Fifteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time
Fr. Jim Deiters

A few weeks ago, when we were all more ‘quarantined’ than now, I asked my great-niece how she was handling not seeing her friends.  She said, “the real problem is, do you know how hard it is to have dad home all the time?”  This surreal time in our life has surfaced all kinds of complaining amongst we humans who like our routines and look for someone to blame when things don’t go our way.

Since the pandemic has affected every nation, there is a kind of global ‘groaning’ going on about the disruption of our lives.  St. Paul, in his letter to the Romans we just heard, contrasts the sufferings of the “present time” with a longing and “expectation” for God.  St. Paul uses the term ‘groaning’ to describe the kind of pain that goes with our incompleteness, our unsettledness…as creatures and humans.  Much of our ‘groaning’ has to do with a frustration with our mortality, and not being able to get all we want in life in the short time we have.

Paul then gives us HOPE when he tells us that this longing and groaning in life is moving toward an ‘end’…which is freedom and “redemption of our bodies.”  When we are right in the middle of suffering or life struggle, it can feel like there is no way out and no purpose to it.  But St. Paul invites us to re-interpret the ‘longings-groanings’ we feel as part of the journey toward an incredible freedom that Jesus offers when we place our trust in him.

Many times it is through an experience of loss or suffering that we actually get closer to God.  While God never WANTS us to suffer, in his great mercy, God finds a way to take the suffering that is a part of our life and uses it for some benefit to help us grow spiritually.  Paul tells us to connect our personal sufferings with the “groaning of ALL of creation.”  He believes that the salvation Christ won for us on the Cross is like a ‘big net’ that is drawing together all the sufferings of the world and uniting them to the sufferings of Jesus that ultimately leads to the Resurrection!  Therefore, the cosmic event of Christ’s Resurrection is the freedom towards which “all of creation” is moving.  Imagine then… if every time we experience another suffering in life…we saw that it was connected to the suffering taking place in the rest of creation…and that it was leading us closer to Jesus’ Cross and Resurrection freedom!  Pope John Paul II spoke about this quite a bit during his own final years of suffering with Parkinson’s disease.  He taught the world that through his living with a terminal illness allowed him to be more united with Christ on the Cross and risen with Christ at the same time!

God certainly hears the ‘groaning’ of his children; and through the example of Jesus, Paul tells us to use our occasions of suffering as opportunities to be less attached to the “present time” of this world…and “set free” for the glory yet to come.  The lives of the saints, who had their own share of terrible hardships, remind us that by uniting our suffering with Christ, we create a fertile place for God’s Word to take root in us.  Therefore, we can ‘re-interpret’ our sufferings and inner groanings as occasions to ‘re-work’ the soil of our interior life so that God’s Word can take deeper root and bear fruit.

As I said earlier, how we interpret the “sufferings of the present time” has a lot to do with either a denial or embracing of how incomplete and limited we really are as human creatures.  The Scriptures assure us that it is okay to lift up our ‘groaning’ to God.  St. Paul and the other saints became holy in the way they embraced their incompleteness, admitting how much they needed God…for the “redemption of their bodies.”  It leads to a question we can bring to prayer this week: what part of my ‘body’ do I need Jesus to save and redeem?

The power and mystery of what happens here in the Mass is that, while God does indeed redeem this body of ours, the Eucharist also takes ‘out’ of this limited body and unites us to the universal Body of Christ, where we become one with the ‘groaning of all creation’ …which is both praising God and being redeemed at this very moment.

Fourteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time
Fr. Jim Deiters

The Statue of Liberty’s interesting history began as a beautiful gift from France to the United States of America in 1885 to celebrate their alliance during the Revolutionary War as well as for the abolition of slavery at that time.   Designed by the French sculptor Frédéric Bartholdi, the statue is modeled after the Greek goddess for freedom.  Interesting that when it arrived, and the United States did not have the money to install it, our own St. Louis famous Joseph Pulitzer, started a national campaign to raise the funds for the pedestal and the installation.  The poet Emma Lazarus wrote the famous sonnet that was used for the fundraising and then engraved for the base.  The poem describes the United States as a woman who is “a Mother of Exiles…who calls out ‘Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free; send the homeless, tempest-tost to me; I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"

How providential that on this Fourth of July weekend, we have this passage from Matthew’s Gospel in which Jesus’ compassionate invitation seems to be a direct influence on Emma Lazarus’ poem as Jesus himself says, “come to me all you who tired and are burdened…”  Between the welcoming raised hand of Lady Liberty to exiles and immigrants…and the welcoming arms and voice of Jesus, the word that comes to mind that encapsulates this American and Christian outreach to those who suffer is “community.”

Our Christian understanding of ‘community’ begins with the Trinity, as God lives as Three Persons in One.  Then God expanded his sense of community by creating the universe and set all of creation to live as a community…of angels, animals, humans, and the oceans in harmony with each other.  God put into our DNA, made in God’s Image, a desire for community – starting with family and friends, and then expanding our compassion toward all who have been left out of community.

If you look at Jesus’ daily routine, he constantly went out of his way to find the ‘lost sheep,’ the suffering, and those whom the rest of humanity had excluded or abandoned from the community.  Our God always leaves the “in” party to go out and find those who “are burdened” with a heavy “yoke” in life.  Beginning with the first woman and man, we humans twisted God’s Original Plan for community and continue to create our own sordid history of wars, division, and prejudice.

Add to this history of society breakdown, along comes this pandemic that has truly damaged our efforts of trying to build community as Jesus taught us.  But the Good News…is that we still have in our God-given DNA an innate sense of how we are supposed to live as one global Body of Christ.  I love the way Pope Francis recently said, “the coronavirus pandemic will remind us once and for all, that humanity is a single community.”  He said, “it will no longer be ‘them’, but ‘us’.”

How marvelous it would be if we could make it to the ‘other side’ of the pandemic with a better understanding of our personal responsibilities in actively working toward ‘community.’  For example, what if we took the experience of building ‘community’ with family members during these past months and made a conscious effort to actively build a renewed sense of ‘community’ in our parish?  Imagine if the 10% of parishioners who are actively engaged in volunteering… doubled?!  And if the number who tithe, giving their most and best to God… tripled(?) … to benefit the community!  Imagine how our understanding of God’s Community would expand if we came out of this time with a more intentional concern for those who are less fortunate, the ‘burdened’ of this world?

In the Mass, listen for words about unity and God’s vision for all of creation to live as one Community, especially in the Eucharistic Prayer we will pray together, “O God, you never cease to gather the whole human race into one.  May your people shine forth as a prophetic sign of unity and concord.”  (EP – Various Needs #1)

While our country celebrates our independence with the symbol of Lady Liberty’s raised beacon of light welcoming the poor…, as Christians, our much greater icon is Jesus’ arms raised and open saying to each of us, “Come to me…and I will give you rest.”  The unity with God we are about to partake in, is meant to transform our hearts and attitudes…to keep expanding our interpretation of what ‘community’ means…so that we never put boundaries on Jesus’ outreach to “ALL who are burdened.”

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Thirteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time
Fr. Jim Deiters

The Catholic Church has had a long, challenging history with regard to the role of women in the Church.  Although women have always been on the frontline of serving in healthcare and the poor for our Church’s 2000-year history, it wasn’t until 1965 at the Second Vatican Council, that Pope Paul VI made the first official mention of women’s significance in the Church’s work of the Gospel.  Since then, it was Pope John Paul II and popes Benedict and Francis since then, who have continued to deepen the conversation about the important vocation of women.  Saint John Paul II, in his letter on the dignity of women wrote, “The Church gives thanks to God for the ‘mystery of woman’ and her feminine dignity, and for the 'great works of God,' which throughout human history have been accomplished in and through women.

Just this week, a symposium was hosted by the US and British Ambassadors to the Vatican on the role of Women Religious who are working on the frontline of the virus pandemic, especially in the poor parts of our world most affected by COVID.  And in two weeks, 25 Catholic leaders are meeting for an online course hosted by the Vatican called “Women in public life: feminism and Catholic identity in the 21st century.”  This kind of ‘good news’ about the Church’s respect for women is very slowly helping heal centuries of hurt.

The significance of women in Salvation history goes back to such important texts as our first reading from the Book of Kings.  It is a simple but profound story of this ‘un-named’ woman from the town of Shunem who was the main provider of water and housing for the prophet Elisha.  She represents all kinds of hospitable, leading women in Judeo-Christian history who, without them…, our male prophets, rabbis, Apostles, and Catholic priests would probably not be where they are today!  I can personally attest to the many feminine influences on my role in the Church, starting with Blessed Mother Mary who kept leading me to Jesus and my vocation to the Priesthood even through my many wayward ways.

Much of Jesus’ own ministry was made possible through the role of women as his most faithful disciples, including being the ones who stayed with him all the way to the Cross and were the first to proclaim the Resurrection.  We all know that God could have saved the human race in anyway God wanted; it is no small matter that God chose to do so through a woman’s womb, the Virgin Mary.

This one un-named woman in the Book of Kings, has been stuck in my mind this week.  Her important role in the prophet Elisha’s life is the kind of hospitality, that in the Gospel, Jesus applauds as a most virtuous act…when he says, “whoever welcomes a stranger and gives them food and water is actually welcoming Jesus himself.”  Women, in Elisha’s time, in Jesus’ time, and in our own day, are created by God with special feminine gifts to complement, and SOME would say, “save” the male species!

But the main scriptural point today is that of hospitality – truly having a Christian welcoming attitude and action toward every one of God’s children, especially those seeking food, shelter, and safety from violence; which if you think about global violent behavior, is usually led by male leaders.  The way we Christians act and vote must always be guided by these teachings of Jesus about caring for those in need, especially he says, towards those seeking a place to live and eat.  Jesus says that any time we do not “welcome the stranger,” we are turning our back on Jesus himself.  And that will be a dark day of judgement for that poor soul.

Jesus’ tough teachings like this are often interpreted as too lofty to achieve.  It definitely requires ongoing conversion as a secular, political way of thinking tempts us to take the ‘popular’ path.  The main hope we cling to is the Holy Spirit’s Power that is given to us in baptism and the other sacraments.  Recalling St. Paul’s section of Romans we just heard, notice the prepositions when he writes, we are “baptized INTO Christ Jesus.”  Then Paul says, we now “live FOR God…IN Jesus.”  For most of us, it takes a lifetime of prayer and grace to understand and LIVE our life and all choices IN Jesus Christ.

The other great hope I have is what I witness happening in the lives of some of our youth and young adults.  Starting with many of our confirmation and high school students whom I have seen serving in leadership roles in our parish, and young adults choosing to stay faithful Catholics amidst cultural pressures to live otherwise, our own parish is working to help parents raise disciples of Jesus.  While we will be forever indebted to the role of women nurturing and shaping God’s Kingdom, here in the Eucharist, our unique ‘gender identity’ is transfigured into the Risen Jesus who models the ultimate form of hospitality – laying down your life for others.

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Twelfth Sunday in Ordinary Time 
Fr. Jim Deiters

Our Catholic faith has an interesting fascination with the human heart.  On Friday of this past week, we celebrated the Solemnity of the Sacred Heart of Jesus.  And yesterday was the feast of the Immaculate Heart of Mary.  Actually, it was God who first became captivated with the human heart from the moment he created this miraculous ‘machine’ in the human body.  I have this image of God having a big smile on his face when he created the heart and its intricate connection to all the other organs in our body!  Throughout the scriptures God talks openly about wanting our heart to be united to his heart of love…and consoling us when our heart is hurt or lost.

The thread I noticed throughout our scriptures for today is God speaking to the world through the human heart.  To summarize what we just heard, Jeremiah and the psalmist both had hearts that at times felt sad and discouraged, as friends had turned against them and people were judging them falsely.  But then, just as they were each bemoaning the way people treated them, their heart turns to a prayer of trusting in God.  After feelings of despair, Jeremiah’s heart ‘beat’ a new rhythm as he prays, “O Lord, you probe my heart…and you rescue me as my mighty champion!”  And when the psalmist prayed to God, “Lord, in your great love answer me,” God responded, “…may your heart revive!  The Lord hears the cry of the poor…”

And just to follow this same thread to Matthew’s Gospel, Jesus addresses various fears that often linger in our heart…sometimes wondering if God is really there.  Matthew is writing this at a time when his listeners felt great fear about being persecuted and martyred for staying faithful to Jesus’ teachings.  And Jesus says, “fear no one.” Shortly after this passage Jesus offers his timeless comforting words, “Come to me…all whose hearts are burdened…and I will give you rest; for I am meek and humble of heart.” 

I feel confident that God will continue to use this uncertain and tumultuous time in our world and country as a ‘heart examination’ for each of us.  From a biological perspective, we must ask our self… what really harbors in the four chambers of my heart?  Since we are called to let faith, love, and hope reside in three of them, what is in your fourth chamber?  Do we let Jesus’ gift of peace, light, or compassion control it?  Or do we let the toxic blood of an angry news channel or divisive Facebook postings get pumped into our sacred aortic valve…(?) that God created to inject the Spirit’s life and love?  Spiritually, we all have a version of a ‘heart condition’…that needs our Divine Physician, Jesus’ help.  We need to stop returning to whatever unhealthy ‘transfusion’ is straining our heart with anger, resentment, or prejudice.  The human heart is a miraculous organ in how the right side of the heart picks up the oxygen-poor blood from the body and moves it to the lungs for cleaning and re-oxygenating.

The breath of the Holy Spirit IS our “re-oxygenation!” A strong breath of God’s Spirit is so needed for our weary heart strained by the bloody mess we humans create for one another and our sacred planet.  We share a heartache over the political divisiveness, the racism, and the built-up anger over injustice that has sadly boiled over into violence.   We need more than ever this holy Eucharist to form a new ‘by-pass’ around the clogged, hardened arteries preventing us from being reflective icons of the Heart of Jesus.  During this time of not receiving from the Chalice, we believe that the Sacred Host contains the fullness of Jesus’ Body and Blood.  God’s ‘blood of holy love’ is about to enter into our bloodstream to possess our whole being.

As we prepare to place our lives at the Altar as our offering to God, let us pray about what is all going on in our heart that needs healed, forgiven, and let go of.  Try to feel and believe that Jesus… and His Spirit of Love… are about to pump ‘new blood’ into your body…to help our heart be more like the Immaculate Heart of Mary and the Sacred Heart of Jesus.

LISTEN TO THIS HOMILY
Corpus Christi 
Fr. Jim Deiters

A great book I recently finished is called “The Beekeeper of Aleppo.”  It is historic fiction that puts names and faces on the reality of what refugees go through in the daily struggle just to find food to live on and a safe place to live.  The author paints a horrific scene of what life is like in a refugee camp…while also telling a beautiful story of faith and hope of a young couple trying to keep their marriage and family together.  Reading the stories of people who long for clean water and a meal… stirred up some guilt in me for the times I take such things for granted.  I cannot imagine the struggle of a refugee parent when they must give up their own handful of food that day for their child’s survival instead.

The stories in the book about living with hunger came to mind when I was reflecting on Jesus’ powerful words, “…whoever feeds on me will have life…”  In John’s Gospel, Jesus says many times that we must “eat his body and drink his blood.” This was a turn-off for some of his followers who then left him, but Jesus’ words ended up being the foundation of our Catholic faith centered in the Eucharist, which we celebrate for today’s feast.

If you think about it, in the bible God is always providing food for people.  From the Garden of Eden, to manna in the dessert for the Israelites, to the multiplication of loaves and fish for the 5000, God knows our human hunger for food and our soul’s hunger for life in God.  Different from other God-given food, Jesus chooses to feed the world with a new kind of sustenance that unites us in a physical way to Jesus…as he says, “this is my Body…for you…so that I will be in you”

The way Jesus talks about ‘feeding’ on him in such intimate terms, makes me think of the beautiful way a baby feeds on the life-giving milk of their mother.  Miraculously, a baby instinctually clings to her mother to be fed… and a bond beyond words is created.  Since God himself created this process and link between a child and parent, it need not surprise us that Jesus, as our Savior, wants to form a new bond between humans and God by telling us to “feed” on him.  The Eucharist, in a sense, becomes our new ‘mother’s milk’ that gives us a new kind of food for our bodies and a new kind of sustenance for our soul.

To dwell on this image a little further, can you also see how this kind of ‘feeding’ that Jesus wants to provide for us requires a child-like vulnerability and dependence.  Perhaps this is part of the reason so many Catholics casually walk away from the practice of their faith since they do not want to admit how vulnerable and dependent on God they really are!  We teach our children to be ‘INdependent’ and strong…but then expect them to docile and obedient to Jesus and the Church’s doctrines…which we call holiness.  Parents and grandparents and all of us adults in the Church must find new ways to teach and model for our children the beauty and wisdom of being vulnerably dependent on God.  It is a beautiful thing to ‘mature’ from the breast of our mother to the breast of Jesus…who gently says to our hungry heart – “Come, feed on me.”

I am always grateful when one of our high school or college students trusts me enough to come and talk about their burdens of depression, drug use, or issues of sexual identity.  But I am also sad when they say they feel very little connection to God or the sacraments.  And I wonder where we as a Church or parents failed in not helping them know how much they need the Body of Christ as the one FOOD that can most satisfy their restless heart.  Why did we not tell them that this is their new ‘mother’s milk’…and without it they will starve?  Why do we try and feed them with so many other things that leave them hungry… like refugees seeking a new homeland?

Our loving God-Parent sees that we are often like the Israelites, wondering around, lost in the dessert.  God knows how hungry we really are for something more meaningful than the material things we keep tasting for pleasure.  Jesus himself, fully human, knows the longings of our human heart, and wants to feed us with his very Self to nourish us with the grace, love, and mercy for which we long.

For those of us who already know and believe in the power of the Eucharist as Jesus’ own Body, our recent weeks away from being able to receive Communion definitely made us appreciate the GIFT of what and WHO we receive at Mass.  We must use this historic moment to become even more on fire in talking about the meaning of the Eucharist with our young people.  Let us ask the Holy Spirit to help us always be vulnerably childlike in admitting our dependence on God for the real food we need for Eternal Life.  And may we be moved by the Holy Spirit to tell others about this miraculous ‘feeding’ from the breast of God… that lets us live IN Jesus… and Jesus in us!

LISTEN TO THIS HOMILY
Trinity Sunday
Fr. Jim Deiters 

When I was waiting in line in the grocery store the other day, along with others practicing distance, I overheard the sweetest conversation between a little girl, probably around 5, and her dad.  I watched her looking around at all of us standing apart from one another and through her own cute mask I heard her say, “I’m just so happy that I don’t have to be safe-distant from you daddy!”

The feast of the Trinity, and all that it means, feels ironic this year since our honoring God as a UNITY of Three Persons is in such contrast to what is going on in our world and country these days.   Even as we live IN God’s unity, as a society we are also living with three different ‘divisions’ that are hurting us as a human race.  Our first suffering is from the ‘distancing’ we need to practice due to the pandemic.  A second more painful ‘divide’ we suffer is the one caused by mean-spirited politics…that has pitted us against one another.  And most recently we have been reminded of the ongoing divide in our country rooted in the sin of racism.  We are indeed a broken human race and so a prayer that has been running through my mind this week is this: O God of UNITY help and heal us! 

Let us look briefly at these three areas of ‘community breakdown’ and how our scriptures can help us.  In our reading from Corinthians, St. Paul gives a blessing at the end of his letter calling on the Blessed Trinity.  Basically, he tells us that God as Trinity gives us three ‘tools’ to help us: “the grace of Jesus, the love of God, and the fellowship (comm-union) of the Holy Spirit.”  Of course, they cannot be separated but I like how Paul distinguishes different blessings that all flow from the same Holy Trinity…to help us he says, “live in peace.”

First: We must admit the divisive prejudice against black persons that has a very long history in our country.  The recent violent killings of our black brothers make our human brokenness glare at us in the face.  We must decide whether to ignore the causes of injustice… or realize, with the teachings of Jesus and our Catholic faith, that this is a pro-life issue where the sacredness of each human life must be defended.  As we long for an end to the sin of racism that causes division, we so need the Trinity’s “grace, love, and fellowship” as we pray, O God of Unity help and heal us!

The second kind of division that haunts us comes from mean-spirited politics.  We get sucked into hateful words and lies that go against the core of who we are as disciples of Jesus who died on the cross as a witness to non-violence and love of the poor.  We so need the three-fold gifts of the Trinity, “grace, love, and fellowship” to help us remember that before any political party, we belong to God, who is love and peace.  O God of Unity, help and heal us!

Amid such bleakness, our parish community joyfully comes together for the first time in three months.  Since the role of God’s Spirit is to draw us INTO the unifying life of God, our time away from each other has given each of us new opportunity to think about what it means to belong to a community and how our life IN GOD calls us to be a unifying force in our neighborhoods and country.  As we gradually come back together, we have to ask ourselves if we will we be any different in how we, as a parish, reflect God’s Unity in the way we treat one another and reach out to others?  Oh God of Unity, help and heal us!

On a practical note for our prayer this week, St. Catherine of Siena wrote about the Trinity as something you must “immerse yourself into like a fish in water.”  And St. Teresa of Avila described the Trinity as “the soul’s dwelling place.” When we realize that we are already within God, it changes and deepens how we pray.  We don’t just pray to God but pray within God.  Dwelling IN the Trinity, we participate in God’s grace, love, and comm-union…and every aspect of our being becomes aligned to the person of Christ.  This is why we pray at the end of the Eucharistic Prayer – through him, with him, and in him…

At the Eucharist, let us bring to God at the Altar any thoughts or feelings of division or angst… and allow ourselves to be immersed into God’s grace, love, and comm-union.  When we receive the Lord in Holy Communion, Jesus himself penetrates and transforms us…so that we can bring God’s grace and love to the rest of humanity.

LISTEN TO THIS HOMILY
Pentecost 
Fr. Jim Deiters

Some of you may be familiar with a book called “The Five Love Languages” that has helped millions of marriages and other relationships discover simple ways to better relate to one another.  We used the book for a marriage night here in the parish a while back, and many parishioners talked about the insight it gave them in their relationship.  Basically, the book explains how we each have unique ways/ ‘languages’ in which we like to give and receive signs of love.  For example, some feel more loved with words of affirmation and others prefer quality time together. If we learn to ‘interpret’ signs of love, it helps our relationships.

The scriptures for our feast of Pentecost celebrate the different ways that the ‘language’ of the Holy Spirit works in people’s lives once they receive God’s Spirit.  In one sense there is only ONE language of Love from the Holy Spirit.  But it is fascinating how people ‘hear’ and receive the Spirit’s ‘love language’ differently; and I also find it amazing how each person ‘speaks’ God’s love differently through their own gifts and abilities.  

Sadly, in our culture we have a strange hierarchy of who is ‘loved’ and ‘loveable’ that is often based on looks, if they think like me, or who makes it to the ‘top.’  And all the while, God’s ‘honor system’ is based on who speaks and lives the Spirit’s language of love in a way that is most like Jesus (!)- inclusive, compassionate, and with non-violence.  

In this famous passage from 1 Corinthians, St. Paul reminds us that we were all “given to drink of ONE Spirit.”  Paul is talking about the Holy Spirit that flows from the heart of Jesus and is Good News, especially for anyone who feels they are not in the ‘in crowd’ or don’t think they are as talented as others.  You and I drink from the same Spirit as did such heroes like Mother Theresa, John Paul II, Dorothy Day, and Martin Luther King Jr.  The Spirit spoke God’s language of love in each of them very differently than how the Spirit wants to use your life and mine.  God needs your life, your voice, and your heart to spread the Spirit’s Love in a different way than any other person can do so!  Do you hear how the scriptures about the Holy Spirit are encouraging and affirming each of us to activate the Spirit’s gifts we have been given?  And that Pentecost is not just a one-time event long ago?

But our false egos get in the way and tempts us to compare our self to others and even get jealous if someone gets more attention for the way they ‘speak’ and live out the Holy Spirit’s love vocabulary.  St. Paul is pleading with us to celebrate each person’s unique gifts that God distributes generously like scattering seed in a field.  We need to see that our unique gifts, our own simple life, compliments the gifts of others instead of competing with them.  But you can also see why someone who uses words that offend the Spirit’s Love angers us when their language is hate, divisive, and deceitful.

Something I have become very aware of in myself the past weeks of not being able to celebrate Mass with you in person… is that I realize, in my own ‘love language,’ how much I need your presence, your faith, and your living witness in my life.  I have come to realize more than ever how much our parishioners mean to me and my vocation…in the way you live out and speak the Holy Spirit’s Love language for me.  Each of you, in your own way, ARE the Spirit’s Love that speak to my life and make me a better person and priest.  Thank you.

The opportunity for all of us is that when we are able to be reunited here in church, we come back with new eyes and ears to better appreciate the unique ways that we each contribute differently to the spreading of the Spirit’s love and gifts.

For our prayer this week, let us be more aware of the words that come from our mouth… and the silent language we express in our actions and attitudes.  Does it sound like Jesus’ language of peace and forgiveness we heard him speak in the Gospel today?  Does our dialect reflect the Holy Spirit’s love and compassion for others?

Spirit Wind, Breath of God, breath new life into the world.

LISTEN TO THIS HOMILY
The Ascension of the Lord
Fr. Jim Deiters

Given my enjoyment of mountain climbing, I’ve been thinking about this surreal time of the pandemic with the image of the whole world being stuck on the same plateau…a long pause from our usual individual hikes up the mountain of life.  Many of us were on a steady pace of ‘climbing’ in our own little world.  Before we all ‘arrived’oi9kl on this shared plateau, some were climbing their own mountainside for their career or business.  On the other side of the mountain were those stepping up for ambitions of politics or financial gain.  And some were climbing another version of the hill that included all kinds of busy-ness with family and social engagements.  And suddenly we all arrived on this global plateau that has given us, if you think about it, a sort of ‘blessed’ time to ‘rest.’  However, what started out as a welcomed rest from the mountain-sized chaos of our lives…has some people feeling frustrated about the ‘rules’ created for our safety…and worries about their future…as we must learn together how to navigate this new world in which we now live.

The image of our lives as a mountain climb came to mind in light of these scriptures for our feast of the Ascension of Jesus to heaven.  In a sense, the word ‘ascension’ can be misleading for this feast if we think of it strictly in terms of Jesus moving ‘upward’ away from the earth as if ‘ascending” up a mountain.  Especially when the scriptures describe Jesus’ Ascension as being “lifted up, and a cloud took him from their sight,” if read too literally, it makes Jesus seem separated and far from us.  Actually, Jesus’ Ascension makes him more present to us than ever.  When Jesus ascends into heaven, we cannot think of it as a spatial lift-off, but rather he ascends into a new dimension of reality that is not bound by time and place.  (Our young people who like science and math can appreciate this language.) Risen and Ascended, Jesus is no longer limited to First Century Israel but transcends ‘space’ as we know it, to filtrate our lives more intimately here on earth while also drawing us into heaven with God.   Not limited by time and space, the Ascended Jesus can now be very close to us in our own homes and at the very Altar of this Mass.  Jesus ascended into the sphere of God’s timelessness; and since we are a part of his Body, our own existence takes on a much deeper meaning…beyond the ‘climbing’ of our personal life mountain.

God entered our earthly sphere of time and space in Jesus’ Birth; then in his Death and Resurrection, Jesus changes death into a transition into eternal life with God; and now in his Ascension he takes all of humanity INTO heaven with him as the realm of God’s world is now intersected with ours.  Christ now reigns as the true Universal Christ, beyond time and space, united with people of every generation, every nation, and all of Creation!  This is why this time that we stand on a plateau with the rest of the world can be seen as a ‘holy time’ since it can help us see our unity as a human race as God sees us.

Not to overkill the image, but instead of thinking of Jesus as being at the ‘top’ of the mountain, Jesus-God IS the mountain…and invites us INTO his life…rather than a tiring hike upward for personal gain.  Sure, our careers and desires for success are still worthy…when we put them into perspective that we are already saved!  There is no need to ‘prove’ our worth to others when we realize that Jesus has given us the ultimate prize already…by taking us with him into his ascended place with God.

Applying all of this more personally, today St. Paul prays that we receive and accept “God’s Spirit of wisdom and revelation, resulting in a deeper knowledge of who Jesus is.”  Paul goes on, pleading with us to realize that with our life in Christ Jesus, we inherit these ‘riches of glory” and a “surpassing greatness” because we are a part of Christ’s Body and you can’t separate Christ as the head from the rest of his Body.  Can you see how this is Good News for your life?

In this strange time of being together on this ‘plateau,’ a break from our usual fast- pace-life climbing, today’s feast lets us see in a new, beautiful way that we have already made it to the ‘top’… since all that really matters in the long run…is our life in God.  In your prayer this week, let yourself feel ‘ascended’  INTO a new life in God.  And from our resting place IN Jesus, we can hear his comforting voice say to us again, “I am with you always.”

LISTEN TO THIS HOMILY
Sixth Sunday of Easter 
Fr. Jim Deiters

On Monday, May 18, we mark what would have been the 100^th birthday of St. John Paul II, a heroic pastor and pope between 1978-2002.  His contributions to the world and Church are many, including his global influence on the end of communism in Russia and Eastern Europe.  He also ignited waves of youth and young adults to the Catholic faith by starting World Youth Day and increasing many vocations to the priesthood and religious life.  One of John Paul II’s famous quotes that he used regularly in homilies, speeches to millions, and in his prolific writings is this – “Be Not Afraid,” words first spoken by Jesus himself.  He was a beacon of hope for people of all denominations by calling people to put aside fear and trust in Jesus.  Many years ago, a faithful parishioner gave me a framed image of these words that hangs at a prominent place in my house for me to pray and remember every day.

With the feast of Pentecost in two weeks, the Church wants us to already reflect on the activities of the Holy Spirit in these Scriptures we hear today.  When Pope John Paul II was asked what one thing we needed more of in the Church, he said, “a better understanding of the Holy Spirit and a relationship with the Spirit.”  Imagine if each of us, and the 1.4 billion Catholics of the world, would become on fire with the Holy Spirit on a similar level to how the Early Christians let the Spirit make them so bold about their faith...even to the point of becoming missionaries and martyrs for Jesus!  We must remember that God’s Spirit is no less active in the world now than it was 2000 years ago. 

Many Christians forget how much Jesus emphasized the role of the Holy Spirit in our life which he says he gives us “to be with us always” and to “guide us to the Truth.”  You see, the Holy Spirit is the LOVE of God, which Jesus and God the Father ‘breathe’ INTO each of us.  And since the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit cannot be separated, as St. Elizabeth of the Trinity wrote, we have the full Trinity dwelling within us...through baptism, confirmation, and the Eucharist.  Jesus speaks so affectionately of our relationship to the Trinity by telling us today, “I am in the Father...and you are in me... and I am in you.”  In this Easter Season, this help us see the connection between Jesus’ Resurrection and his gift of his Spirit that he breathes into us so that we can trust God is always within us!

But Jesus gives us his Spirit, not to just make us feel good and content.  In addition to the Spirit helping us to not be afraid, the role of God’s Holy Spirit is to ‘equip’ us for mission!  Each one of us has been given certain gifts and charisms of the Holy Spirit for some specific purpose in God’s Church.  We as a Church have not been very good at helping people discern what gifts of the Spirit they have been given.  And parents and grandparents have the extra task of helping their children discern what gifts the Spirit has given them to use for God’s Kingdom.  We spend so much energy and resources wanting kids to be good at sports and a get a good education...but forget to teach them about praying to the Holy Spirit to discern how God wants to use their life for some great purpose in his Kingdom – which is their real path to happiness!  Young people, be sure you talk to the Holy Spirit each day, asking what God wants you to BE – before you choose a career, spouse, or vocation.

But I want to come back to John Paul II’s favorite quote from Jesus, “Be Not Afraid!”  In the Gospel today, Jesus calls the Holy Spirit our “Advocate,” to “be with you always.”  Think of the description ‘advocate’ as a ‘helper,” almost like a defense attorney who always works on our behalf.  Jesus describes the Holy Spirit even more personally by telling us that this Spirit of God’s Love will “remain with you” and “will be IN you.”

We can all use an ‘update’ on praying to the Holy Spirit, God’s breath of Love, to help us know what we are supposed to be and do with the short life God has given to us.  In your prayer, first recognize the Holy Spirit inside of you as your “Advocate-helper;” then think about talents that come more naturally for you...gifts that God has given you, different from other persons…like being a good listener, helping others…or being a leader, praying for others, being passionate for justice, or teaching others about God.

We must remember that the Holy Spirit IS God, the ‘part’ of God that dwells within us, aids us as our Advocate, and helps us to not be afraid during whatever challenge we are facing.  In this strange time in our lives, just in case you have been wondering where God is in all of this…let us listen again to the calming assurance of Jesus, “I will not leave you orphaned; I give you my Spirit to be with you always; you are in me… and I in you.”