During these days of the Christmas Octave, I won't have any homilies to post. Because I have three different homilies to give--Christmas Midnight, Christmas Day, and Holy Family--all in the span of about three days, I just don't have the time nor the ganas to go through my usual composition and editing process.
This is actually pretty dangerous, because it's when you don't prepare well that you end up preaching too long and too randomly. One of my favorite quotes to apply to homiletic preparation is from Antoine de Saint Exupéry: “A designer knows he has achieved perfection not when there is nothing left to add, but when there is nothing left to take away."
That's my definition of elegance. It's good to keep in mind when it comes to the curious intersection of theological reflection, salesmanship, and theater that is preaching in the assembled Body of Christ. You don't want to be one of those priests who suffer from the dreaded 'banana problem,' named for the little girl who said, "I know how to spell 'banana,' but I don't know when to stop."
Friday, December 26, 2008
Saturday, December 20, 2008
The New Temple
(4th Sunday of Advent, B)
The first reading we hear today from the second book of Samuel contains two momentous events in the history of the people of God: First, we hear the beginning of the reflection that will lead to the construction of the great Temple of Solomon in Jerusalem. Second, we hear David the king receive the everlasting, royal covenant from God. These two great moments in the history of salvation help us to understand what God is doing in the human birth of his Son, the annunciation of which we hear in today’s Gospel.
By the time of king David, the people of God had settled down. David had captured Jerusalem and united the people. As the Scripture says, David notices that he lives in a palace, while the Ark of the Covenant—the presence of God for the Israelites—continues to dwell in a tent, as it had when the people were in the desert. So David starts to think that he should build a kind of palace for God, a temple where prayer and sacrifices can be offered. But the word of God that comes back to David through the prophet Nathan is a little ambivalent. God says, “…should you build me a house to dwell in?” As God also says through the prophet Isaiah, “What kind of house can you build for me?” In fact, God turns the reflection around on David, and says that it is God who will build David a house, by which God means that he will establish David’s dynasty in everlasting grace and favor. This is the royal and everlasting covenant.
Now we know from history that the Temple did get built eventually, not by David but by his son Solomon. David, who, as you remember, who made himself a conspirator to murder in order to commit adultery, didn’t turn out to be God’s man for the job. But Solomon was, and he built the great Temple of Jerusalem. It stood for a few hundred years until it was destroyed by Nebuchadnezzar II of Babylon in the year 586 B.C. Two generations later, when the Jews returned from the Exile, the Temple was rebuilt. This Second Temple stood in Jerusalem for another five hundred years until it was destroyed by the Romans in 70 A.D, around the time the gospels were being written.
So what does all this ancient history mean for Christmas, much less for us? A lot, I think. The birth of the Son of God, Jesus Christ, is the fulfillment of God’s promise in the first reading. It is not us who build a house for God, but God who builds a house, a Temple, for us. Think of the very end of the Bible, the two last chapters of the book of Revelation. The New Jerusalem descends from heaven and is joined to the earth. But the narrator notices that this New Jerusalem doesn’t seem to have a Temple. What gives? As Revelation says, God himself and the Lamb are the Temple. So now, as Jesus is born, the new and eternal Temple of God appears. Remember, what is a temple? It’s a place where prayer and sacrifice are offered to God, and in his incarnate life, the Son of God becomes this Temple for the world, offering prayer to the Father on our behalf and becoming on the Cross not only the Temple where sacrifice is offered but the perfect sacrifice itself.
In his Risen Body, Christ continues to do this through the ages. His Risen Body is the Temple where prayer and sacrifice is offered to God. And where is this Risen Body? It is us, brothers and sisters, all of us gathered together by our baptism into Christ’s death and our Holy Communion with his risen Body in this Eucharist. In this we are made into God’s house in the fulfillment of his promise to David. And we become the Temple where sacrifice is offered to God. That means that all the joys and pains, the sufferings and the loves of our lives are consecrated through Christ and offered to God. That’s the good news of Christmas; that by the Word becoming flesh, our humanity is given the opportunity to live in communion with God, such that everything about our lives becomes a consecrated and holy sacrifice, pleasing to God in every way.
The first reading we hear today from the second book of Samuel contains two momentous events in the history of the people of God: First, we hear the beginning of the reflection that will lead to the construction of the great Temple of Solomon in Jerusalem. Second, we hear David the king receive the everlasting, royal covenant from God. These two great moments in the history of salvation help us to understand what God is doing in the human birth of his Son, the annunciation of which we hear in today’s Gospel.
By the time of king David, the people of God had settled down. David had captured Jerusalem and united the people. As the Scripture says, David notices that he lives in a palace, while the Ark of the Covenant—the presence of God for the Israelites—continues to dwell in a tent, as it had when the people were in the desert. So David starts to think that he should build a kind of palace for God, a temple where prayer and sacrifices can be offered. But the word of God that comes back to David through the prophet Nathan is a little ambivalent. God says, “…should you build me a house to dwell in?” As God also says through the prophet Isaiah, “What kind of house can you build for me?” In fact, God turns the reflection around on David, and says that it is God who will build David a house, by which God means that he will establish David’s dynasty in everlasting grace and favor. This is the royal and everlasting covenant.
Now we know from history that the Temple did get built eventually, not by David but by his son Solomon. David, who, as you remember, who made himself a conspirator to murder in order to commit adultery, didn’t turn out to be God’s man for the job. But Solomon was, and he built the great Temple of Jerusalem. It stood for a few hundred years until it was destroyed by Nebuchadnezzar II of Babylon in the year 586 B.C. Two generations later, when the Jews returned from the Exile, the Temple was rebuilt. This Second Temple stood in Jerusalem for another five hundred years until it was destroyed by the Romans in 70 A.D, around the time the gospels were being written.
So what does all this ancient history mean for Christmas, much less for us? A lot, I think. The birth of the Son of God, Jesus Christ, is the fulfillment of God’s promise in the first reading. It is not us who build a house for God, but God who builds a house, a Temple, for us. Think of the very end of the Bible, the two last chapters of the book of Revelation. The New Jerusalem descends from heaven and is joined to the earth. But the narrator notices that this New Jerusalem doesn’t seem to have a Temple. What gives? As Revelation says, God himself and the Lamb are the Temple. So now, as Jesus is born, the new and eternal Temple of God appears. Remember, what is a temple? It’s a place where prayer and sacrifice are offered to God, and in his incarnate life, the Son of God becomes this Temple for the world, offering prayer to the Father on our behalf and becoming on the Cross not only the Temple where sacrifice is offered but the perfect sacrifice itself.
In his Risen Body, Christ continues to do this through the ages. His Risen Body is the Temple where prayer and sacrifice is offered to God. And where is this Risen Body? It is us, brothers and sisters, all of us gathered together by our baptism into Christ’s death and our Holy Communion with his risen Body in this Eucharist. In this we are made into God’s house in the fulfillment of his promise to David. And we become the Temple where sacrifice is offered to God. That means that all the joys and pains, the sufferings and the loves of our lives are consecrated through Christ and offered to God. That’s the good news of Christmas; that by the Word becoming flesh, our humanity is given the opportunity to live in communion with God, such that everything about our lives becomes a consecrated and holy sacrifice, pleasing to God in every way.
Saturday, December 13, 2008
Clothed and Adorned
(Gaudete Sunday, B)
In the midst of this season of “joyful expectation” we arrive at this especially joyful day, the third Sunday of Advent, traditionally called Gaudete Sunday. This name comes from traditional entrance antiphon for today, Gaudéte in Dómino semper: íterum dico, gaudéte. Dóminus enim prope est, which sings St. Paul’s imperative from the fourth chapter of Philippians: “Rejoice in the Lord always. Again I say, rejoice. The Lord is near!”
And that is exactly why we are invited into this mood of rejoicing today, because the Lord is near. But why should we be so happy about the arrival of the Lord in the coming feast of his Nativity? The second part of the reading we hear from the prophet Isaiah says it all: God “has clothed me with a robe of salvation and wrapped me in a mantle of justice.” Listen to force of these verbs! ‘Clothed me,’ ‘wrapped me,’ as Isaiah says, made beautiful as a bride. Who is he talking about? It’s us, brothers and sisters. For when the Son of God is born as one of us, in our humanity, yours and mine, our humanity is clothed with the blessing of God, wrapped in salvation, and restored to the original beauty God has meant for us all. That’s the good news of Christmas; not just the miracle of the Word made flesh, but all the miracles of our humanity being lifted up to God. As the priest says when he prepares the chalice, “Through the mystery of this water and wine, may we come to share the divinity of Christ who humbled himself to share in our humanity.” The Son of God becomes flesh in order to establish a union between our humanity and God. It is us who are given the opportunity of changing from water into wine, friends.
This is the great work of God of which our religion is meant to be a celebration. As St. Paul puts it in the second reading today: “May the God of peace make you perfectly holy and may you entirely, spirit, soul, and body, be preserved blameless for the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. The one who calls you is faithful, and he will also accomplish it.” This is God’s passion and desire—to take on our humanity in the Incarnation, so as to lift us up to perfect holiness. Too often we think of holiness as something we have to accomplish by our own agonistic effort. No! As Paul says, it is God who will make us holy and prepare us for the end and goal and purpose of creation. By uniting himself to us in the Lord whose human birth we will soon celebrate, all of the holiness of God becomes available to our human nature.
So rejoice, brothers and sisters. And if this time of year finds us a little more tired or even a little more blue, be encouraged. The true Light to which John the Baptist witnessed is coming into the world. In whatever darkness we find in our own hearts or our own families or in our society, let us fix our gaze on this Light that is coming into the world. The mystery of Christmas teaches us that it is in these places of darkness that the Light wants to be born. This Light from Light—as we say in the Creed—is the hope for each of us. For God’s great work of uniting himself to us in Christ means that we will be clothed in comfort and wrapped in salvation.
In the midst of this season of “joyful expectation” we arrive at this especially joyful day, the third Sunday of Advent, traditionally called Gaudete Sunday. This name comes from traditional entrance antiphon for today, Gaudéte in Dómino semper: íterum dico, gaudéte. Dóminus enim prope est, which sings St. Paul’s imperative from the fourth chapter of Philippians: “Rejoice in the Lord always. Again I say, rejoice. The Lord is near!”
And that is exactly why we are invited into this mood of rejoicing today, because the Lord is near. But why should we be so happy about the arrival of the Lord in the coming feast of his Nativity? The second part of the reading we hear from the prophet Isaiah says it all: God “has clothed me with a robe of salvation and wrapped me in a mantle of justice.” Listen to force of these verbs! ‘Clothed me,’ ‘wrapped me,’ as Isaiah says, made beautiful as a bride. Who is he talking about? It’s us, brothers and sisters. For when the Son of God is born as one of us, in our humanity, yours and mine, our humanity is clothed with the blessing of God, wrapped in salvation, and restored to the original beauty God has meant for us all. That’s the good news of Christmas; not just the miracle of the Word made flesh, but all the miracles of our humanity being lifted up to God. As the priest says when he prepares the chalice, “Through the mystery of this water and wine, may we come to share the divinity of Christ who humbled himself to share in our humanity.” The Son of God becomes flesh in order to establish a union between our humanity and God. It is us who are given the opportunity of changing from water into wine, friends.
This is the great work of God of which our religion is meant to be a celebration. As St. Paul puts it in the second reading today: “May the God of peace make you perfectly holy and may you entirely, spirit, soul, and body, be preserved blameless for the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. The one who calls you is faithful, and he will also accomplish it.” This is God’s passion and desire—to take on our humanity in the Incarnation, so as to lift us up to perfect holiness. Too often we think of holiness as something we have to accomplish by our own agonistic effort. No! As Paul says, it is God who will make us holy and prepare us for the end and goal and purpose of creation. By uniting himself to us in the Lord whose human birth we will soon celebrate, all of the holiness of God becomes available to our human nature.
So rejoice, brothers and sisters. And if this time of year finds us a little more tired or even a little more blue, be encouraged. The true Light to which John the Baptist witnessed is coming into the world. In whatever darkness we find in our own hearts or our own families or in our society, let us fix our gaze on this Light that is coming into the world. The mystery of Christmas teaches us that it is in these places of darkness that the Light wants to be born. This Light from Light—as we say in the Creed—is the hope for each of us. For God’s great work of uniting himself to us in Christ means that we will be clothed in comfort and wrapped in salvation.
Saturday, December 6, 2008
Think Again
(2nd Sunday of Advent, B)
“The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ the Son of God!”
So St. Mark begins his gospel, which we will be reading over the course of the coming year. “The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ the Son of God.” And how does this gospel, this “good news” begin? It begins with the appearance of the Forerunner. This is John the Baptist, who fulfills the prophecy of Isaiah that a cry of repentance will precede the appearance of the strong arm of God which will be the comfort of God’s people. We know that this arm with which God reaches out to us is our Lord Jesus Christ. And we know that the Comfort Isaiah prophesied is the coming of the Comforter himself, the Holy Spirit.
John the Baptist prepared the way for the Lord by proclaiming a “baptism of repentance.” This word we translate ‘repentance’ is one of the great New Testament terms—metanoia. It means, perhaps more literally, ‘to think again,’ ‘to have second thoughts,’ or even ‘to change your mind.’ Those who thought again and changed their minds received the baptism of John for the forgiveness of sins, and Jesus himself receives it on our behalf, with the humanity he had borrowed from us through our most Blessed Mother. Having repented through John’s baptism, the people were prepared to hear the good news of the arriving Kingdom of God.
As it was then, so it is now, as we prepare once again for the coming of the Lord. Each us is called to repentance, to have second thoughts about our selfish ways, to change our minds, bending them once again to God. Each of us is also called to the vocation of the Forerunner, to the work of John the Baptist. We are to proclaim the need for repentance, the need to think again, in the wilderness of the unbelief of our culture and the despair and depression of our secular society. By our own repentance we are to prepare a place for the Light from Light to be conceived anew in our own hearts. And by the proclamation of the coming Lord through how we live our lives, we cry out to the world around us its need to do the same.
We know well that the reward and the end of this work is the full baptism that Jesus brings, the baptism with the Holy Spirit which we have received in Christ. And our prayer and our hope during this Advent is that the whole world will be plunged into baptism with the Holy Spirit, that all creation might emerge as a full and complete Resurrection.
“The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ the Son of God!”
So St. Mark begins his gospel, which we will be reading over the course of the coming year. “The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ the Son of God.” And how does this gospel, this “good news” begin? It begins with the appearance of the Forerunner. This is John the Baptist, who fulfills the prophecy of Isaiah that a cry of repentance will precede the appearance of the strong arm of God which will be the comfort of God’s people. We know that this arm with which God reaches out to us is our Lord Jesus Christ. And we know that the Comfort Isaiah prophesied is the coming of the Comforter himself, the Holy Spirit.
John the Baptist prepared the way for the Lord by proclaiming a “baptism of repentance.” This word we translate ‘repentance’ is one of the great New Testament terms—metanoia. It means, perhaps more literally, ‘to think again,’ ‘to have second thoughts,’ or even ‘to change your mind.’ Those who thought again and changed their minds received the baptism of John for the forgiveness of sins, and Jesus himself receives it on our behalf, with the humanity he had borrowed from us through our most Blessed Mother. Having repented through John’s baptism, the people were prepared to hear the good news of the arriving Kingdom of God.
As it was then, so it is now, as we prepare once again for the coming of the Lord. Each us is called to repentance, to have second thoughts about our selfish ways, to change our minds, bending them once again to God. Each of us is also called to the vocation of the Forerunner, to the work of John the Baptist. We are to proclaim the need for repentance, the need to think again, in the wilderness of the unbelief of our culture and the despair and depression of our secular society. By our own repentance we are to prepare a place for the Light from Light to be conceived anew in our own hearts. And by the proclamation of the coming Lord through how we live our lives, we cry out to the world around us its need to do the same.
We know well that the reward and the end of this work is the full baptism that Jesus brings, the baptism with the Holy Spirit which we have received in Christ. And our prayer and our hope during this Advent is that the whole world will be plunged into baptism with the Holy Spirit, that all creation might emerge as a full and complete Resurrection.
Saturday, November 29, 2008
Shhh!
(1st Sunday of Advent, B)
Many times we hear and we act like this short season of Advent is a time of ‘waiting and preparation for Christmas.’ But that’s only part of the story. Yes, Advent is the time when we await the arrival of the Lord, and so this certainly means that we use this time to prepare ourselves to recall his first coming to us in his Nativity in Bethlehem. But just as we look back to the Lord’s historical birth, we also look forward to his arrival again at the end of time, the Second Coming. So the Advent season has this double character; we look back and prepare to celebrate Jesus’ birth among us in history, but we also look forward to the Arrival that will mark the fulfillment and the goal of history and creation.
In fact, during this time of Advent I think we reflect and dwell on the nature of God as just that, adventitious. Our God is a God who arrives, who appears, who comes to dwell in our lives. I think we’ve all had the spiritual experience of suddenly becoming aware of God’s presence or action in the midst of a difficult situation, or maybe in a moment of quiet and solitude. This is the arriving God. I think we experience God this way because we exist in time, but God is eternal. So there is no before or after with God; there is nothing that God is doing tomorrow that he is not doing now. With God there is only a Now, a nunc stans¸ as the scholastic theologians liked to say.
This is why the presence of God of God always seems new and fresh, and is refreshing for the soul, because God is always Now. This arriving presence in our hearts is the real desire of our souls—a desire we so often squander on things that are less than God and will not satisfy. We get this in the reading from Isaiah we hear today—he is the great prophet of Advent because he is the prophet of longing for the renewal of the presence of God among his people. He cries out, “Return, for the sake of your servants.” That’s the real desire at the root of our humanity, the longing for the presence of God.
This presence of God which arrives in the soul is the soul’s true giftedness, as we hear today from St. Paul. It is God’s desire to come and dwell in our hearts and minds, if only we will prepare a place for him. When we do, we open ourselves up to a spiritual giftedness and will make us ready that day when the Lord himself returns in glory.
So as Jesus commands in the gospel today, let us watch. Let us quiet down our voices and our thoughts, so that we might be alert in prayer to the arrival of the Lord of our lives, ready to greet him when we comes to make his home in us. The mysterious and eternal God who is beyond anything we can say and more than anything we can think, seeks a dwelling in each human life, and wants to become the peace and giftedness of each soul. Let’s begin again, for the first time, to wait for the God who wants to speak the Word of his own self from within each of us.
Many times we hear and we act like this short season of Advent is a time of ‘waiting and preparation for Christmas.’ But that’s only part of the story. Yes, Advent is the time when we await the arrival of the Lord, and so this certainly means that we use this time to prepare ourselves to recall his first coming to us in his Nativity in Bethlehem. But just as we look back to the Lord’s historical birth, we also look forward to his arrival again at the end of time, the Second Coming. So the Advent season has this double character; we look back and prepare to celebrate Jesus’ birth among us in history, but we also look forward to the Arrival that will mark the fulfillment and the goal of history and creation.
In fact, during this time of Advent I think we reflect and dwell on the nature of God as just that, adventitious. Our God is a God who arrives, who appears, who comes to dwell in our lives. I think we’ve all had the spiritual experience of suddenly becoming aware of God’s presence or action in the midst of a difficult situation, or maybe in a moment of quiet and solitude. This is the arriving God. I think we experience God this way because we exist in time, but God is eternal. So there is no before or after with God; there is nothing that God is doing tomorrow that he is not doing now. With God there is only a Now, a nunc stans¸ as the scholastic theologians liked to say.
This is why the presence of God of God always seems new and fresh, and is refreshing for the soul, because God is always Now. This arriving presence in our hearts is the real desire of our souls—a desire we so often squander on things that are less than God and will not satisfy. We get this in the reading from Isaiah we hear today—he is the great prophet of Advent because he is the prophet of longing for the renewal of the presence of God among his people. He cries out, “Return, for the sake of your servants.” That’s the real desire at the root of our humanity, the longing for the presence of God.
This presence of God which arrives in the soul is the soul’s true giftedness, as we hear today from St. Paul. It is God’s desire to come and dwell in our hearts and minds, if only we will prepare a place for him. When we do, we open ourselves up to a spiritual giftedness and will make us ready that day when the Lord himself returns in glory.
So as Jesus commands in the gospel today, let us watch. Let us quiet down our voices and our thoughts, so that we might be alert in prayer to the arrival of the Lord of our lives, ready to greet him when we comes to make his home in us. The mysterious and eternal God who is beyond anything we can say and more than anything we can think, seeks a dwelling in each human life, and wants to become the peace and giftedness of each soul. Let’s begin again, for the first time, to wait for the God who wants to speak the Word of his own self from within each of us.
Saturday, November 22, 2008
Destination and Destiny
(Christ the King, A)
The cosmic kingship of Christ is the end of the world. ‘End’ not so much in terms of a terminal point—though it is that too—but ‘end’ in the sense of purpose. That the kingdom of God in which Christ reigns forever should become complete and extend to every human soul and every other part of creation is the point and purpose of everything God has ever done.
We start to get a sense of this in the second reading we hear today from St. Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians. “…in Christ all shall be brought to life, but each in proper order.” This is the process of creation moving toward its final goal of all being brought to eternal life. Christ was first at his Resurrection; his rising to new life is like a kind of preview of the world to come. As Paul says, then those who belong to Christ will be raised as well. When this resurrection of the world reaches completion, then even the final enemy, death, will be destroyed and Christ will reign supreme, and, as Paul says, “God will be all in all.” That’s the reign of Christ the King.
This is about destiny! The full and final reign of Christ is the “life of the world to come” we proclaim in the creed, when the eternal life which we now enjoy obscurely comes to rule every heart and mind and all creation is rolled back into the Original Blessing we call God. This is the fulfillment for which all the prophets hoped, just as Ezekiel in the first reading today looks forward to that divine shepherd who would gather those who are scattered, injured, lost, or sick. This is what God is doing for us in Christ; by pouring his own infinite goodness into our humanity through the Incarnation of Jesus Christ, God offers us a path to safety and healing from all the injuries and misery we have brought upon ourselves with our sins.
In the meantime, brothers and sisters, God not only invites but commands us to become part of this movement towards the final fulfillment of creation. We are not in the situation of the nations who stand before God in St. Matthew’s vision of the Last Judgment—the nations who didn’t know that they were or were not serving Christ in the least of their brothers and sisters. We who are Christians know that on account of the Incarnation of the Eternal Word and the Passion of our Lord Jesus Christ, the presence of God is to be found in suffering and needy humanity. We are not ignorant like the nations who are judged in the Gospel we hear today. Instead, we are gifted with the eyes of faith that can see the broken body of Christ in the least of our brothers and sisters, and God calls us to serve him in them and so join in the real history of the world, which is the movement toward the fullness of the kingship of Christ.
This is where the world is going, to the fullness of love in which the Resurrection of Christ comes to encompass all the hurt, lost, and broken of our world. Let’s join in.
The cosmic kingship of Christ is the end of the world. ‘End’ not so much in terms of a terminal point—though it is that too—but ‘end’ in the sense of purpose. That the kingdom of God in which Christ reigns forever should become complete and extend to every human soul and every other part of creation is the point and purpose of everything God has ever done.
We start to get a sense of this in the second reading we hear today from St. Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians. “…in Christ all shall be brought to life, but each in proper order.” This is the process of creation moving toward its final goal of all being brought to eternal life. Christ was first at his Resurrection; his rising to new life is like a kind of preview of the world to come. As Paul says, then those who belong to Christ will be raised as well. When this resurrection of the world reaches completion, then even the final enemy, death, will be destroyed and Christ will reign supreme, and, as Paul says, “God will be all in all.” That’s the reign of Christ the King.
This is about destiny! The full and final reign of Christ is the “life of the world to come” we proclaim in the creed, when the eternal life which we now enjoy obscurely comes to rule every heart and mind and all creation is rolled back into the Original Blessing we call God. This is the fulfillment for which all the prophets hoped, just as Ezekiel in the first reading today looks forward to that divine shepherd who would gather those who are scattered, injured, lost, or sick. This is what God is doing for us in Christ; by pouring his own infinite goodness into our humanity through the Incarnation of Jesus Christ, God offers us a path to safety and healing from all the injuries and misery we have brought upon ourselves with our sins.
In the meantime, brothers and sisters, God not only invites but commands us to become part of this movement towards the final fulfillment of creation. We are not in the situation of the nations who stand before God in St. Matthew’s vision of the Last Judgment—the nations who didn’t know that they were or were not serving Christ in the least of their brothers and sisters. We who are Christians know that on account of the Incarnation of the Eternal Word and the Passion of our Lord Jesus Christ, the presence of God is to be found in suffering and needy humanity. We are not ignorant like the nations who are judged in the Gospel we hear today. Instead, we are gifted with the eyes of faith that can see the broken body of Christ in the least of our brothers and sisters, and God calls us to serve him in them and so join in the real history of the world, which is the movement toward the fullness of the kingship of Christ.
This is where the world is going, to the fullness of love in which the Resurrection of Christ comes to encompass all the hurt, lost, and broken of our world. Let’s join in.
Saturday, November 15, 2008
The Optimistic Investor
(33rd Sunday in Ordinary Time, A)
The parable we hear today from St. Matthew is one of those parables in which we usually jump too quickly to an examination of ourselves. As soon as we hear it we begin to judge ourselves morally to see how well we are doing with the resources that God has entrusted to us. But when we begin our self-examination right away, we miss a lot. We’ll get to all that, but first let’s bracket ourselves off and take the time to notice the image of God presented by the man in the parable, and the attitudes of God that are imagined through his relationships with his servants.
I don’t prefer the traditional title for this passage, the “parable of the talents,” but instead I like to call it the parable of the optimistic investor. The man entrusts his servants in the parable with a huge amount of money; the talent was a unit of both weight and currency in the ancient world. Now nobody is exactly sure how much it was. One commentator I read said that it might be about fifteen years’ worth of wages for an ordinary worker. Another said that a talent would be about a cubic foot of gold or silver. So in any case we’re talking about a lot of money. And this is the first part of the image of God we should notice; God has entrusted to each of us resources of tremendous value. Indeed, God has invested in us, in our humanity, the divine life of his only Son. Through our baptism into Christ’s death and Resurrection and through our Holy Communion with his humanity in this Eucharist, God has invested each of us with his own divine Presence. In fact, God has poured out his own infinitely loving and refreshing Self into our humanity. That’s the good news of the Incarnation, and the ultimate blessing each of us has received as members of Christ’s body.
Just like the man in the parable, God looks forward to a return on his investment. It is God’s delight to see us taking the gift of God within and making it flourish in the particular circumstances of our relationships and our lives. This is what we do as Christians; we strive to become vehicles for the grace of God, bringing the caring, gentle, reconciling love of God to all that we do and giving it a chance to grow and increase in the world around us. Notice what the man in the parable says when he settles accounts with the first servant, the one who had doubled his money: “Come, share your master’s joy.” This is the God who is delighted when we take the presence of Christ within us and allow it to flourish in our families, our jobs, and our communities.
But we also have to keep in mind that though heaven rejoices when we make God’s investment in us grow, this is not just an invitation. God does not invite us to make his goodness and holiness multiply in the world; he commands us to do so. God is demanding! See how the man treated the servant who buried his talent in fear. That servant was condemned pretty harshly. Is this unfair? Well, no, because as we were told in the beginning of the parable, each servant was given a sum to work with “according to his ability.” From this we know that the servant who was given the one talent could have done something with it, but he didn’t.
So it is with God. God invests his own divine life within us according to each one’s ability. The presence and blessing of God that each of us has is tailored and meant for the particular creation that each of us is. It is up to us to take the saving, reconciling, and renewing presence of God that he has placed within us and use it to build up the people and the world around us in love. This is what it means to be the body of Christ we become in this Eucharist, and to participate in God’s great work of lifting up all creation in the Resurrection of Christ.
The parable we hear today from St. Matthew is one of those parables in which we usually jump too quickly to an examination of ourselves. As soon as we hear it we begin to judge ourselves morally to see how well we are doing with the resources that God has entrusted to us. But when we begin our self-examination right away, we miss a lot. We’ll get to all that, but first let’s bracket ourselves off and take the time to notice the image of God presented by the man in the parable, and the attitudes of God that are imagined through his relationships with his servants.
I don’t prefer the traditional title for this passage, the “parable of the talents,” but instead I like to call it the parable of the optimistic investor. The man entrusts his servants in the parable with a huge amount of money; the talent was a unit of both weight and currency in the ancient world. Now nobody is exactly sure how much it was. One commentator I read said that it might be about fifteen years’ worth of wages for an ordinary worker. Another said that a talent would be about a cubic foot of gold or silver. So in any case we’re talking about a lot of money. And this is the first part of the image of God we should notice; God has entrusted to each of us resources of tremendous value. Indeed, God has invested in us, in our humanity, the divine life of his only Son. Through our baptism into Christ’s death and Resurrection and through our Holy Communion with his humanity in this Eucharist, God has invested each of us with his own divine Presence. In fact, God has poured out his own infinitely loving and refreshing Self into our humanity. That’s the good news of the Incarnation, and the ultimate blessing each of us has received as members of Christ’s body.
Just like the man in the parable, God looks forward to a return on his investment. It is God’s delight to see us taking the gift of God within and making it flourish in the particular circumstances of our relationships and our lives. This is what we do as Christians; we strive to become vehicles for the grace of God, bringing the caring, gentle, reconciling love of God to all that we do and giving it a chance to grow and increase in the world around us. Notice what the man in the parable says when he settles accounts with the first servant, the one who had doubled his money: “Come, share your master’s joy.” This is the God who is delighted when we take the presence of Christ within us and allow it to flourish in our families, our jobs, and our communities.
But we also have to keep in mind that though heaven rejoices when we make God’s investment in us grow, this is not just an invitation. God does not invite us to make his goodness and holiness multiply in the world; he commands us to do so. God is demanding! See how the man treated the servant who buried his talent in fear. That servant was condemned pretty harshly. Is this unfair? Well, no, because as we were told in the beginning of the parable, each servant was given a sum to work with “according to his ability.” From this we know that the servant who was given the one talent could have done something with it, but he didn’t.
So it is with God. God invests his own divine life within us according to each one’s ability. The presence and blessing of God that each of us has is tailored and meant for the particular creation that each of us is. It is up to us to take the saving, reconciling, and renewing presence of God that he has placed within us and use it to build up the people and the world around us in love. This is what it means to be the body of Christ we become in this Eucharist, and to participate in God’s great work of lifting up all creation in the Resurrection of Christ.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)