Back to normal and then on vacation

I'm hoping to have some deeper posts this week because I'll be on vacation. I'm actually really hoping to relax without a lot of responsibilities. It's spring break here at Iowa State and I'm hoping to take full advantage of it. I'm sorry that I haven't been posting well but the heart of the semester is over and now I'm hoping to get bck to more frequently posting. I hope all is well with you.

Being "in the zone"

I read the readings for this Sunday and thought that the connection between all three is that moment when you are startled out of the "normalness" of life. Moses, on the mountain, sees an oddity, a bush that is burning but not consumed. Some of Jesus' more arrogant followers thought that those people over there deserved their tragedy and didn't realize that they too could have been. Even Paul thought had to tell his followers that they can't take consolation in knowing the revelation of Jesus Christ. They have to live the revelation they've received.

One of the things we have that pulls us out of our illusions of "the zone" is the sacrament of reconciliation. It forces us to acknowledge that we make mistakes, that we aren't perfect. We are fallible and God loves us most when we recognize that.

The transfiguration of our bodies

Who's the most beautiful person in America? Every year, People Magazine publishes its list of the top 100 best-looking people. Last year, Angelina Jolie number one but it seems like we all know the profile of the person even before the results are released. The person is, usually, a woman because, in general, women are better looking than men. The person is probably going to be thin, without any blemishes, whether humanly done like tattoos, body piercings, or unusual hair cuts, sorry Brittany, or natural blemishes like a birth mark, mole, or deformed ear. The person is probably a celebrity, either in movies or television. And society is fixated with youth. It prizes attributes like hairless chests on men and wrinkleless faces on women. And, it is interesting to note when society conveys its double message to "be yourself" and “fit into the above stereotypes”. So, on the one hand, we hear that we shouldn’t conform to anyone else's stereotypes as to looks or expression but, instead, carve out our own look and, simultaneously, we should be thin, perfect, and young in order to be beautiful.

This becomes, then, very frustrating for those of us who aren’t thin, young, hairless, wrinkle-free celebrities. Of course, the solution we hear from our society is simple. Go dye your hair. Get liposuction or staple your stomach. Shave your body or, even better, wax it. And, of course, use oil of Olay to get rid of all those nasty wrinkles. Then you will be beautiful just like the rest of society and, finally, be able to be yourself. What a relief.

If you were to say what Catholicism believes to the most beautiful attributes of a person, what would they be? In other words, who should we, Christians, say is beautiful? We can probably all agree that we aren't going to base our opinions on outward appearances, right? Despite all the depictions of Jesus on the cross with six pack abs and that great picture of surfer Jesus with wind blown hair, we can probably all agree that Christianity isn’t known for a photogenic imperative. I mean, hopefully no one is going to say that we need a team of "experts" to come running into the Vatican to do a makeover. Well, in the gospel today, it could seem like Jesus thought he needed a makeover. On the eighth day, he takes his friends to go off to pray on a mountain. As is typical, they get sleepy and decide to take a nap in the middle of prayer. They'll do that again in the garden so they're just practicing here. While they nap, Jesus' face changes and his clothes become dazzlingly white. And then, Moses and Elijah are there. But, in truth, we aren't looking at anything as simple as a makeover. Peter and the brothers awake, they are given a vision of what it will be like in heaven. In truth, they are seeing heaven on earth. They even get to hear God's voice, just like at Jesus' baptism, declare Jesus to be God's son with the mandate to listen to him. The scene is so overwhelming the Peter doesn't want to leave it. He wants to set up some booths to keep Moses and Elijah from going back to heaven. Yet, he will know later that it is not the right time. The time will come when the Son of Man will open the gates of paradise for all his believers. That will be the most beautiful of times.

That's the true difference between the beauty of Christianity and the beauty of this world. No matter how hard we try, most of us will never look like a model. They'll say that we can and show us pictures of other people who have become beautiful. But, we know that we'll never be like them. And, in fact, the harder we try the more angry and frustrated we become. The beauty of Christianity, on the other hand, is open to all people. The beauty of Christianity is in the realization that we always live with a certain awkwardness in this world. The solutions it offers are always short term because we know that our real happiness is in heaven.

Especially during Lent, we recognize that our time on earth is passing away, not on our schedule but on God's time. Yet, just as Elijah and Moses had to return to the Father, so we know that we will have to go to him when he calls us. We patiently wait for that day knowing that, when it does come, we shall be transfigured just as Jesus was. This gospel, then, shows us what true beauty is all about. It's not in vain desires to be eternally 18 years old. It is in the realization that each day that we live is another gift from God even as we know that this world is passing away. It's in the hope that we have that, when God and God alone, takes us from this world, he will take us to himself to change our faces and make our garments dazzlingly white. All we have to do, is remain faithful to our Lord Jesus Christ and those he has appointed to preach his word.

Warning! Don't send email to my office address!

A couple of months ago, we switched email servers. As a web server, it has been great. It has more options and more memory than we'll ever use. But the email server is terrible! It's been off since Monday, basically. In other words, I've not been able to check my email for four days. I can only imagine how many emails will be sitting there with urgent messages. Ugh! So, if you know what my office email is (not listed on this blog) don't send anything there but send to the email on this blog instead.

Antioch...where the disciples were first called Christian

And where we almost spent an extra week trying to dig out!

I took a group of college students on retreat this past weekend. It's always powerful for me to hear their stories of faith and to watch the peer ministry that happens among the college students. I love to see one person who has such deep faith assisting someone else who doesn't have as much. It's truly remarkable.

But, beginning on Friday, the weather was bad. It was raining with periods of sleet/ice pellets mixed. On Saturday the rain started to freeze and turn to snow, which is an ominous sight when you figure that you came down a windy hill to get where you are. On Sunday at the end of the retreat, we came up with a full proof plan. One person would try to make it up the hill who had four week drive. Then we would send the rest of the vehicles that were only two wheel. The second vehicle, a rear wheel car, made it up without a problem. The next vehicle, a front wheel drive mini-van, had a deer cross its path and forced it to stop. They had to back down and I made the decision to go out the back way. Thankfully, the fourth car had already come to that decision on its own and left, leaving the four wheel drive, the minivan, and myself. I needed to turn around so I started driving and met the minivan at a narrow strip of roadway and, guess what...he ended up in the ditch. And not just somewhat in the ditch were talking like undercarriage scraping ground, back wheels off the ground in the ditch. We sent the four wheel arrogance home and waited for the tow truck to come and pull him out, which was itself an experience. And finally we made it home approximately 5 hours late.

The most beautiful experience, however, happened on Sunday morning. The entire group was just awesome. They hung together and were very open. When we woke up on Sunday, the snow had clung to the ice and turned the trees into what I referred to as a Tim Burton film. They were like hands wrapping around our cars. In other places, they had broke the trees and tree limbs so I was worried one would crush a car. So, I decided we needed to get out cars out from under them before a limb broke, which turned into this amazing little experience of cooperation among the students. They took turns shoveling and helped each other clean off cars. They really did a fantastic job of just working to ensure what I would call the public good. It was awesome to see amidst this Hollywood-esque winter scene.

darn flu

The stomach flu is an aweful thing and it's just overwhelmed me this week. So, rather than tell you my homily, I'll just link the homily I'm basing all of mine on. Here it is.

What bugs me about Gitmo

I read stories like this and I come up against this concept.

We claim that our goal in Iraq (and Afghanistan) is to establish a stable democracy in the Middle East. Wouldn't it make sense, therefore, to show what a stable democracy does with felons and criminals? Innocent until proven guilty. Prove them guilty. I'd hope that we are waiting for Iraq (and Afghanistan) to be a place where a fair trial could take place more than we are just storing these people in a camp until they all die. That would only inflame hatred of us. If we give a sense that there will be a resolution for these people, it would be better than simply pretending like a group of people who have had their rights completely stripped of them, who may or may not be terrorists, don't exist.

There’s a hole in my heart that can only be filled by Christ

How many of you have, as a goal, to be poor? Don’t raise your hands; just think about how absurd of a question that is. How about a little starvation? How many of you want to weep, not just cry but that uncontrollable mournful, dead-pet type of weeping? And should it be the goal of Christianity to be hated? I mean, if that is the pinnacle of expression of Christianity, isn’t Kansas’ minister Fred Phelps the model each of us should follow? Shouldn’t we all be willing to do something like protesting the funerals of soldiers because this country is becoming too accepting of homosexuality?

I think it’s clear to all of us that this just can’t be what Jesus was intending in his sermon on the plain, as scripture scholars call this passage. They point out that there is a connection between each of these statements in the classical notion of evil, or privation. In other words, each of the four statements and antitheses that Jesus posits today deal with a metaphorical hole that must be filled. Someone who is poor needs money. Someone who is starving needs to be fed. Someone who is mourning needs to be comforted. And someone who is being persecuted needs to have rights. So how do we understand that these are the ones that are really blessed? Is Jesus just off his rocker? Or is this a kind of exaggeration in order to highlight the plight of individuals in those states of life like some scripture scholars suggest, as though Jesus were, by calling them blessed, calling his believers to reach out to them.

I think in order to understand this passage, once again, we have to know what precedes it. Immediately prior to sitting down to teach, Jesus calls the 12 apostles around him to a particular kind of servant-leadership. He looked out at his growing number of followers from all over the Middle East, “Judea and Jerusalem and the coastal region of Tyre and Sidon,” and chose 12 men to be leaders in this new community. They couldn’t have known at the time that Jesus was really beginning the first church, the first diocese, with himself as bishop, the apostles as priests, and a growing group of laity. What they did know, however, was that there was danger in following Jesus. Not only did you have to neglect you family in your commitment to follow, but you, in effect, became an enemy of the state and synagogue. The Romans would view you as being an insurrectionist and the Jewish leadership would see you as following a rogue rabbi, just as they had viewed John the Baptist and his followers. So, these men, now rightly filled with fear and trepidation, as well as the congregation surrounding them, are hearing their bishop warn them about what to expect if they believe in him. Don’t expect to be rich, well fed, happy, or admired. In fact, if you do expect that treatment, you aren’t following Christ. Instead, expect to be poor, hungry, mournful, and hated because of the fidelity you feel to Christ, If you do, you are probably following in the ways of the prophets and following in the way of Christ.

Jesus ultimate message, then, is not that there is innate value in these characteristics, as though we were saved by being poor, hungry, or hated. Instead, he is saying that those who are satisfied with what they have and where they are already have what they need. There’s no hole inside them that needs to be filled, or at least not one that they are willing to acknowledge. But, we who do feel the hole inside of us have, basically two choices. We can fill it with the stuff of this world, which our world loves to try and offer. It offers things like television, consequence free intercourse, guilt free excesses, hedonism, and other things intent on filling the hole in our lives. Unfortunately, the majority of what our culture offers is very temporary and leaves us desiring an even greater high. The alcoholic is constantly searching for an even more potent source of alcohol in order to get drunk, the sex addict an even more explicit web page, and so on.

We who are Christians recognize the arid nature of these responses, to use the imagery of the first reading and responsorial psalm. Those answers only leave us feeling even more empty. We need to recognize that the holes we feel are opportunities to connect up with the biggest hole in history, the cross. This evil torture device on which hung the savior of the world, is the ultimate hole that was filled by the God-Man who alone satisfies our hungers, makes us rich, and shows us a way out of morning to the comfort of eternal life. The only thing, the only person that can fill the holes in our hearts is Christ.

Josephine Bakhita

Today was the feast day of the first Sudanese saint, St. Josephine Bakhita. She was remarkable because her life clearly didn't go the way she'd expect. Born to an affluent family, she was sold into slavery in the middle of the nineteenth century. She was passed from one slave owner to another until she was purchased by a member of the Italian consulate. She was to impressed by the kindness of her Christian owners who eventually brought her to Italy and gave her freedom. She eventually joined the church and became a nun, in fact and was a well sought after speaker by the end of her life.

She couldn't have imagine that that was the way God wanted her life to go but that's the way it went. If it hadn't she would have never known our Lord.

Warning! Warning!

For those of you who think that Johnathon Edwards looks like a good candidate for president, read this article. It's enlightening.

God calls those who are imperfect to make them perfect

I’m fascinated by the television show Monk, I hope not in an unhealthy way but in one of those ways that well written shows can make you fascinated. It’s one of the four or five shows that I set my VCR to tape each week just in case I miss it. If you haven’t yet seen this show, it’s about this obsessive-compulsive detective who finds unusual and unique ways of solving crimes. And, when I say he’s obsessive compulsive, I’m not being anecdotal in the slightest. This character has all the phobias and fears of almost any other OCD person; needing to wipe his hands after each handshake, measuring and leveling and releveling all the paintings on his walls and the walls of any place he enters, and, my own personal favorite Monkism, trying to make sure there are an even number of every thing in his house, whether that be marshmallows, pens, books, or any other object. Part of me likes this show because there’s a part of me in Monk, a part that doesn’t like dirty places and a general lack of order. I mean, I’ll admit that the worst day that I’ve had at St. Thomas thus far had nothing to do with ministry. It had nothing to do with a family who had lost a loved one or a college student who was struggling with difficult grades. No, my worst day was when I discovered a bat flying around in my apartment at 1:00 in the morning and spent the rest of the night, locked in my bedroom trying to convince myself that the bat had not flown through the small crack under my bedroom door and landed on my feet. So, I admit that I have some fears that are like Adrian Monk. Only, his fears are mine multiplied by a million. Yet, despite all these fears and foibles, when the police cannot figure out who it was who committed the crime, the know they can turn to Adrian Monk who will notice that one detail they all missed that will help him solve the case.

I was thinking about this in the context of vocations, a topic our readings seem intent on focusing us on. Being the associate director of vocations for this diocese and having walked with a few people that seem on their way towards priesthood, I know that oftentimes vocations come from people’s involvement in church. Especially for vocations to priesthood and religious life, there seems to be a kind of sense that people who pay attention to the church are the ones who will want to be connected for the rest of their lives. This seems true of the Prophet Isaiah as well, although he wasn’t a person that hung around the church inasmuch as the Temple. Isaiah has this incredible image of the heavenly Jerusalem in the Temple in which God is the celebrant of the model for all liturgies and, in this context, Isaiah is called forth to service. This is a great passage to reflect upon for all of us who feel called to ministry, weather that be to priesthood, being a sister or a nun, or being a lector, eucharistic minister or hospitality minister. God often influences our call when we come together to pray.

Yet, God also works in more unexpected places as well, as we heard in the gospel. I imagine that Peter had no idea when he went fishing the previous night that he would be called to ministry the next day. Here he is by the side of the lake getting finished from a long night probably looking forward to a day of rest before another night. He probably feels frustrated and angry because of his bad luck the night before when, all of a sudden, this guy that he probably doesn’t even know, this carpenter-turned-traveling preacher decides to tell him how to do his job. Peter’s response very easily could have been to tell Jesus to mind his own business. Peter’s the professional fisherman. Jesus is not. But, in humility, he throws out into the deep. And the reward for his humility is such a large catch of fish that he needs two boats just to pull it in.

It doesn’t matter where our call comes from, it matters how we respond to that call. In both Isaiah and Peter we see humble people who feel totally unworthy to be called to the ministry. I imagine all of us feel unworthy to be called to a particular ministry, weather that be as a parent, priest, or some other ministry, we should feel like we aren’t worth. But, all too often, God doesn’t call the perfect to ministry: he calls the imperfect in order to perfect them. We should feel like we aren’t deserving of the gifts God has given to us. But we also need to know that God can take our weaknesses and use them in ways that make them strengths. Our job, when we hear God asking whom shall I send, is to echo the call of Isaiah and say, “Here I am, send me.”

The sacrament of reconciliation as sociological study

I was reading this article about a reporter who, so-to-speak, turned the tables on the privacy of confession by posing as a penitent individual and lying about sins like abortion, euthanasia, homosexuality, etc. You know, all those topics that magazines like his hate about the catholic church. And, the Vatican is angry. Well, to be honest, I'm angry too.

The value of this sacrament has been lost in the past 40 years and this only demeans it that much more. The fact that priests give varying advice points more to the weaknesses in seminary education and the stubborness of priests than on any supposed difficulties priests face. Priests don't face difficulties if they know and preach the gospel. The difficulties we have come when we preach more about our own issues than about the gospel.

I presuppose that when someone comes into the confessional, it's someone who is hurting that needs to know 1. God forgives them 2. God welcomes them back and 3. They can turn away from past sins and learn to do God's will. I'm disguested by the thought that someone who isn't hurting would waste a priest's time for the sake of some sick sociological study. To paraphrase a line from Jesus Christ Superstar, "People who are hurting matter more than your publicity."

Playing the Prophet

Fr. Ev had a great homily weekend about being a prophet. He talked about how a prophet doesn't say what people want to hear but a prophet says what people need to hear. I was kind of invigorated by it because I often envision the role of the priest in preaching as being prophetic, first to oneself and then to the congregation. It's nice to be able to hear other preachers, on occasion. It reminds me of how I also need to listen.

The best way to control something...renovate it.

When I studied in Jerusalem, there was a chapel owned by the Syrian Orthodox that was completely burnt out. The fire, apparently, started because of candles, a staple in the forms of Christianity that actually trace their roots back to the time of Christ. In any case, the Syrian Orthodox church is very poor. They are unable, financially, to rebuild the chapel. But, when asked for assistance from (I believe) the Armenian Orthodox Church, the refused. Why, you may ask. Because they knew that if the Armenians helped them they would also be able to say that they own it. It would, for all intents and purposes, become their chapel that they renovated.

In the last couple of weeks, I've found the inverse of this principle to be particularly useful. There are people who want me to take over responsibility of something so they pretend that they don't know how to do it. Of course, they really want me to take over something. But, ironically, they wouldn't let me have creative control (along with the students who work with me) on their event. They just want me to take my group to them so that they can take control of my group. It's a tricky way of doing things, if you ask me and a hard principle to implement. Don't fall into the trap of believing that you can do everything. Limit yourself to what you can actually do.

Pride in a student

Read this!

It will give you hope for the future.

Die to selfishness to rise with Christ

There’s a story in the life of St. Benedict of Nursia that says that, after years of attempting to attain spiritual perfection as a hermit, Benedict was, reluctantly, called upon to take charge of an abbey of monks. The man of God, as St. Benedict is often called in this rather fantastic biography, upon arriving at the monastery, was distressed by the monks unlawful lifestyle. They couldn’t leave their former lives behind, for instance, in order to live the radical life necessary for monastic living. The monks became so perturbed at his constant correction that they decided to poison his wine so that they could elect a different abbot. St. Benedict was protected by God, however, for when he made the sign of the cross over the glass, it broke in two and Benedict, aware of their treachery, was forced to leave the monastery because of the selfishness of these monks and return to the peaceful, isolated life of a hermit, though eventually he began founding his own good monasteries.

In many ways, we live in a very selfish world, and we are painfully aware of this in January as we remember the anniversary of a profoundly selfish act on the part of this country, the legalization of abortion with the supreme court decision Roe V. Wade. Yet, it is but one way in which selfishness seems to be a corrupting force in American society. Abortion says not only will I not have this child I will not share it with someone who will love her and take care of her. Euthanasia says not only will I not suffer any pain but I will choose when I die. Embryonic stem cell research says not only will I get a cure for my disease but I will go to any length to get that cure. Capital punishment says not only will I mourn for the loss of my loved one but I will get revenge for his loss. And this is just the beginning of the selfishness that Pope John Paul II first called the culture of death and Cardinal Bernadin saw as needing a seamless garment to fix, including war and famine.

In the first reading, our Israelite brothers and sisters are living in a similar culture of selfishness. This reading is taking place after the third time that they had been living in exile in Babylon, possibly some 70 years since they had been a unified nation. They gather to be instructed by Ezra and the priests to begin reeducating the people about how they are to live the law and they start to weep. I wondered what would cause them to start weeping like that. At first, I thought they might be tears of joy, at being back where they belong, hearing what they should hear. But Ezra clearly says “Do not be sad”. So I thought they were tears of sadness for realizing all that had changed since they first went into exile. But the more I thought about it, the more I thought there was probably a mix of both. On the one hand they are overjoyed at being back in their home but they have to ponder all the years that they couldn’t live the Jewish life they wanted and even probably forgot some critical parts. Imagine what it would be like if we suddenly switched mass one weekend back into the pre-Vatican II mass. Most of us have never experienced it and, those who have, have probably forgotten a great deal about that celebration. These Israelites are saddened that they have forgotten so much.

Ezra, in calling for them to stop crying, is not simply a callous individual who can’t stand tears. He is trying to articulate a truth that I see when someone approaches me after not living their catholic faith as they should. Perhaps they don’t come to mass as often as they should, or they don’t come at all. Or, perhaps they have been saddled with living a double life in a state of serious sin while pretending to be a perfect Christian to the outside world. For whatever reason, they feel distant from their catholic faith and, tragically, feel unworthy to accept God’s forgiveness in order to start practicing their faith as they’d like. Ezra’s call is just as powerfully to them as it is to the people of Israel. He is, basically, saying to get past yourself. Today isn’t about the Israelite’s sinfulness. Today isn’t about your absence from church. Today is holy to the Lord your God. God is holy and has made today holy. Now live in today, this today of holiness.

It truly is as St. Paul says in the second reading, like being one body with different members. We are all connected to one another. My actions affect you and your actions affect me too. As Christians, we are not just members of one body but members of the body of Christ. St. Pauls uses this imagery especially to draw us out of our selfishness. He says, “those parts of the body that we consider less honorable we surround with greater honor, and our less presentable parts are treated with greater propriety…” In other words, we are to especially care for those who cannot care for themselves. This is what makes those threats to human life that I listed before so dangerous: they affect the weakest among us and give into the basest sense of selfishness in each of us, a willingless to solve complex issues with simple answers. That’s why St. Paul adds, “If one part suffers they all suffer.”

In the Gospel, Jesus lists some things that are part of that very law that our Israelite brothers and sisters heard today that are fulfilled in his life, death and resurrection. In many ways we can find comfort in bringing glad tidings to the poor, proclaiming liberty to the unjustly captive, giving sight to the blind, letting the oppressed go free, and making a year acceptable to the Lord. The really radical part of our faith that the culture of death will never understand is much harder for us to commit to: to die to ourselves, our ego and sense of entitlement to live an easy life, in order to truly be part of the body of Christ for this world. How can we Christians be a voice for the weakest in this world and promote a true sense of respect for human life?

A Most dangerous homily

I did one of the cardinal sins of homily preparation. I only preached at Sts. Peter and Paul church this weekend. I changed the content of my homily in the middle of mass. I had really been struggling with a message all week and couldn't come up with one. I tried and tried but nothing would come. Then, parly because of this statement from the first reading...

" For Zion’s sake I will not be silent, for Jerusalem’s sake I will not be quiet..."

and mostly because of this interraction from the gospel....

"When the wine ran short, the mother of Jesus said to him,
'They have no wine.'
And Jesus said to her,
'Woman, how does your concern affect me? My hour has not yet come.'
His mother said to the servers,
'Do whatever he tells you.'”

It reminded me of a church sign I had seen on the way up that didn't seem to make sense to me until I connected it with this gospel. It said something like, "Sometimes silence isn't golden. Sometimes it's yellow." I realized that the implications were that we are called, at points, to speak up and not just sit back on our laurels. This, it seems to me, is the call Mary gives to us today. She saw a need. There was no wine. She turns to her son who isn't just being disrespectful in his address. The term "woman" here is an honorific term as though he was saying, "my lady" or "my beloved". He's telling her that it's not yet his hour to reveal himself as messiah, a feat that he accomplishes each Sunday when he comes to us in bread and WINE. I believe there must have been a look exchaged between mother and son to get him to change his mind. It's the look that only a mother can give her disagreeable son to get him to change his mind. Mary knew that this was too important to be put off by the word "no".

As believers, I feel like we give up too easily when we initially hear "no". When theologians claimed that dissent was the best way to respond to Humane Vitae, Pope Paul IV's encyclical on birth control, we followed their advice. As predicted, it led to an unparalleled disrespect for human life because we didn't speak up and follow what the Pope said. We are being called to speak out, like Mary, to respect human life. During this month that marks the anniversary of the greatest civil rights tragedy of our time, Roe v. Wade, a decision which allows thousands of people to be denied the right to life EVERY DAY, we must renew our calls to law makers and not accept their simple minded "no's"

The Loss of liberal Christianity.

I was just at a meeting and, even though I know it's dangerous to publicly criticize nowadays because it may be offensive, I will risk it because of larger implications. I'll at least make an effort not to unveil the group with whom I was meeting.

The point of the discussion, basically, was that liberal Christianity was the way to go. Why? Because conservative Christianity is bad. Of course, I kept thinking the whole time that if both liberal and conservative christians hadn't left the Catholic church, almost all the issues our speaker was addressing would be solved.

What is really at issue for liberal catholics, according to this speaker, is that we need a "broadbased coalition" to bring together "disperate viewpoints" and allow for multiple "truths". I may know that there is truth in Christianity but that doesn't mean that Christianity is the only truth. I was on board with him until here.

There is where, in my own opinion, he oversteps his authority. He basically asks how he can be certain that others aren't saved. He says Christians need to allow that others ARE saved in following their own path. That's a game I like to call, "not my job." I didn't die for your sins, Christ did. I didn't open the gates of heaven, Christ did. I get really frightened when any Christian for whatever reason believes he or she can tell others that they know they are or aren't saved. We don't know yet. We have hope, don't get me wrong. But, I can't honestly turn to a Buddhist who may or may not believe in God and say that I know you are saved.

Ultimately according to this speaker, we are judged by what we do, ironically the complete antitheses from what Luther and Calvin had as their reasons for leaving the church. It's sola fides, faith alone, by which we are judged, right? Not any more. Now it's sola labora, works alone since we don't want to condemn the non believer.

I give thanks every day to three people for making me catholic: Jesus Christ and Jim and Jean Miller. If I wasn't Catholic, I might actually believe this dribble. As it was, I walked out of the room and banged my head against the wall out of concern for the lost souls that believe this.

Where is the newborn King of the Jews?

I hate this time of year. It’s time for me to start gathering together all my financial information from this past year in order to prepare my taxes. I am, by nature, not very organized so it always takes me longer than really necessary to do this and each year, I resolve that this will be the year that I get organized and am ready when tax time comes around. And, don’t get me wrong, I will not be the one doing my taxes on April 14th. They will be done long before that. But, I know that these next few weeks will include several hours of number crunching and looking for that one receipt from Hawaii that could be a deduction only ending when I hand a stack of forms to my tax preparer hoping that she will find a way to get me the biggest deduction possible.

We come to this celebration that, for all intents and purposes, ends the Christmas season in the church and echo the question of the magi, “Where is the newborn King of the Jews?” This celebration, in many ways, mirrors the story of St. Thomas after Easter, in that we are told about people who receive answers to the most profound question of our life, God’s existence. You may remember from the story of Thomas that he was not present with the apostles when Jesus first appeared to them after his three-day-death in the tomb. Thomas, in jealousy, denies that Jesus appeared to them as though the apostles were playing some kind of sophomoric prank on their absent friend. It wasn’t until a week later, when the doors were locked where the disciples were gathered and Jesus appeared to them again, that Thomas finally believes despite not probing his wounds. Today, the magi stand in the place of the apostles and tell us that they have seen the newborn king of the Jews. We, “Thomases”, echo their question, “Where is he?”

This timeless question grips the most pious and the most agnostic of us all. If God has been so present in history, as we hear in the readings whenever we come to church, why is he not as present today? Undoubtedly, some of you ask this question in your witness to hurricane Katrina and the service you provided for the people of New Orleans over the Christmas holiday. Others of you may wonder how a God who is love allows a terrible situation like September 11th take place and the wars that have followed killing tens of thousands of Iraqi’s, Afghani’s and American lives. Others may, for whatever reason, simply feel more the absence than the presence of God. All of this leads us to ask the question, “Where is the newborn King of the Jews?”

In this light, we come to this celebration and receive an answer that doesn’t always make sense. We are told to see Christ in the Priest who stands in the place of Christ as shepherd of the community; to see Christ in the Word proclaimed, to see Christ in the gathered community where two or three are gathered in his name, and most preeminently in the body and blood that gathers the community together. And, yet, even as we are told this we ask that fundamental question of how we see God in these things that don’t always seem so God-like: Priests abuse, the Word is confusing, the community sins against one another, and the eucharist looks and tastes like simple bread and wine. This is where we are to look for the answer to that deepest of questions regarding the presence of God? Where is the newborn King of the Jews?

Perhaps the search is the point. If God’s presence were as simple to find as knowing which star to follow, wouldn’t we all be disappointed? Wouldn’t it feel a little too shallow to really be able to see the all-transcendent God who created heaven and earth, the universe and all it holds? We trust that, when we gather together whether as a family, prayer group, or parish, God is with us. We trust that, when we hear the word of God, God is with us. We trust that, despite the wound the priesthood has been dealt in this country, priests remember that there is a reason we call them Father. We trust that what we receive each week is not just bread and wine but is the body and blood, soul and divinity of Jesus Christ. We are not being taunted by the Magi today, we are being invited to journey with them in search of the Christ, the King of the Jews.

The church’s celebration of the birth of our Lord

"Do not be afraid; for behold, I proclaim to you good news of great joy that will be for all the people. For today in the city of David a savior has been born for you who is Christ and Lord.”

These angelic words express the heart of this celebration that gathers us here tonight/today. We celebrate the birth of our savior and sing with the Angels, “Glory to God in the highest”. For the past four weeks we have been preparing for the birth of Christ. We have been the people who have walked in darkness that long to see the wondrous light. Tonight/Today that light illimines our hearts with tidings of comfort and Joy. Yet, we cannot forget that we are really celebrating a real person’s birthday, the birthday of Christ. There are those families that will go so far as to bake a cake and have their children blow out the candles to remind themselves of the reality of this birthday.

Around the middle of November, a student who was writing an article for the Iowa State Daily came to me and asked me to comment on the status of Christmas. As you are undoubtedly aware, Christmas began about two weeks before Thanksgiving this year for most retailers. He asked if I thought there were really two Christmases, two different uses of the same word, that people were invoking. It was with regret that I admitted to him that I, in fact, thought that to be true. Christmas is a national holiday in the United States. Most Americans will celebrate it. Yet, I believe that a sharp division is being drawn between a secular understanding of Christmas and the true celebration of Christmas that takes place in the lives of Christians. While I’m not willing to say there is a war on Christmas, I believe we would be mistaken if we were to deny the schism that has taken place.

The secular celebration, as I said, begins at least a month before the actual date of Christmas. While there is still sentiments of good will towards men, for the most part it deals with buying presents. Radio stations begin playing our Christian Christmas melodies over the air for a month, which will end precisely at midnight on December 26. The Christian celebration begins with an acknowledgement of waiting and preparation, similar to the secular celebration. But, we don’t usurp the celebration by worrying about details like shopping and presents. I mean, let’s face it, if it were my birthday, you wouldn’t start singing happy birthday a month and a half before the actual date. You would at least wait until the day of my birth before you started to do that. And I would hope that you would worry more about the gifts that you were giving me than the gifts you were giving to those coming to the birthday party. To me these two realities identify the largest difference between the secular understanding of Christmas and our Christian understanding: we believe that Jesus was a real person and that his birth was a real event. The Lord of Life who created us and watched with pain as we succumbed to the temptations of the evil one decided to walk among us and come into this world as “an infant wrapped in swaddling clothes and lying in a manger.” We believe that the prophecies from old have been fulfilled. “For a child is born to us, a son is given us; upon his shoulder dominion rests. They name him Wonder-Counselor, God-Hero, Father-Forever, Prince of Peace.”

And, for me, the most palpable difference between the two celebrations takes place in the days following Christmas. As the secular parts of society quickly turn from tidings of comfort and joy back toward the normalcy of life, Christians are just gearing up. The children may neglect the great presents Santa Claus gave to them. You may find yourself standing in line trying to return that one-size-too-small sweater that your family member gave to you. But you will come to church and finally sing the songs that celebrate Jesus’ birthday. Because, like our secular counterparts, we believe this celebration is too important to confine to one day. We want to celebrate it for about three weeks, until the celebration of the Epiphany. Yet, we also need to discover ways to live out this celebration of the birth of the Lord, to celebrate each day the God who dared to walk among us as one like us though free from sin.

Now, don’t get me wrong. I’m not saying that you have to buy gifts for your family members each day of these three weeks. That’s really more a part of the secular celebration than the Christian one, though we can’t forget that tradition began when a certain Saint Nicholas gave candy to the poor children of his city. No, instead, let us focus on the side of things that our society tends to neglect: Good will towards our fellow human beings. Let this celebration be a time to love one another with even more gusto, especially family members that may be difficult to love. Let the good news of great joy continue to affect your life this Christmas season. Sing the great songs of praise for our King who walks among us.