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Truth and Consequences

Pentecost (A):  I Corinthians 12: 3-7, 12-13

 

Many years ago, there was a popular game show called Truth or Consequences.  A contestant in this show would be asked a difficult trivia question, which the contestant would usually get wrong.  Getting the question wrong had consequences! The contestant would then have to participate in a potentially embarrassing stunt.

One unintended effect of this show’s title was to affirm that truth has consequences.  If something is true, certain conclusions necessarily follow.  For example, if we claim that Jesus of Nazareth is true God as well as true man, and that His Passion, Death and Resurrection are, together, the defining moment of human history, that claim has consequences.  Our lives cannot be like the lives  of those who do not claim this.  Our perception of reality, our ways of thinking and acting, must be fundamentally transformed by this claim.  If not, then we do not really believe that our faith in Jesus Christ is true.  It may be only a slogan.  It may be only political spin.  But it is not truth unless it has real, visible, perceptible consequences for us. Continue reading “Truth and Consequences”

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The Stone Rejected

Fifth Sunday of Easter (A)  John 14: 1-12

 

Jesus said to his disciples, “Do not let your hearts be troubled. You have faith in God; have faith also in me.”  – John 14:1

Our Gospel reading for this Sunday is also one of the options for a Funeral Mass.  One does not need to be a Biblical scholar to understand this.  The words of Jesus speak directly to the grief and loss of the mourners, offering consolation and a solid basis for hope.  As such, these words bear a fresh meaning for us as we deal with the COVID-19 pandemic.  Over a quarter of a million people have died around the world so far due to the effects of the coronavirus.  Many of then died without the presence of family or clergy.  For each one, there are relatives and friends who suffer grief at their death and who wonder what more they could have done to help.  There are many more who fear the coronavirus and lock themselves away. Continue reading “The Stone Rejected”

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Catholicism And…

One of the effects of original sin is an instinctive prejudice in favor of our own selfish desires. We see things as they are not, because we see them centered on ourselves. Fear, anxiety, greed, ambition and our hopeless need for pleasure all distort the image of reality that is reflected in our minds. Grace does not completely correct this distortion all at once: but it gives us a means of recognizing and allowing for it. And it tells us what we must do to correct it. Sincerity must be bought at a price: the humility to recognize our innumerable errors, and fidelity in tirelessly setting them right. ― Thomas Merton, No Man Is an Island

Recently we learned that Australia’s High Court overturned a lower court’s guilty verdict against Cardinal George Pell on the charge of sexual abuse.  The reactions to this acquittal from Catholics in the United States were all over the map.  The website of the journal First Things posted articles praising this exoneration of an innocent man who was the victim, as they argued, of an anti-Catholic lynch mob.  On the other end of the spectrum, the National Catholic Reporter published articles and editorials lamenting how yet another high-ranking Church official got away with sexual abuse, and quoted sexual abuse victim advocates who all agreed that justice was not served here. Continue reading “Catholicism And…”

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Emmaus

Third Sunday of Easter (A): Luke 24:13-35

You find the sparrow that falls
When boughs break, to you she calls
With broken wing, still she sings
You find the sparrow that falls

– from The Language of Flowers, by Connie Dover

 

In this Sunday’s Gospel, we have a memorable account of an appearance of the Risen Lord, given to us by Saint Luke. Before we move into the story itself, it’s important to recall what the Gospel writers were up to in giving us accounts of the Risen Lord’s appearances to his disciples. They wanted to accomplish at least two things: to show how the disciples, who had (for the most part) abandoned Jesus after he was arrested, came to encounter him risen from the dead. However, the Gospel writers had their own readers in mind, both those of their own time and us. How do people who have not seen the Risen Lord Jesus come to have faith in him? What sustains our faith in him? Conversely, what challenges and wears down our faith in him?

This account of the two disciples who unknowingly encounter the Risen Lord on the road to Emmaus is one of my personal favorites. It shows Saint Luke’s masterful literary ability. It is awash in levels of meaning and symbolism. It isn’t possible to say everything that could be said about this passage here. I will confine myself to pointing out one obstacle to Easter faith that this story offers us, and then speak of three ways in which we may encounter Jesus, risen and with us still. Continue reading “Emmaus”

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Quarantine and Acedia

Our soul waits for the Lord,
  who is our help and our shield.
May your kindness, O Lord, be upon us
  who have put our hope in you.   Psalm 33:20, 22

Here in the State of Maine, it has been five weeks since public Masses were suspended.  It has been three weeks since Governor Mills issued a stay-at-home order for the residents of Maine.  Some people are working at home.  Others who have “essential” jobs continue to go in to work.  Still others have lost their jobs, at least for the time being. For Catholics, we find that our weekly routines have changed.  Going to Mass on Sundays is no longer on the schedule.  Masses are live-streamed from many parishes, and efforts are being made to reach out to people in various ways.

Early on, when all this was new, some people (at least) may have felt some excitement about it.  There may have been the novelty of seeing our parish church and our pastor celebrating Mass on TV or on one of our digital devices.  But the novelty has worn off, at least for some.  I hear of a growing hunger for the Eucharist itself, a feeling that “this can’t go on indefinitely”, a desire to go to Mass and celebrate the sacraments.  Some people now find the live-streamed Masses insufficient.  A few even say that they prefer the emptiness of not watching Mass than the sense that watching Mass may give them that “everything is okay”. Continue reading “Quarantine and Acedia”