ricans, they were the columbians, and on and on and on, in never ending cycles of suspicion of the next one down on the ladder, breading hate, discrimination, and even violence.

The antidote to such fear, of course, is the confidence of the children of God, who welcome the alien as a brother, treat the stranger as they treat their Lord, and even seek to love their enemies as they love themselves.

So what's the remedy? Is it our good reason, our common sense, or our ability to figure it all out. Hardly! For left to our own devices, we only succeed in digging ourselves deeper and thickening the web of our sins and deceptions.

Our only hope is to be redeemed by Christ, with absolute faith in him, and an absolute surrender to his will, that the hardening of our hearts might be redeemed by the blood which flows from his side. For at the end of the day, 'We are nothing but unprofitable servants, who if they had faith but the size of a mustard seed, would never know violence or misery, ever again.

Monsignor James P. Moroney

Rector