Category Archives: Faith

The Torah and the Sermon on the Mount

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Dear Folks,

Our Gospel today is the Beatitudes, the beginning of the Sermon on the Mount. This opens Jesus’ public teaching in the Gospel of Matthew and sets the stage for what follows.

To appreciate how the Sermon on the Mount is presented in Matthew, we need to talk about the Torah, which is the term the Israelites use for the first five books of the Bible. The word is usually translated “law”, but a rabbi told me that didn’t convey the meaning well. He said, “Sin is missing the target, and Torah means hitting the target. However, when you go through the Bible and see references to “statutes”, “ordinances” or “decrees” they are talking about the Torah. Psalm 1 and Psalm 119 are both hymns in honor of the Torah and say that it is the way to true blessedness. The Torah was the foundation of the nation of Israel and their relationship with God. Being in right relationship with God came

from doing the works of the law of Moses, the Torah. To this day, Jewish people revere the Torah and treat Torah scrolls with great reverence. They are kept in a cabinet called an “ark” (think ark of the covenant, not Noah’s ark), and taken out and carried in procession when read in prayer services.

Exodus 20 is a classic presentation of the giving of a new Torah. Moses goes up a mountain to receive it from God. It begins with the 10 Commandments (the pocket-sized version) and then expands on them. In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus goes up the

mountain. He starts with the Beatitudes, the pocket-sized version, and then expands on them.

We, of course, would not call the Sermon on the Mount the new Torah. We would say that Jesus himself is the new Torah. Pope Benedict makes this point in his “Jesus of Nazareth”

book when referring to another mountaintop experience where Jesus in transfigured, and the Father speaks from a cloud and says, “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased; listen to him (Matthew 17:5).” St. Paul will argue extensively, especially in Romans and Galatians, that for Christians, being in right relationship with God is no longer works of the law of Moses, but about faithfulness to Jesus.

From now until Lent, we will take our Sunday Gospel readings from the Sermon on the Mount. I would challenge everyone to read Psalm 1, and then read Matthew chapters 5-7, and maybe even spend some time wrestling with them. As we go through the Gospel of Matthew this year, it would be useful to look for echoes from this sermon in Jesus’ teaching throughout the Gospel. I suggest that if people reflect on it from time to time, they could

find deeper insights on different parts of their Christian journey. A key concept to keep in mind is that this is not just a list of rules, of things to do and things not to do but a vision of total transformation, changing us to the core. The process is not done until we are fully perfected at the end of our journey (Mat 5:48).

Blessings,

Fr. Jim

Word of God

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Dear Folks,

“I will make you fishers of men.”‘

This Sunday is dedicated as “Sunday of the Word of God.” Of course, we know that the first meaning of “Word of God” is Jesus Himself (John 1:1 and following), but we have long had the tradition of calling the Bible the Word of God and holding it in high reverence. God inspires many things, but nothing else is inspired on the level of Sacred Scripture. It is not just the power of the authoritative teaching, but we believe that Jesus is present to us in a special way when we read the Scriptures with an open heart. They are, of course, most powerful in the liturgy, especially the Eucharistic liturgy.

One of my goals in life is getting Catholics to know the Bible better. I’ve heard many Catholics tell me that the Church never encouraged them to read the Bible. I’ve worked very hard to make sure a lot of Catholics will not be able to say that anymore. Of course, it isn’t just reading, but getting to know, to go from being foreign tourists in the Bible to being at home in the Bible.

Good Catholic Bibles always have footnotes and cross references to give us some background on the language and the culture, and to see how everything is woven together.

For beginners, I do not recommend starting at the beginning and reading straight through without help. Some intrepid souls may do that, but most drop out. There are wonderful resources out there, including Ascension Press and the Augustine Institute. If you have access to Formed.org there are loads of good things there. If you don’t have immediate access to resources, I urge you not to wait. If you start reading through the Gospels a bit every day that will be a great beginning. You don’t have to do much, but every day, every day, every day. I challenge you if you do that, it will change the way you think. An alternative would be to read the Mass Readings every day. The three-year Sunday cycle and the two-year weekday cycle in the Roman lectionary will give you a very large amount of Scripture. A few minutes a day can make a huge difference over time, and you might just find you are hungering for more. We can never get enough in this life.

After eight years in the seminary and thirty-five years of priesthood, I find that the more I learn about the Scriptures, the more wonderful I see they are, and the more I want to explore further. The various books have a wonderful diversity, but they all fit together in one big story of salvation. We also learn that the Scriptures and the liturgy are interwoven: the Bible is very liturgical, and the liturgy is very Biblical. Knowing the Catholic faith is not just getting various tidbits of doctrine and morality but seeing how it all fits together in one big story of salvation, the story of God seeking to gather us to Himself and how this makes sense out of our lives. This will all help us to know Jesus better and share Jesus better. It is something everyone can do.

Blessings,

Fr. Jim

Seekers of the Light, Sharers of the Light

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Dear Folks,

We celebrate Epiphany, which celebrates the light of the Gospel coming to the outside world. We remember that the story of Jesus is not just for us, but to be shared with all nations.

One of the big and most essential tasks of our generation is shifting many Catholics’ paradigm from Catholics as customers for spiritual services, to Catholics as coworkers in mission, ambassadors of the Gospel. Catholics have long not seen themselves as missionaries, nor have we been taught how to share the faith. Even in the seminary they never taught us to share the faith with those who don’t already believe. Of course, we can’t all be as talented as Fulton Sheen, and the challenge can be intimidating, but there are simple ways for us to start.

To share the faith, it is important to be seekers of God’s goodness, beauty, and truth.

The US Catholic Bishops did a document called, “Go Make Disciples” which suggested three basic tasks:

1. Grow in enthusiasm for the faith ourselves until it spills out of us (Continue to evangelize ourselves).

2. Invite everyone everywhere to share the fullness of the Catholic faith (Evangelize people: invite those outside the faith to come inside; invite those on the margins to come deeper; invite those in deep to come even deeper)

3. Transform society according to Gospel values (Evangelize society).

We can start by planting very small seeds. Some very simple things we can do to help draw people to the faith:

1. Learn something new about the faith and share it with someone

2. Tell someone something good about your faith community

3. Introduce yourself to someone you don’t know at church

4. Create a holy moment (an action that shows the love of God)

We, of course, can grow with learning and practice, and set things up for the next generation to go farther than we can. The more we learn about the goodness, beauty, and truth of the faith the more we have to share. We also remember that sharing is a separate skill that must be developed. We can all start where we are at. I would suggest that it would be good to consider how we might answer some key questions:

1. Why are you glad to have Jesus in your life?

2. Why is it a good thing to be a practicing Catholic Christian?

3. How does my life show that I believe in Jesus?

There is a lot of concern for the future of the Catholic Church, and for the future of our parishes. There is a lot of talk about what the Pope should do, what the bishop should do and so on. That energy could be better spent sharing the faith. The more people who are intentional about being ambassadors of the Gospel, the greater the hopes for the future.

The first step is always to fall more deeply in love with Jesus.

Blessings,

Fr. Jim

Abundant Life

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Dear Folks,

God made the world so that life could flourish, and he called us to steward the earth (Genesis 1:28; 2:15). Imagine, if human beings had done what we were supposed to do from the beginning, how much better the world would be. How many diseases would have

been cured, how we could have stopped the harmful effects of many natural forces. Perhaps we could have tamed mosquitoes, so they weren’t a problem. We might even have lettuce that tastes like bacon. Imagine the cumulative effects of all the good that people could have done but didn’t do, add the cumulative effects of all the active evil that people have done since the beginning of the human race, and that gives us the difference between the world God has wanted and the one we have. Instead of a lush world that we should have had, there is so much barrenness and death.

But God does not leave us there. A theme throughout the Bible is “where there was only death, there is now life.”

The stories about manna in the desert (Exodus 16), and water from the rock (Exodus 17) show us a desert that cannot sustain life, but God sustains them. This has an echo in the multiplication of the loaves and fishes (See Matthew 14).

Ezekiel preaching to the dry bones (Ezekiel 37) is a metaphor for a people in exile, whose country is, for all intents and purposes, dead, and God promises to bring them back to life, as He brings the dry bones to life.

The river from the temple that turns salt water fresh (Ezekiel 47). In a desert country where drinking water is always in short supply, salt water would be especially frustrating. When a river of fresh water flows into the ocean, it becomes undrinkable salt water. A river that

turns salt water fresh is a wonderfully life-giving river. This has its fulfillment in Revelation 22:1-2.

Sin makes our lives and our world barren and less life-giving, but the power of the Paschal Mystery brings new life. As a sign of this, Jesus cures the blind, the deaf and the lame, bringing dead eyes, dead ears, and dead limbs to life, He is showing the power that will

bring us, dead in our sins, to new life, a life of flourishing that the world cannot give.

As we proclaim the Gospel, a key part of our proclamation is helping people to flourish. This includes education (the mighty Catholic schools, as well as other educational programs for all ages), Feeding the hungry, visiting the shut-in, caring for the sick, and many other things that Christians do that can help the desert in people’s lives to bloom. These are valuable in and of themselves, of course, but they are signs that can help people when they ask if Jesus is the one they seek, or should they look for another (see

Matthew 11:1-6).

Blessings,

Fr. Jim

Be Awake

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Dear Folks,

We begin advent, a journey of waiting and preparing to be more welcoming to God. I challenge everyone to take a look at how we understand prayer and how we pray. It involves attentiveness to God’s presence. Jesus emphasizes the need to stay awake.

In our second reading, St. Paul says “You know the time; it is now the hour for you to awake from sleep. For our salvation now is nearer than when we first believed (Romans 13:11).”

Obviously, this does not mean that we should stop sleeping, sell our beds, fill up on coffee and try to be awake 24/7. We are still human and cannot function that way. So what does it mean?

“Beware that your hearts do not become drowsy from carousing and drunkenness and the anxieties of daily life, and that day catch you by surprise like a trap (Luke 21:34-35a).”

Notice two sources of drowsiness: pursuit of pleasure and anxieties of daily life. This should remind us of the parable of the sower (See Matthew 13:1-23). Seed that is sown on rocky ground withers because of some tribulation or persecution. Seed that is sown among weeds is choked by worldly anxiety and the lure of riches.

Perhaps being drowsy involves being so focused on the pleasures we pursue and the tasks and worries that pursue us that they fill our whole mind, and we start to think they are all that there is. We have heard stories of those who would spend all their time either at work or at the golf course and lost contact with their families, and they became strangers. The idea is not to remove all pleasure from our lives, nor to neglect our tasks, but to put them in proper context of our relationship with God. Heaven knows we struggle to balance the parts of our lives that are always competing for our attention, and they can be overwhelming. On vacation I read a book called “Juggling Elephants” about sorting your life like you were a ringmaster coordinating a three-ring circus.

I would ask you to consider some questions:

What if prayer is more important than you have thought it is?

What in our behavior shows that God is a dear friend to us?

Do we treat Him like a dear friend?

What if everything depended on a bit more prayer each day?

Is there anything else we do that we can shave just a couple minutes off from to make just a couple more minutes for prayer?

Even a brief minute attending to the presence of God several times a day can make a difference. What if we resolved this advent to make a bit more room for God every day? We might be surprised, first that we can do it at all, and second, how good it is to do it.

Saint Gianna Beretta Molla, patron Saint of doctors, mothers, and unborn children, pray for us and for our nation. Help us be attentive to God’s presence in everyone, especially the weakest and most vulnerable.

Blessings,

Fr. Jim

Strength in Weakness

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Dear Folks,

Today we celebrate Christ the King. In our Gospel today (Luke 23: 35-43), we see Jesus portrayed as King, but appearing as unkingly as it is possible to appear. This is the great paradox of Christianity, that the greatest of all victories was won by what looked like the greatest of all defeats. This defies the wisdom of the world and turns it on its head. “The message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God (1 Corinthians 1:18, though I encourage you to read the whole chapter).”

In the Second letter to the Corinthians, St. Paul is dealing with a challenge. He had taught the Gospel to the Corinthians, but then some others came and claimed to be better apostles with a better Gospel. They called St. Paul weak, and unworthy of following. They boasted about how wonderful they were by comparison. St. Paul said he could boast too, and then talked about being imprisoned, flogged, shipwrecked, and similar things that were normally not cause for boasting. He accomplished great things because he was willing to be a suffering servant.

This is not possible without a close relationship with God. Christianity does not work as a project, as a set of beliefs and tasks. It is a love relationship, or it is not Christianity. Our Scribe and Pharisee friends tried to make it a project, a set of beliefs and tasks, but their hearts remained closed. “Although if I should wish to boast, I would not be foolish, for I would be telling the truth. But I refrain, so that on one may think more of me than what he sees in me or hears from me because of the abundance of the revelations. Therefore, that I might not become too elated, a thorn in the flesh was given to me, an angel of Satan, to beat me, to keep me from being too elated. Three times I begged the Lord about this, that it might leave me, but he said to me, ‘My grace is sufficient for you, for power is made perfect in weakness.’ I would rather boast most gladly of my weaknesses, in order that the power of Christ may dwell within me. Therefore, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and constraints, for the sake of Christ; for when I am weak, then I am strong (2 Corinthians 12:6 -10).”

By the way, I’m very unhappy with the passing of Proposal 3. I’ve talked to a number of people who are also unhappy and would like to do something about it. We all can recognize that what we have been doing hasn’t been getting us where we need to go. I’ve connected with a few people on a project to shift the culture. The first step will be to pray (of course!), and I don’t mean saying a quickie prayer and getting to business, but serious time with God. Then we can talk about action, and I suggest that we work messages that promote empathy for unborn children. I’m tentatively calling this the “Notice Human Life Project.” Much more to be figured out, but this is a beginning.

Blessings,

Fr Jim

Destruction of What We Take For Granted

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Dear Folks,

As we get toward the end of the Liturgical year, we talk about endings. In “Avengers: Endgame” Iron Man famously said, “Part of the journey is the end.”

Matthew 24, Mark 13, and Luke 21 are the apocalyptic chapters. John, instead of a chapter, gives us the Book of Revelation or Apocalypse. “Apocalypse” comes from the Greek for “removal of the veil. “Revelation” comes from “removal of the veil” in Latin. Apocalyptic writing tends to use bizarre imagery and lots of numbers. It is to unveil the meaning of what is happening. It is not meant to help us figure out when Jesus is coming again.

These chapters in Matthew, Mark, and Luke start with Jesus talking about the destruction of the temple, move to dealing with persecutions, and ending with the coming of the Son of Man. This finishes Jesus’ public teaching, except Matthew adds chapter 25 with three parables about the last judgment. The prediction of the destruction of the temple was amazing to people. It had been destroyed once before in 586 B. C. by the Babylonians, so it was not without precedent, but that was a long time ago, and the temple was the most stable thing they knew of, and the center of their cultural and religious life. In the year 70 the Romans did destroy it and destroyed much of Jerusalem.

In Apocalyptic writing, there are some key points:

• Anything of the earth might be destroyed.

• We will see virtue punished and evil rewarded.

• It might look like God’s side is losing.

• We will be tempted to give up.

• God’s plan is actually unfolding, and He wins, but it might not look like it until the end, so..

• Most Important: Don’t give up!

In a culture that is increasingly hostile to the Christian faith, Christian belief, and Christian values and accusing us of being oppressive and hostile to human rights, we have to get better at sharing God’s teaching in a way that shows its goodness, beauty, and truth. Many Christians have shared Christian faith and values in a way that makes sense to them but does not make sense to others who have been steeped in the mindset of society. We live in a society in which killing babies, mutilating confused children, and defining marriage out of existence is seen as compassionate, and opposing it is seen as cruel. We have to start at the beginning, on the dignity of every human life, empathy for those different from us, and how being human means something much deeper than following our feelings and desires. We have to show God’s love by example and do better than we have been doing (whatever we have been doing, it clearly is not enough).

We have to bridge the gap between the Christian world view and the society’s perspective. One of the great champions of this is St. Paul, and I recommend his talks in Acts 17, Acts 22, and Acts 26. Much to be done, and we are just getting started. “Let us not grow tired of doing good, for in due time we shall reap our harvest, if we do not give up

(Galatians 6:9).”

Blessing

Power of Baptism

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Dear Folks,

At the priest conference, Dr. Timothy O’Malley said that if there is going to be Eucharistic revival, we must deepen our sense of the Baptismal priesthood. He reminded us that when we got ordained, we had a different role in the Church and the world, and the presence we bring is different, but it doesn’t immediately “attune” our thinking and our behavior to our new reality. That is a task we take up from then on, to be who we have become. I gradually

got used to the fact that people looked at me differently because I was a priest, and there were different sets of expectations (that is several conversations right there). When he got married, there was a similar process. Our faith tells us our baptism changes us. We

remember from the rite that we are anointed “priest, prophet and king,” a participation in the anointing of Christ (we remember that “Christ” means “anointed.” We are then called to attune our view of ourselves, and how we approach the world, according to that reality.

The Second Vatican Council called for renewal of awareness of the Baptismal priesthood, but what was often done was to erase the distinction between the baptismal and ordained priesthood. People started saying priests’ parts at Mass, and there wasn’t room to talk about the unique gifts that the ordained priesthood brought to the Church. When I was in the seminary, it was pretty rare to talk positively about the ordained priesthood, except when they were talking about ordaining women (the dropout rate was very high). The mistake was thinking it was a zero-sum game, that for one to shine, the other had to be in the shadow. We can celebrate both vigorously.

The council said that the two priesthoods differed in kind, rather than degree. Think about how love relationships can differ in kind: the love between husband and wife, the love between siblings, the love between parent and their children are different kinds of

relationships, each with some different qualities and proper ways of expressing themselves. We do not start by ranking them according to intensity but appreciating their uniqueness.

The baptismal priesthood is exercised in sanctifying the world. The Constitution on the Church (Lumen Gentium) says, “Though they differ essentially and not only in degree, the common priesthood of the faithful and the ministerial or hierarchical priesthood are none

the less ordered one to another; each in its own proper way shares in the one priesthood of Christ. The ministerial priest, by the sacred power that he has, forms and rules the priestly people; in the person of Christ, he effects the eucharistic sacrifice and offers it to God in the name of all the people. The faithful indeed, by virtue of their royal priesthood, participate in the offering of the Eucharist. They exercise that priesthood, too, by the reception of the

sacraments, prayer and thanksgiving, the witness of a holy life, abnegation, and active charity (LG 10).” People help sanctify the world through their worship, through their seeking to grow in holiness, through their family life, through their work, and through their enduring suffering and trials with patience and faith. Again, the council says, “For all their works, prayers and apostolic undertakings, family and married life, daily work, relaxation

of mind and body, if they are accomplished in the Spirit –indeed even the hardships of life if patiently borne—all of these become spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ (cf. 1 Pet 2:5) in the celebration of the Eucharist these may most fittingly be offered to the Father along with the body of the Lord. And so, worshipping everywhere by their holy actions, the laity consecrate the world itself to God (LG 34).”

Let’s face it; the world needs lots and lots of sanctifying.

Blessings,

Fr. Jim

Eucharistic Revival I

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Dear Folks,

At the priests’ conference, we talked about the Eucharistic revival. Our speaker was a theology professor, Dr. Timothy O’Malley. We reviewed the statistics about the (vast) majority of Catholics who believe that at Mass the bread and wine are only symbols of the

Body and Blood of Christ, rather than being truly, substantially the Body and Blood of Christ. As horrible as that is, we cannot solve the problem simply by telling them the correct doctrine, but people need to know why this matters, what difference it makes in

their lives. Furthermore, they must not only know it cognitively, but personally, deep down to their core. There is a gap between faith and life, and people don’t see that it matters that much.

Nor need we think only of those already beatified and canonized. The Holy Spirit bestows holiness in abundance among God’s holy and faithful people, for “it has pleased God to make men and women holy and to save them, not as individuals without any bond between them, but rather as a people who might acknowledge him in truth and serve him in holiness”. In salvation history, the Lord saved one people. We are never completely ourselves unless we belong to a people. That is why no one is saved alone, as an isolated individual. Rather, God draws us to himself, taking into account the complex fabric of interpersonal relationships present in a human community. God wanted to enter into the life and history of a people (Gaudete et Exultate 6).”

We are so busy and moving so fast that life is a series of events, and we don’t step back to see the larger narrative, the meaning. People have been taught that the good life is being very productive. Relationships, contemplation and meaning get pushed aside by an ever increasing torrent of tasks. People are falling apart, and there are not nearly enough counsellors to help people who need counselling.

People see the reality as primarily something to manipulate rather than resonating with it. Consider, for a moment, resonating with someone or something. Rather than coming to a reality with preset preferences and trying to see how much we can push things in that

direction, we are sensitive to the movement and quick to adapt. Think of two people dancing together, their movements seek to be synchronized so that they flow together. This is a powerful experience and helps draw us out of ourselves. One of the major challenges of our time is to get more Catholics to see themselves less as customers in the Church, and more as disciples and co-workers in mission. More on that later.

As we talk about becoming a Eucharistic people, we start with looking more deeply at the meaning of baptismal priesthood. I trust everyone was taught that at our baptism we were

anointed “priest, prophet, and king,” but we most were not taught much about what that means, much less what it means in practice. That is for next week.

Blessings, Fr. Jim

Poor in Spirit

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Dear Folks

In the beginning of the Sermon on the Mount in the Gospel of Matthew (the importance of which I cannot emphasize enough), Jesus starts by saying, “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven (Matt 5:3).” If you ask a lot of Christians what that means, most will not have an answer.

Matthew 8, immediately after the Sermon on the Mount, begins with two healings. First is a leper. This guy was poor, absolutely poor. He could offer Jesus literally nothing in return for a favor. He has no money, no contacts, and couldn’t even offer Him his coat if he had one (it would be infected). He was completely dependent on Jesus’ mercy. The second miracle is the centurion’s servant. This centurion was, in the world’s terms, probably the richest, most powerful, most important person who had ever been in Capernaum. Furthermore, he had been good to the residents, and had built a very large synagogue (bigger than such a small community could normally afford), and so might easily be thinking that everyone in town owed him a favor. If anyone could be expected to approach Jesus with a sense of entitlement to special treatment, it was him. And yet we see the opposite. When Jesus says he will come and cure the servant, the centurion says, “Lord, I am not worthy to have you enter under my roof (Matt 8:8).” This is, perhaps, the greatest expression in the Bible, and we repeat it every Mass. He approached Jesus, not with a sense of entitlement, but of humility, as a beggar. He was not poor, but he was poor in spirit.

Contrast with Jesus’ visit to the synagogue in Nazareth in Luke 4. The people there thought that since Jesus had grown up there, they were entitled to see some miracles. When Jesus told them they weren’t they got quite nasty. When people approach Jesus with a sense of entitlement it does not go well.

Our Gospel today tells the story of a servant who had been plowing the field or tending sheep all day (Luke 17:7-10) comes home, and, instead of being able to relax and eat, still has to make and serve dinner for the master.

In C. S. Lewis’ “The Screwtape Letters” he says, “Men are not angered by mere misfortune but by misfortune conceived as injury. And the sense of injury depends on the feeling that a legitimate claim has been denied (Letter 21).” We can believe that after all we have done and all we have suffered, we should have things go our way for a while, but things don’t go as well. There is not just a sense of disappointment, but a sense that we have been wronged. Sometimes people do wrong us, but when there is nothing we can do to correct the situation, holding on to the resentment will harm and not help us. We recognize the truth, but must work toward healing. We can feel wronged that God has not done what we wanted. We can decide we deserve better from God after all we have done and all we have gone through. We are all reminded today that however much we do for God, He doesn’t owe us anything. Ephesians 2:1-10 makes that point very powerfully. If we worked 29 hours a day, 11 days a week 64 weeks a year for a million years, we could not earn a moment of heaven.

When we approach God, we are confident that he will respond because of His infinite love, not because we are entitled. A disciple does not tell God that we will follow so far and no farther, or we will follow only if our conditions are met. We do not know what discipleship will demand in the future, but we are called to follow wherever it leads. I find He will send some consolations and encouragements to keep us from getting totally discouraged, but not always when and how much we think He should.

We ask for the strength to follow without limits, and with a willing heart.

Blessings,

Fr Jim