Mass Prep Sunday September 2nd 2018

Sunday September 2^nd 22^nd Sunday Ordinary Time (Cycle B)

Freedom

The tie in between today’s readings: There is No Liberty Without God

Psalm 15:1-5, Deuteronomy 4: 1-8 , James 1: 17-27, Mark 7: 1-23

     Have you ever wondered what a Theocracy under God would look like? In today’s Old Testament reading, Deuteronomy 4: 1-8, God is preparing His people to take possession of the Promised Land. They have a priesthood to worship Him and His law to guide them with prophets and judges to maintain order. There is no legislature because God is their king. If each person sticks with the framework, they will not only posses their inheritance promised by God, but they will live in a society whose shared moral code is outlined in Psalm 15. He is setting up Israel to become a beacon to the world. Israel will be great because Israel will be good to the glory of God, as long as they can avoid incidences like the one at Baal-peor.  

     Baal-peor is the culmination of a very interesting story between a sorcerer named Baalam and Balak the Moabite king (Numbers 22-25). Essentially, a Moab/Midianite coalition would not be able to defeat the Israelite army in the field. Baalam suggested a plan to destroy Israel from within by corrupting the worship of Jehovah with Baal worship. The plan worked very well. The leadership got sucked into the trap and many of the people followed.  In a Theocracy, this is tantamount to high treason.  God slew 24,000 of His own people and declared war on Midian to finish them off for their treachery in the matter. Throughout the Old Testament, God takes dramatic and decisive actions against idolatry and sin because it strikes at the heart of a shared moral code necessary for a free society. Without it, a nation descends into chaos, totalitarianism, and destruction as Israel eventually does. 

     “You shall not add to the word which I am commanding you, nor take away from it” (Deut. 4:2a). In Mark’s gospel, Jesus confronts the Pharisee’s lip service to God’s law.  The traditions of men, such as keeping the Sabbath, or ritual washing, add to God’s words with a veneer of misguided righteousness. Their teachings about divorce and Corban use a little lawyerly slight-of-hand to nullify the intent of scripture. Unlike the open rebellion of idolatry, these are a hidden contempt for the Almighty. God is not mocked. Even today, we play these games with Him. God hates an empty “go through the motions” religion, transforming worship into a clueless chore done out of duty. He also despises the replacement of sound doctrine with our uninformed self speculations.  As in ancient Israel, both are a breeding ground for sin and undermine the shared moral code.  Our practical idolatry with worldly things and our lack of concern with Biblical teachings has brought us to the point where we are asking the question: “Is there anything wrong with anything?” We need to take a good look at ourselves.

Isaiah 5:20-24 New International Version (NIV)

²⁰ Woe to those who call evil good
    and good evil,
who put darkness for light
    and light for darkness,
who put bitter for sweet
    and sweet for bitter.

²¹ Woe to those who are wise in their own eyes
    and clever in their own sight.

²² Woe to those who are heroes at drinking wine
    and champions at mixing drinks,
²³ who acquit the guilty for a bribe,
    but deny justice to the innocent.
²⁴ Therefore, as tongues of fire lick up straw
    and as dry grass sinks down in the flames,
so their roots will decay
    and their flowers blow away like dust;
for they have rejected the law of the Lord Almighty
    and spurned the word of the Holy One of Israel.

     A free society starts with the individual. In James 1: 17-27, today’s epistle, he compares the word of God to a mirror. Lip service people give a casual glance into God’s looking glass, disregard their unflattering reflection, and turn away unchanged. Preferring sin, morality breaks down and bedlam ensues. Society gives up freedom for order. A strong centralized government arises, which will threaten all established rights or worse. We need to be the people who intently look at God’s word and conform to it. James calls it the perfect law of liberty. “If the Son shall set you free, you shall be indeed free” (John 8:36). So now it comes full circle. God’s implanted word in my life will transform me into a Psalm 15 kind of person, who loves God and neighbor. Belief in the God of the Bible creates the Church, which fosters a culturally shared moral code. This moral code acts as a law unto itself and keeps society together without the need of a police state. We can be free because we are good. This is not the current situation in our country. We are losing our common moral code. But it’s not too late. God has given a way back:

2 Chronicles 7:14 New International Version (NIV)

¹⁴ if my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and I will forgive their sin and will heal their land.

Mass Prep August 26th

Sunday August 26, 2018 21^st Sunday Ordinary Time (Cycle B)

Where Shall We Go?

The tie in between today’s readings: Faith Grounded in History is Trusting for the Future.

Psalm 34: 2-3 and 16-21, Joshua 24: 1-2 and 15-18, Ephesians 5: 21-32, John 6: 60-69

     So, I’m watching TV when an advertisement for a Mutual Fund comes on. The narrator is explaining to me that this is a great investment because of the success it has had in the market for the past five years.  Despite the disclaimer that past performance doesn’t indicate future outcome, he still asks you to trust them and buy their fund because of history. Like investments, trust or faith is grounded in history and tries to make a sensible calculation of the future. At times you will be wrong, but try to live your life without it. Buying a gift, planning a vacation, or even getting married: it all takes faith.  In the Bible, our faith pleases God because it acknowledges His attributes and gives Him credit that He’ll do what He says.  Faith has you act with a divinely ordered set of priorities as you live your life based on God’s promises and direction.  

     Our reading is Joshua chapter 24. Joshua gathers the nation together and reviews their history with God from Abraham up to their present situation. Based on this, the people pledge their faithful to God for the future. David, in Psalm 34, also encourages us to trust in God for our future based upon his own history with the Lord.  Jesus speaks spiritually about Himself being the Bread of Life. No one understands it. No one believes it and the crowd leaves, shaking their heads and thinking that the man they wanted to be their earthly king is nuttier than a Pay Day© bar. Jesus asks the Apostles if they will also leave Him. They don’t know any more theology than the people turning away, but they know Jesus. Their history leads them to trust Him. Peter asks a perceptive question: “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have words of eternal life. We have believed and come to know that You are the Holy One of God.”  It’s all faith based on history.

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      Now the hard part: In the Christian life, faith translates into obedience. “God said it. I believe it. That settles it!” Great in theory, but the real challenge is when God tells you to do the hard thing that grates against your very fiber: like forgive your enemy, or give up a habit, or even submit to your husband. In today’s reading, Paul in his letter to the Ephesians gives a beautiful picture of how the marriage relationship mirrors the union of Christ and His Church. This passage is often resisted by the wife in this age of feminism. There’s a breakdown somewhere. It’s difficult for a woman to let herself become venerable. Can you blame her?  Look at the man she is supposed to be subordinate to. Husbands have the daunting task of loving, caring, and cherishing their wives as Jesus cares for His bride. A lot of times they’re MIA. Guys! Your wife’s submission has to be earned by a consistent Christ-like walk within your relationship. So, love her, die for her, and take out the trash!

     Bottom line is: we walk by faith not by sight. We have a personal God who does not lie or fail. We know that, in this case, past performance does indicate future outcomes. We believe that the One who has proven Himself in history can guide us through the flow of life. A door closes, another opens. A struggle comes and is overcome.  We don’t have to understand it all and we’re not going to. But, we can face life’s challenges, as they come, with confidence, knowing that the One who loved us, even to die on a cross, hasn’t brought us this far to drop us now. Where else would you even want to go? The Christian life is an adventure with God. All adventures require faith; why have faith if you can’t test it?

Mass Prep August 19th

Sunday August 19, 2018 20^th Sunday Ordinary Time (Cycle B)

Don’t Ask the Fish

The tie between today’s readings: Wisdom is a gift from God

 Psalm 34: 2-7, Proverbs 9: 1-6, Ephesians 5: 15-20, John 6: 51-58

     The first step in gaining wisdom is humility. The God who loves us has opened up “Wisdom House” (Proverbs 9) and advertises to the world to come and learn His ways…free lunch provided. Our problem is that we become more and more proud with each new technical breakthrough to make our lives longer, easier, and better. Our heads swell with “progress” as we unlock the secrets of the universe and push the Almighty into a smaller and smaller corner of irrelevance. Who needs God? He is us. Yet, despite this, no one can seem to answer the big question: If we’re so smart, why can’t we live together in peace… or even with ourselves?  Political leaders, doctors, and philosophers give their opinions and diametrically opposed solutions for our disintegrating culture, but to no avail. That’s because we have knowledge without wisdom. Knowledge is awareness that a tomato is a fruit, but we foolishly keep heaping it into our fruit salads.

     If you want to know what water is like, don’t ask the fish. (Chinese Proverb) Like the fish, we lack the objectivity to make judgments about life because we are so deeply entrenched in it. We can’t see the forest for the trees. Wisdom, the correct application of knowledge, has to come from a higher, outside cause and effect perspective. It must be true, experienced, and universal. It has to come from God. We must give up our own self important positions and submit to Him for guidance. God, from His vantage point judges even the wisest among us as foolish, but He has not left us alone to our devices.

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     The Gospel reading today, once again, illustrates the foolishness of man who can’t comprehend the wisdom of God: “Unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His blood, you have no life in yourselves.” Drilling down to the core of the issue, in a Temple sacrifice, each penitent person would eat part of the offering as a way to be intimately connected with it. The sinner is stating the he deserves the fate of the dead animal standing in for him. To eat and drink the flesh and blood of Jesus is to intimately partake in His sacrifice. You can’t have an arm’s length Communion.  You need to see yourself spiritually on the cross with Jesus as the Lamb of God who takes away YOUR sin. You eat the bread, the Body of Christ, and physically make a connection with His crucifixion. The Bible also says to present your body as a living sacrifice (Rom 12:1); in effect you’re responding to God, “This is my body which I give up for you.”  With this communion you are a part of a whole community of believers: the Church, in the power of the Holy Spirit, serving one another in Christ (Eph 5: 15-20). This mandate also goes out to the whole world as Jesus commands us to love even our enemies as we appeal to our fellow man to be reconciled to God and eat of the Bread of Life.  So Christ, the Wisdom of God, answers the deepest problems of existence, co-existence, and beyond. When you were born, God gave you this big box called “Life”. It has many wonderful and curious pieces in it. If you’re having trouble fitting the parts together, why don’t you try reading His manual? Go to Him: be humble, be wise.

Mass Prep August 12th

Sunday August 12, 2018 19^th Sunday Ordinary Time (Cycle B)

Heroes

The tie between today’s readings: Heroes come in different ways.

Psalm 34: 2-9, I Kings 19: 4-8, Ephesians 4:30-5:2, John 6:41-51

     Heroes come in many ways: our brave military personnel, firefighters who rush into burning buildings, paramedics and doctors in the ER, and even the person who runs for coffee so that we could meet a looming deadline, or at least we tell them that. God is in the hero business and He is always looking for new talent. You don’t have to be super smart. You don’t have to have lion-like courage, although heroes are braver than they think. You don’t have to be rich. You don’t even have to be in shape to be a hero. No experience necessary. You get on the job training set down by the Master. In the Bible, God gives us a template to follow as He shows Himself as a rescuing hero, a healing hero, and a sacrificial hero.  All you need is the willingness to follow His lead and step up when you’re called…and there are so many calls.

     The most familiar way that we think about God is as the rescuing hero. King David, our psalmist today, rejoices when he remembers how God delivered him from a tough spot. David was in a lot of tough spots in his life, maybe that’s why there are so many Psalms. David not only recalls his own experiences, but points to many other times when God’s saved the day for His people. God is there for the little guy when we cry out to Him, or for an entire nation facing destruction. He camps His angels around those who fear Him and rescues them. His power is unstoppable.  He always wins. But God is not all shock and awe. He has a softer side.

     God comes as the healing hero.  After a long career serving God, Elijah came off a great victory where he destroyed the prophets of Baal at Mt. Carmel. Now, he is on the run from Queen Jezebel, who has a contract out on him. Crushed with battle fatigue, Elijah sits under a tree and prays to die. God provides food for His clinically depressed servant and prepares him for the road ahead. God the healing hero knows our weaknesses and cares for us at our points of need.  He meets the believer with the promise that all things will work out for our good; giving strength and peace in the trial. He meets the unbeliever with an open hand and an invitation to be delivered from an even bigger crisis.

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     Jesus in our gospel reading shows Himself as the sacrificial hero: “I came down from heaven and give My flesh for the life of the world.” The sacrificial hero is God’s greatest role. Greater than physical healing and more profound than rescuing a nation, God makes a way for a man to escape the horrors of his own destiny: death and hell forever. The hero Jesus dies on a cross and with His Resurrection once and for all conquers these greatest enemies of mankind. Now we have a future!  By destroying everyman’s curse; Jesus becomes everyman’s hero.  We only need the faith to cry out to Him for rescue from our sins. He will save us and with this salvation He gives us new lives as children of God.

     Therefore be imitators of God, as beloved children. (Eph 5:1) Your church life isn’t supposed to be a dead end routine of rituals. Christianity is an adventure of growth and transformation of your life into the likeness of Jesus. God has a plan for you. He wants you to become like His Son and get into the family business. Die to yourself, so that you may live for others and by this earn a hearing for the Gospel.  You have His power! You have His gifts! You have His purpose! Step up! The world needs heroes.

Mass Prep August 5

Sunday August 5, 2018  18^th Sunday Ordinary Time (Cycle B)

God under contract

The tie in between today’s readings: God wants a personal relationship with you.

Psalm 78: 3-4/ 23-25/ 54, Exodus 16: 1-15, Ephesians 4: 17-24, John 6: 24-35

     

      In today’s Exodus reading, the Hebrews can’t grasp that there’s more going on than meets the eye. After 400 years of praying to be released from slavery, God responds. He plagues Egypt, parts the Red Sea, and makes polluted water drinkable in the middle of the desert. Now hungry, they’re whining about the “good old days” when they were slaves…Seriously? Instead of praying to their Redeemer God, who brought them this far, and trusting Him for help, they complain: “C’mon God, you’re slacking. You’re not meeting expectations.  Maybe we should just leave you and go back to Pharaoh.”  Complaining to God is never good; it shows contempt for the Almighty, is self-centered, and blinds you from the bigger picture. Despite the insult, God in His mercy gives quail and manna to sustain them. He sets up the Ten Commandments and the Law, whose foundational underpinning is love of God and neighbor.

     God is reaching out for a relationship, but they don’t get it. They know that they’re going to the Promised Land, but don’t know that it is a mere representation of what God really wants for them: eternal life with Him in heaven. They never understand the personal connections: grace for failure, obedience in love, forgiveness for sin, and trust in trial. All they see is a God as a boss, just another master with an agenda and rules to follow. You can tell because they are exactly like us: if we don’t like something at work, we complain to management, if we dare, and certainly murmur amongst ourselves.  So, what do you do if you don’t like what the boss is doing? Well, you try to get a better deal somewhere else. When your stomach is empty, it’s easier to go back to the devil you know than to trustingly march forward into the unknown. God had an intimate relationship with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Now, after 400 years of slavery, all that the Hebrews see is a God under contract.

     Fast forward to our gospel, which places us at the morning after Jesus feeds the 5000. Jesus and the apostles had crossed the Sea of Galilee during the night, but the crowd tracked Him down, determined to make Him their Caterer- King. Jesus’ statement sets the stage for their conversation, “You look for me not because of the sign I gave you (pointing to Him as the Messiah), but because your bellies are full. Don’t work for food that perishes. I’ll give you food which endures to eternal life.”  

      “There’s a good deal,” they’re thinking, “Food for eternal life that doesn’t spoil. What do we have to do for it, Jesus?” 

     “Nothing, it’s a gift. Just believe in Me.”

     “Well, Jesus, we don’t know…That was a good start yesterday with the fishes and loaves, but Moses fed the whole nation with manna in the desert for forty years.  We’ll give you the job if you can top that.”

     “My Father, not Moses, gave you the manna. I come from Him and He’ll give you the true bread out of heaven that will give life not just to you but the whole world.”

     “OK! You got the job, Jesus. How are you on supply?”

     “Guys, I’m talking about ME! I AM the bread of life. Come to me and hunger no more. Believe in me and never thirst.”  (Check out a similar conversation Jesus had with the woman at the well in John Chapter 4)

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    They are still stuck on God under contract, while Jesus is trying to take it up a notch and reveal a personal relationship with God that the physical bread only points to. There’s a greater need that He is trying to address: the need to be reconciled back to Him.  Just like their ancestors, Jesus’ teachings fall on deaf ears because they see with their bellies, not their souls.

     Does our situation mirror the Hebrews? Do we see God as another boss with rules that we must follow? Do we gladly and whole-heartedly participate in the worship service or do we simply endure it for an hour every Sunday (or maybe just Christmas and Easter) to keep “the boss” happy? Are we searching for a better deal?

     Be careful! You may be on the way, as Paul says in Ephesians, “being excluded from the life of God because of personal ignorance and hardness of heart.” Paul encourages you to be renewed and put on a new self in the likeness of God, a personal relationship born-again in Jesus Christ, the Bread of Life. The thing of it is this:  if God under contract thing isn’t working for you, then maybe it’s time to date the boss.

The WC

     My mother-in-law, Marianne Finnegan, passed away last July. She was a fun loving-person, who enjoyed a good joke, but could never tell one. While we were going through her belongings, we came upon this: 

A 'WC' is an English or German bathroom or Water Closet.

Some time ago, an English Lady was looking for rooms in Switzerland and asked a schoolmaster if he would recommend any. He took her to several places and, everything being arranged, she decided to take one of the rooms. 

On her way home, however, it occurred to her that she had not noticed a WATER CLOSET. She immediately wrote the schoolmaster to ask if there was a W.C. in or near the house. The Schoolmaster, upon receiving the letter, was baffled, for he did not understand the abbreviation W.C. 

Finally he asked the parish priest to help him. Together they tried to find out what the lady meant and concluded that she meant a "Wayside Chapel". So they wrote her the following letter. 

Dear Madam: 

I have the pleasure to inform you that the W.C. is situated only nine miles away from the house in the center of a beautiful grove of trees and surrounded by beautiful and magnificent scenery. It is capable of holding 25 people. 

It is open Tuesday, Thursday, and Sundays of each week. There are a good number who go during the summer months. I would advise you to go there early if you want a good seat, although there is plenty of standing room. This is an unfortunate position, especially if you are in the habit of going regularly. 

No doubt you will be glad to know that a number of people take their lunch with them and make a day of it, while others who cannot spare the time travel by car and arrive there just in time. I would advise your ladyship to go on Thursday because there is an organ accompaniment on that day. The surroundings are really excellent and even the most delicate sounds are audible. 

It may interest you to know that our daughter was married in the W.C. and as a matter of fact, that is where she first met her husband. I remember well the rush for seats on that particular day. There were exactly 10 people on the seat I usually occupy. 

It was wonderful to watch the changing expressions on their faces. A wealthy resident of the district recently donated a bell for the W.C., which rings each time you enter it.

My wife is rather delicate and cannot go regularly. It's been more than six months since she last went. Naturally, it pains her very much not to be able to go more often. 

I shall be glad to save a seat for you. 

Yours Truly. 

     I remember when my wife read this out loud to us and we couldn't stop laughing. We live on in the hearts of the people we touch. Mom you will always be with us; laughter and tears.

Mass Prep July 29

Sunday July 29, 2018  17^th Sunday Ordinary Time (Cycle B)

The God of creation…in creation…and re-creation

The tie in between today’s readings:  Praise is forever.

Psalm 145: 10-18, 2 Kings 4:42-44, Ephesians 4:1-6, John 6:1-15

                

     Praise: The act of expressing approval or the offering of grateful homage in word or song as an act of worship. Psalm 145 is electrical with the excitement of praising God. There is plenty of material to work with. Throughout creation, from the smallest atom to the biggest star, we find out the more you know, the more there is to know. The most brilliant among us often end their seminars with: “we’ve just scratched the surface,” but there is jaw-dropping wonder even in that scratch. If you take time to contemplate the Amazing Creator behind the world that you see, then your praise of God’s handiwork will never end. Yet that’s only His fingerprint…there’s more!

     

     Today, in our readings, we see an impossible task in 2 Kings and the Gospel of John; that can only be solved by a miracle. Remember this:  the Almighty doesn’t do tricks. Along with the physical events, miracles in the Bible have a potent message. God presents the apostle and us with a “crisis of lack”. We all know it: not enough time, not enough talent, not enough money. We’d like to have more faith, but we’re afraid we’d be consumed in the process. We know that a sparrow doesn’t hit the ground without our heavenly Father knowing it…but it still hits the ground.  Jesus, there’s not enough fish, not enough bread…send them away. We fail. In feeding the 5000, God shows that He is aware of our needs and is not bound by limits. We must learn to stop compromising the right thing to do for the sake of the safe thing to do and step out in faith…well baby steps, anyway.  Scripture, miracles, and crisis are used to grow our faith. We give God all that we have as we ask Him to fill in what’s lacking in our lives to shape our personalities, our family, and society, to the praise and glory of His name.

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     The biggest miracle of all is God in re-creation. God made the universe with just a few words. Multiply some bread…no sweat. But to redeem mankind took an incarnation, a crucifixion and a resurrection. The greatest act of God is the born again person. By the transforming power of the cross God shares His intimate Self with us. Grace, mercy, forgiveness beckons us to a new life with the God who loves us. People who before would be at each other’s throats are now brothers! In Ephesians 4: 1-6 we see the fruits of the Holy Spirit: love, humility, and tolerance as evidence of a new personal relationship with the Divine. He offers this salvation to you even now. Take Him up on it. Leave your sins at the cross. Give your life to Jesus. He’ll make you a new person.

     God makes Himself known in creation, socially and intimately. We get lost in the wonder of Him with only the little glimpse that we have. So get excited!  In heaven we will see Him face to face! He will reveal more about Himself to us than we can handle. The explosion of thanksgiving, worship and praise will blow our minds, as we try to take it all in! What we’re headed for is greater than all the rock concerts, sporting events or political rallies ever! The beatific vision awaits…buckle up.