2nd Sunday in Ordinary Time - 2022

Isaiah 62:1–5
1 Corinthians 12:4–11
John 2:1–11

The words of the prophet Isaiah and the Gospel story from John concern weddings–both are a special kind of wedding. At a first glance it looks like the gospel story is about something that could happen at the wedding of someone we know. Food and drink are not enough…This could be an embarrassment for the bride and groom. Someone miraculously intervenes and everyone saves face!!!

It is the vision of Isaiah that clues us in that there is something bigger going on than a familiar Galilean wedding scene. Isaiah sees a wedding, but the wedding is between God and his people. The people are the bride and the Lord God is the bridegroom. The prophet is excited about the significance of this wedding. He says he cannot keep quiet and will not be silent. He must say what he sees. And what does he see? He sees God coming close to his people, he sees God loving his people. He sees an intimate relationship between God and the community. Yes, he sees everything there could be between a bride and groom: all the love, the closeness the care, the forgiveness, the respect, the hopes and dreams that come with every bride and groom. Yes, he sees that all happening between God the creator and redeemer and the people he calls his own. A people he calls his delight.

Like any wedding, the prophet sees a new beginning in this relationship. The lives of bride and groom are not the same after the wedding. Something new is born between them. So the prophet sees that something new is born between God and his people. There is a new name because there is a new relationship and a new love taking place.

When we look closely at the story of the wedding of Cana, we can find this same message hidden in what looks like an all too familiar Middle East wedding. The clue to what this story is all about is at the end. John says Jesus was doing a sign. What happened was not so much a miracle but a sign. John says look beyond what you see and hear at first; look beyond the physical elements to the spirit elements of the story. What happened in Cana points, like a sign, to something and someone.

How does the story begin? It begins with a lack on our part. Mary’s says it clearly, “They have no wine.” Her simple words state the obvious—our human insufficiency. We have lost something in our relationship with God. Something is missing and the union between God and humanity, the wedding, cannot go on. It is terribly broken and wounded.

They have no wine. This statement reflects all our limitations. We see it in the Gospels. Each person that approaches Jesus for help is lacking something essential: sight, hearing, the ability to walk, stand up straight, is hungry and thirsty and finally facing death, the great gap in life. In the face of our limitedness, Mary gives us a voice. She mediates our lack and limitedness to the Son who reflects the love of God. We have come to the end; we feel the helplessness of our human condition; think of sickness and death alone. Our wine, our zest for life is running out. The Spirit seems far away.

At first Jesus seems to balk at having to do anything with human limitation. “Why are you telling me?” It is not the time to get involved in humanity. But he knows he must. He knows that his hour is coming when he will have to face human treachery and death. He knows that the moment he stands in now is about the love of two human beings being sealed—it is a wedding. And he must be faithful to healing human love. Love is what he knows in the bosom of the Father and love he must show. And so he does. Mary points him the direction of divine love fulfilling human love and relationships.

Jesus turns to the limitations around him: simple stone water jars that are empty, waiting to be filled--six of them, the number signing incompleteness. He speaks a word and the servers fill them with water; something, yes, but not quite what will match the festivities of a wedding. But Jesus takes all this limited material of humanity: a failing party, the loss of face of the bride and groom, 6 empty jars, water and fills them with something new, with wine. Jesus transforms the limited situation and fills it with abundance and blessing. Jesus takes his hour, though he says it not yet, and yet does what his hour is all about. He loves the human situation, he takes delight in our humanity. He will do that fully when he takes our death and fills it with new life.

It is the least in the story that mediate this transformation from empty jars to full jars of water and carry it as wine. Who are the ones in the story who realize what has happened between filling the water jars and carrying them to the headwaiter? Only the servers. The servers know.

Isn’t being a servant where you and I are in the story? We are caught in a life whose joy seems running out. We can name the limitations in our society and in our world at large. We can see the party of humans, but we know that it is lacking life, commitment. The delight of togetherness is fragile at best. But then comes the word of Jesus. We hear it as we do every Sunday here. With that word in our hearts, we do what at first makes no sense. But we are faithful servants who obey the master so we carry out his word.

We servants believe that our human limitations, like no wine, empty earthenware jars, are the stuff that our God takes up and fills with new life, with reconciled relationships, with hope and grace. We believe that because Jesus stands in the middle of our life’s journey to take up our emptiness and fill it with new wine, with the Spirit with all its gifts to generate life. Our task is simple: be servants who carry this new wine to a world whose meaning is running dry. Do that and the delight God sees us to be will not be a distant promise but a reality.

~Prior, Fr. Joel Macul, OSB

Feast of the Epiphany

Mt 2:1-12
Is 60:1-6
Eph 3:2-3a,5-6

focus: Jesus is the light, the Savior of all humankind.

We are invited to receive the light and to manifest it to others. Some things we’ve lost we seek with greater intensity than others. If we’ve lost a penny, we don’t bother much; if it’s a hundred dollar bill, we bother much more! A person who misplaced their only set of car keys may turn the whole house upside down. Parents who’ve lost a child will never, never stop searching!

Today’s gospel presents us with the magi form the East. Their scientific insight, and probably what they’ve read in their own sacred writings, move them to embark upon a great search, a long journey. They follow a star. They travel “from the east.” They bring gifts. The diligence of their search indicates their belief in the value of the One for whom they search. They seek a special “newborn king.”

They don’t mind the discomfort, the troubles and risks that often came with traveling in antiquity. In Jerusalem, they have to contend with the power hunger, the fear, and the intrigue of King Herod. Finally, the seekers arrive. Because the eyes of their hearts are open they can recognize the wonder-full work of God in the poor child of Bethlehem. They use their own knowledge; they are willing to learn from the Scribes in Jerusalem;and they are ready to be surprised by God! Beyond the reverence due to any ruler, they fall down – in worship. They become the first representatives of the peopleswho get to Jesus after his birth. They acknowledge, as was said earlier in Matthews Gospel,that in this child “God is with us.”

Oftentimes artists depicted in paintings the effect that the visit in the stable had on the magi. The rough hands of the old men become tender and their faces marvel as they kneel down at the manger and present their gifts to the child. The gifts symbolically fit with the recipient: The gold represents Jesus’ royalty, the incense points to his divinity, and the myrrh indicates his suffering and death. Then the magi are warned in a dream not to return to Herod; and they depart for their county by another way. That they are open to such guidance from God shows once again that they are people who listen inward. At the same time, this different route symbolically expresses that their experience has transformed them. The ways they choose in their lives now are new and different ones!

In today’s first reading, the prophet Isaiah presents with a vision of God’s light and glory, which, he says, will be granted to many nations. One day, so Isaiah, nations and kings will walk by this shining radiance and will joyfully come with their gifts and riches to praise and adore God. With the Evangelist Matthew, we see this prophecy fulfilled in Jesus Christ.

Today’s solemnity of Epiphany, the word translated means ‘Manifestation,’ expounds for us in greater fullness the meaning of Christmas: Jesus is the Light of the nations, as the 2nd Vatican Council points out, ‘Lumen Gentium.’ He is the Messiah, the shepherd and ruler of his people Israel and of all peoples. And in him, as the preface of the feast proclaims, God has renewed all humanity in God’s own immortal image. Through Him, in Him, God gives all of us, all humans, a share in his divine nature.

My sisters and brothers, Jesus is the light, the Savior of all humankind. We, like the magi, are called upon to receive the light and to manifest it to others. In a threefold way, the magi are models for us. First, they were seekers. They made use of their mind’s natural light in order to gain knowledge; and they were open to a revelation that they could only receive. Prayer, regular and persistent prayer, is necessary for such openness of mind and heart to come about.

Second, the wise magi were also people of action. They were ready to set out, to act upon what they had understood. They took risks, and gave up the comfort of their lives at home, for the sake of the journey. The result was that they found God, not in abstract concepts, but in the person of Jesus Christ. Also for us, finding God is very concrete and often involves concrete human beings.

Finally, the magi were transformed by their experience. They returned on a different route. It was impossible for them to be silent about what they had heard and seen. They became persons of manifestation themselves.

Cardinal Kurt Koch, the President of the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity,wrote, “As the Lord’s appearance in Bethlehem was plain and inconspicuous, so His Epiphany in the lives of Christians will occur ordinarily and not sensationally. And as the Lord appeared in our world humanly and in solidarity with the people, his appearance can be extended through the church today and bring encouragement and liberation. Since Christmas, God’s Epiphany wants to continue through the lives of Christians in this world.”

‘Lumen Caecis’ is the motto of our missionary Benedictine Congregation, Light for the Blind. That’s what all of us can be as a result of our search for God and of our pilgrimage to Bethlehem.

~Fr. Thomas Leitner, OSB

Christmas Day - 2021

Joh 1:1-18 
Is 52:7-10 
Heb 1:1-6 

focus: God’s gifts often come in simplicity.

function: We are invited to notice the gift, to adore, and to be a gift to others.

The largest diamond of all times was found in a mine in South Africa in 1905. It was bigger than a man’s fist and weighed more than a pound, or 621 grams. The Transvaal government at the time  bought it from the mine and it decided to give it as a gift to the king of England, Edward VII. First, however, it had to be shipped to England! Due to its extraordinary value, a rumor was spread that it would be transported on a steamboat. A parcel was ceremoniously locked into the captain’s safe there and guarded on the entire journey. However, this was a tactic to divert the public’s attention. The stone on that ship was fake; and not too much would have been lost if someone would have stolen it. The real diamond was sent in a simple cardboard box through regular mail. Both diamonds, the fake and the real one, made it to England without a problem. The raw diamond was later cut into 105 smaller diamonds, the two largest of them are among the jewels in the British crown.

Just like the gift of the diamond arrived in a cardboard box in simplicity, so it is with the much greater gift that we celebrate today: Jesus Christ, who is God’s gift  to us.  He came in the simplicity of a stable. The child was born in poverty. Mary, his mother, laid him in a manger, a feeding trough for animals. And there in the stable he was surrounded by Mary and Joseph, the simple shepherds, marginalized at this time because they were smelly and often considered thieves. And there were some animals.

Today’s gospel points us to the true magnitude of God’s gift:  Christ is the creative Divine Word through which in the beginning everything came into being. He is the source of life. His life is the light of the human race. He shines more than any diamond ever can. No darkness can ultimately overcome his light.  And then there is the key sentence: “The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us.” He pitched his tent among us, would be the literal translation from the Greek text of the gospel. He became one of us, in all things like us except for sin. He knew poverty and life’s hardships. The tent reminds me of refugees. Jesus was a refugee himself as a baby in Egypt. Later in his ministry Jesus will show how much God cares for all,   especially for the poor, for those on the margins like shepherds and foreigners, for sinners, and for all of us.

 Jesus is the fulfillment of what the prophets of old longed for. “How beautiful upon the mountain are the feet of the one who brings glad tidings, announcing peace, bearing good news, announcing salvation.” This was originally an oracle for the people who have returned from the Babylonian Exile, but the beginnings were difficult.  With the help of God’s amazing grace, the prophet says, Mount Zion, the temple, Jerusalem, will be restored. The people can live again at home with peace and joy.  What follows then certainly became true more in Jesus: God’s salvation, God’s comfort,  extends to everyone, to all the nations, to the whole world! We have reason for joy!

To those who accept him, St. John says, Jesus gave power to become children of God.  We can be born anew of God. “God took on our human nature, in order for us to share in God’s own nature,” Pope St. Leo the Great says in his famous Christmas sermon that we heard last night.  He continues, “Do not forget that you have been rescued  from the power of darkness and brought into the light of God's kingdom … Christian, remember your dignity … Through the sacrament of baptism you have become a temple of the Holy Spirit. Do not live below your dignity.”

Dear sisters and brothers in the faith, God’s gifts often come in simplicity. We are invited to notice the gifts, to adore, and to be a gift to others. How have God’s gifts come to you in the course of this year which was still marked quite strongly by the pandemic? Let’s think of the simple gifts. While we have been able more this year to go about the activities of our lives as usual, some of my meetings still took place on videoconference rather than in person. We sometimes conversed on Zoom or on the phone rather than in the same room. Did you have more time to go out for good walks, to get things in order in your home and to pray? I can say that this was true for me and I am grateful for it.

Our nativity sets that surround us these days are an invitation to sit down in front of one quietly in adoration. As we do so, the darkness about which the gospel speaks may come to our minds at first. The suffering of so many of our relatives and friends from Covid or other illnesses, the loneliness and the economic hardships that so many still experience   and so much more. And yet we can pray that the gentle Divine Light that shone forth at the first Christmas may brighten our hearts and the hearts of those who are near and dear to us. The light shines in the darkness and the darkness has not overcome it.

Christmas shows us God’s greatest and most precious gift to us, his Son Jesus Christ. We can ask ourselves: How can we whom his has given a share in his divine nature, be a gift to others? Through listening, through tokens of appreciation, through sharing what we have, through prayer?  There are many ways of extending Jesus’ work of making known God’s great love for all and so become God’s precious gift for others. AMEN.

~Fr. Thomas Leitner, OSB

Christmas Eve Vigil - 2021

The Nativity of the Lord-Mass during the Night

Isaiah 9:1–6
Titus 2:11–14
Luke 2:1–14

Christmas is a feast of light. The official prayer of the Christmas Mass that we prayed speaks of the splendor of true light radiating in the night. The prayer reminds us that we have known the mysteries of light in our lives. Ultimately, our minds are illuminated so that our actions may shine with light. The prophet Isaiah opens the feast with the grand proclamation that “the people who walked in darkness have seen a great light, places of gloom have seen light shine on them” (Is 9:1). Of course, we know something of light associated with Christmas from the many trees and houses decorated outside with lights. The lights on the trees inside are a fascination when we are young. As we get older and see these lights around towns and decorating malls, they bring a sense of comfort. We might wonder at times if there is too much light in decorations. But we will in the end say, no, we need these lights. This is an indicator that light holds an attraction for us in its beauty and in its hope for a renewed earth with the richness of its cultures.

The light, says the prophet tonight, shines in the darkness; it shines on people living in gloom. Perhaps for the light of Christmas to make any sense, we first need to acknowledge the darkness in our world and in our hearts. Christmas is not a season to forget all the darkness that we acknowledge or reluctantly admit. Or worse, it is not a time to deny the darkness. We live in a broken world, a fragile world.

Who are the people living and working in the darkness? For the prophet Isaiah, it is that section of Israel that had fallen under the dictatorship of Assyria, the super power of his day. Every Israelite who experienced that knew the sound of the invading boots. They saw and heard the cracking of the whip of slavery, the yoke that forced them to work or go in one direction or their blood would be shed. Anyone who knows the history of Assyria at war knows the cruelty and violence with which they exercised power and dominion. Forced labor and exile were their preferred methods of conquering. This is the darkness that the prophet knows and sees. And in that darkness, he sees God’s response: a child, a son.

The darkness Isaiah sees is not for his time. We can name who the people are living in darkness now: It is the human family, brothers and sisters, who live with war and conflict; it is that portion of humanity on the move that arrive at borders, walking in hope, but find the way blocked, or in the story of Christmas, “no room at the inn.” Humanity living where poverty reigns and the dregs seem endless or who live under dubious political structures or are caught in rampant economic inequality by powers seeking oil or weapons. Or it is the brothers and sisters standing out in the open air because their houses and living have been blown away in a whirlwind. What of the darkness of the drug addict’s mind or a family member hemmed in by addiction. Yes, the darkness of Isaiah is well-known in our human family.

Yet it is for those in such darkness that a great light is seen today; it is for those in gloom that light is shining tonight. But it is not a light of our own making, a candle or electric bulb, white or colored. The prophet says look, there is a child born for those in darkness, a son is given to us who know gloom. This is God’s response to the power, the slavery, the war and violence that breathe in darkness. We look for relief from oppression and structures of sin and how does God respond? He responds in the fragility of a child. A child whom we all know is powerless, except when the child is God’s gift. In the powerlessness of this child, a new world opens up for us. It is a world not just for you and I in our comfortable society, but a child for the earth, for humanity, for all its peoples. On this child’s shoulders, rests a dominion of peace, of justice and freedom—not on our terms, but on God’s terms.
We gather as a church in the darkness this Christmas night, we do this so we can proclaim that light has come and will shine all the brighter for its contrast to the dark. It is not a flickering light, like a candle ready to go out. It is a clear light that only our God has promised and we believe has come true. In the end, darkness, we believe, does not reign; it is light that rules. It is imperative that we proclaim this light in the darkness and especially for those who are living in it in any form.
The story of Jesus’ birth has him born in the night. This is not by mere chance. It is because he is the child of light. Listen closely to the story again and you will find where the light is shining. It shines around those earning a living in the darkness. It is around the shepherds that the glory of the Lord shines. It is around the lowly shepherds, whose work goes on even in dark, that glory and light shines. And they receive the same message that Isaiah gave: a child is born for you, your joy and your hope. And they go and see. But that is not all. They talk and speak about the child.

We need to be the shepherds who go about telling all that the light means. For the light becomes real when we sit with it, when we are in awe of its radiance, and finally when we speak about it. For Christmas happens when the unspeakable light that is God is spoken and becomes our flesh, a child for us. And Christmas continues to happen when we in our turn become shepherds who speak the word about the light we have come to believe. The more we proclaim that light, the more we live that light, the more humanity will know God’s plan, God’s vision for us, a plan for peace, for solidarity among humans, for justice, for an earth that is a garden bearing fruit and a place of beauty for all.

~Prior, Fr. Joel Macul, OSB

The Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary

Genesis 3:9-15.20
Ephesians 1:3-6.11-12
Luke 1.26-38

You may have heard that some Catholics think the feast of the Immaculate Conception is honoring the conception of Jesus in Mary’s womb. That would be a misconception of the mystery before us. The misunderstanding may be reasonable as the Gospel for today even tells the story of Jesus’ conception in Mary’s womb. But today we are honoring someone affected by the sinlessness of Jesus. We are honoring his Mother. And we are honoring her conception, her coming into existence in the flesh. We are recognizing her as “full of grace” as “highly favored” by God.

Another aspect of the feast that can lead to misunderstanding is the word “immaculate”. For most of us, immaculate has to do with getting things clean, and I mean clean—no dirt, no dust. We might get the impression that God has to clean up a human pathway so his Son could enter into the human world. We might think that everything and everyone around Mary is dirty, unclean, and sinful. We might even go so far as to say that the sexual activity by which Mary was conceived was sinful. And so God has to overcome that sinfulness by a sinless conception in Saint Anne. All that could be a distraction from what we are remembering and honoring today.

It might be helpful if we were to introduce a simple word like “origins”. The feast today is about Mary’s origins in God’s plan to save. We are honoring the woman who is part of God’s will and who says yes to that will. We are taking time today to honor the woman whose whole life is rooted in God. We are clearly proclaiming that this human being did not arise from anything but God’s love for humanity.

This is a feast that remembers and celebrates origins and foundations. It celebrates the original intention of human life as a life lived in communion with God. As much as we have grown accustomed to saying and singing Mary conceived without original sin, it is not feast about sin. It does not honor original sin. It is a feast about what lies before sin ever was. And before sin ever was, there was grace, favor, companionship, intimacy, presence and praise without end. Could we say that in honoring Mary, really we are honoring Eve, that first woman who could walk and talk with God in the garden freely and without shame? The angel greets Mary as one full of grace. He is not speaking as though he were bringing the grace to Mary or carrying a favor of relationship from God to her. He is in fact recognizing someone who has been that way all along, from the beginning.

Some people say the coming of God as a human being is a scandal. It is hard to accept that God would take on himself the human condition. Well, if that is a scandal, and it is from one point of view, then today’s feast is also a scandal. It goes against everything that we human beings experience. After all, we do experience the world as less than clean. We don’t live in an immaculate environment.  Whether that environment is the air, the water, or the soil. And we don’t live in harmony with one another. Human relationships are for the most part broken relationships or at best fragile. We live in a society that many say is characterized by consumerism, greed and selfishness. We can’t get beyond ourselves. We look out for ourselves first. The only will is our own will. And we have become very good at making sure that the dirtiness of others is properly exposed for cleaning.

But today’s feast is a scandal in that is puts in front of us the image of someone who is rooted and grounded in goodness, love, fidelity and commitment. And we say that is the way human beings are called to be. Not by accident, not because it would be better that way, but because we are that way from the beginning. It is not sin that is original but rather grace. Eve walked with God in the garden before she and Adam made a choice that changed the relationship. The scandal is that a young women known to us as Mary of Nazareth, another way of saying, an insignificant woman because she comes from an insignificant place, is actually blessed to live as we were created from the beginning. We are proclaiming today as good news that a human being has lived her life in such a way that she is in harmony with God. We are proclaiming that God’s creative power is stronger than any negative force no matter how ancient we may say it is.

All that we ever say of someone when we say they are blessed, favored, beloved by God, we are saying today of Mary. We do not acknowledge it reluctantly or grudgingly. We don ot acknowledge it and then remain envious. We acknowledge it as truly a gift given by God. We say with the angel: Greetings, Mary, you are blessed by God. To acknowledge Mary’s honor is also to say something about our place before God. Acknowledging Mary’s election is also to admit our own election. We too are “chosen before the foundation of the world” as Paul says. We too are chosen to be holy and to live in love before God. There is solidarity between Mary and ourselves. She models for us what we as a community are called to be. And in honoring her we begin to allow the favor she received to work in our own lives. We are called to be a community that is conscious of the fact that we belong to God, that he has chosen us. We are called to be a community that waits for his word that seeks to do his will. We are called to be a community that lives by a plan that is larger than ourselves. We are called to be a community that reflects God’s willingness to be involved in the ordinary affairs of life, in human flesh. We are called to be a community that praises God for adopting us into his family, into his people.

Mary is given to us again as the image of our way of being human. She is given to us as the servant/handmaid who waits on the word and who says yes to it. That is the core of being human: to wait on a word and then to live attuned to it. To live a life in response to that Word is to live freely. Put in other words, it is to live without sin. For sin, as the first story we heard today, is nothing more than refusal to live by the Word.

In Mary we are offered a picture of ourselves as living by the Word and surrendering to it. In Mary we are offered a picture of what we, too, are called to become. We are to become a Church honoring its origins in God since the foundation of the world. We are to become a Church gathering to praise God because he has been faithful to her through the work of his beloved son, Jesus Christ.

~Prior, Fr. Joel Macul, OSB

2nd Sunday of Advent - 2021

Baruch 5:1–9
Philippians 1:4-6, 8-11
Luke 3:1-6

This is one of those rare Sundays in the year when the Gospel does not mention Jesus directly; it does not recount an incident from his life or one of his sayings. Jesus is absent in some way or at least is only in the background. Perhaps that is a clue about this season called Advent. It is not about someone here; it is about someone coming; it is the Advent of the Lord, to give this season its original and full title. It might do us well to be reminded that Jesus is not here. It is a central mystery of our faith that Jesus is still coming. And if he is coming, then he is not here.

Advent reminds us clearly of the fact that we are living in expectation of someone’s coming. This is not a fearful time. It is not an idle time, either. This time of waiting for Jesus is rather full—full of images of what is to come with Jesus; images of hope and fulfillment. At the same time, the Word of God is quite concrete about what we are to do as we wait in hope. And waiting in hope is a must of our lives as I see it. We can find two images in the word today that clue us in on this work even art of waiting.

First image: roadwork. Those of us who use HWY 30 have seen roadwork in progress for some time. It may not involve a filling in of valleys or leveling of hills. It does involve widening and changing the route, straightening maybe. Perhaps what stays with us the most about work on HWY 30 is the length of time it is taking. A good reminder of the long waiting period for the Lord to come.

The prophets Isaiah and John the Baptist make it clear that the roadwork is as much about our lives as it is any improvement and realignment of HWY 30. John goes around proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. The roadwork of waiting is called repentance. Translate that word literally into English and it means a change of mind; it means a change of thinking, a change of the way I look at my life and the lives of others. As John understands it, the one who is coming is calling for a response to his coming even before he arrives. Something has to change. God’s expected arrival demands something radical. John’s baptismal ritual is a sign that I am willing to change, to put my life in harmony with what and who is coming. It seems that the change of attitude and behavior is focused on forgiveness. Forgiveness in two ways: I accept forgiveness from God—I am cleansed from my failure in my relationship with God and with others; my past is cleansed by the mercy of God. I don’t go into the water so that I can wash myself; I go into the water so that God can pour his mercy and Spirit over me. I go into the water because washing myself is an illusion. Real cleansing means submission to being washed by another.

An important element of my new heart, a new way, is that if I accept forgiveness, then I can forgive. I let go, I relax my expectations of what I expect from those who have hurt or injured me. The wrong they have done me might never be justified. But my holding on to the hurt is not the road to healing. Much roadwork is necessary here to move mountains in my heart so that it is leveled and the way forward is smooth. My heart has surely to be softened. The prophet John the Baptist was quite serious when he talked about the roadwork that would be needed to make way for new life. Road building is not done with half-measures: the valleys are filled in and the mountains leveled and the road is straight not crooked or winding… A repentance that leads to accepting forgiveness and offering forgiveness ourselves is radical. It goes to the roots of the resistance of my mountains. …..Preparation for the Lord’s coming involves that radical remaking of life’s road. It is key to the new life. We must remember that forgiveness is the hallmark of the one who is coming. Every Eucharist reminds us: my blood is poured out for you for the forgiveness of sins. In Luke’s gospel, the dying Jesus asks the Father to forgive those killing him because they just don’t know what they are doing.

A second image of what to do while waiting is offered to us by the first prophet we heard today, Baruch. We hear him is offering hope and comfort to exiles and to a bereaved Jerusalem. He asks Jerusalem to change her clothes. The image is that Jerusalem is wearing mourning clothes because she lost her children in exile….Now there is a promise that they are coming home. Look to the East!….something is happening there—time to change to a new outlook on things; time to change from mourning and lamenting to something new. This was difficult in Baruch’s day. I would say that it is equally difficult for us today given the situation of the world in our time.

The new clothes that the community is asked to wear reveal the change that is to come: now the clothes of the community are justice, peace and mercy. Some might put on new clothes for Christmas or receive a gift of some new clothing to celebrate the Lord’s coming. All well and good…But it seems that if we heed the prophet’s word: then what we really are to be putting on as a community is peace, mercy and justice. When these are our clothes, then truly the Lord will come because he will recognize his own. If we want to hasten the Lord’s coming, then we need to put on these clothes because they are attractive.

When we listen to Paul today, we hear him praying for his community in Philippi as they await the Day of Christ. And what does he pray for? He asks for love, knowledge, discernment, righteousness to be alive in them. These are the qualities he says that will make them blameless and pure when the Lord comes.

Advent is about making preparations because someone is coming: the preparations are as radical as road building or changing clothes. But the result of making preparations means a new heart, a change in behavior; it means living out the very qualities of the one who is coming: peace, justice, knowledge and discernment, mercy and a love that keeps on growing.

New clothes mean a new person, new identity, new dignity; road work means a new landscape. The clothes and the landscape are marked by deeply human qualities that reflect the divine in whose image we are all made: peace, justice, mercy, knowledge and love. Those who are putting on such clothes will know their Lord when he comes.

~Prior, Fr. Joel Macul, OSB

Thanksgiving Day - 2021

Sirach 50:22–24
1 Corinthians 1:3–9
Luke 17:11–19

The gospel today is a selection from the travel narrative of Jesus from Galilee to Jerusalem passing through Samaria. Perhaps it is preserved for those of us on the journey of life with Jesus. It has something to say about journeying. The Thanksgiving Day in the US has something of the notion of journeying about it also. In the mists of the origins of the first thanksgiving, we find people called ‘pilgrims’. Though they themselves never used that name, it has become a popular designation. But a pilgrim is one on a journey. The English on the Mayflower saw themselves as journeying to a foreign land. They gave thanks for their safe arrival and the first fruits of the land.

The gospel story hints at how we might best journey. American Thanksgiving day is fundamentally a day to be the foreigner in the story, to be the Samaritan. All of us are in some way foreigners here. Our ancestors or we came here from some other place. And the land on which we now live was already home to others. What sets apart the foreigner in the gospel story is rather simple: he knew he was a foreigner. He was different from the others in that he did not take Jesus’ word and the healing for granted. We could ask the same question of the others that Jesus did. Why do they not give thanks? Maybe they took Jesus for granted; his healing powers were for them; it was their due, their right. Jesus was one of them. He did what he was supposed to do. The foreigner did not take Jesus for granted and so came to say thank you. He understood his restored condition as pure gift, a gift that needed to be acknowledged. Notice that in acknowledging his being cleansed Jesus continues to gift him with salvation, with freedom. It was his inner self that we healed and restored.

When one has an abundance of things, especially material things, it is easy to take them for granted. It is also easy to take some non-material things for granted like virtue and life values: such as liberty, reasonable security, the freedom to speak one mind without recrimination, the right to worship in one’s tradition. These can be taken for granted also. When that happens then gratitude slips almost out of sight. Complacency, forgetfulness even arrogance and entitlement take over. And at its worse, the material things are no longer gifts but things and people to be dominated over. And the values become turned in on oneself. Being grateful is more than saying words; it is an attitude, it is a way of life; it is an expression of humility: like the Samaritan who goes to his knees before Jesus, overwhelmed at what gift Jesus has offered him simply because he cried out.

The Thanksgiving tradition in the USA is permanently bound up with a meal. Thanksgiving means sharing food with others. Thanksgiving means communion. It is a day of being together, a day of recognizing bonds, bonds of love and caring. Thanksgiving is a time of solidarity with other human beings. It begins where we have experienced being loved and nurtured.

For us Christians Eucharist is our weekly Thanksgiving. And it too is about communion and bonds. Here we come before Jesus, the Master, the one who can tell us to stand up and get on with life—The Jesus who says that sharing in this meal is a share in freedom and hope. For us the Eucharist is a sign that our fellowship with Jesus is strong and clear. But our presence must be more than a take it for granted attitude like the nine in the gospel journey story. The Eucharist comes real because we realize, like the foreigner, how grace has worked in our lives, both materially and spiritually. Jesus is present because we are present to ourselves.

Thanksgiving Day with Eucharist is being bound together again by the food that Jesus offers. It is communion with him, as we understand that everything in our life is gift: relationships, the earth, the home, community, the universe and its galaxies. Thanksgiving is the moment to realize that we can take nothing for granted. All life is gift. And only with gratitude will we be able to continue our earthly pilgrimage when shadows darken the way, even the shadow of death. But then, it is precisely in the heart of that shadow that we celebrate Eucharist and take food for our journey. For with this Eucharistic food in us, we extend thanksgiving into the threads of our daily pilgrimage toward the Kingdom.

Let us give thanks….

~Prior, Fr. Joel Macul, OSB


Memorial of St. Charles Borromeo

Romans 14:7–12
Luke 15:1–1

It is fortuitous that we have heard this passage from Romans during the first week of this month. This text is one of those suggested for proclamation at Masses for the Dead. Here we are having remembered all the Faithful Departed two days ago. Along with them, those departed whom we know and have loved and appreciated in a particular way for the witness they gave us. This remembering of the dead and the experience of dying we stay in touch with throughout this month.

In this regard, Paul makes two clear points today:

The first is Christological. Christ is the Lord because of his dying and rising. This means that the human experiences of living and dying come under his lordship. That goes for each of us as well as all of us as community. If Christ is lord, then who are we? It is understood that we are the servants of Christ. This servanthood to Christ carries with it the implication that we are not lords of ourselves or of others. If we take baptism seriously, then we realize that we are in a permanent relationship to Christ. We no longer stand alone; we are not the source of the power and energy in our lives or our death. It all comes from Christ. Baptism releases us from any self-centered focus, as though everything revolves around me or us. Instead, we live for someone, the Lord. The new life Christ brings is other centered. As Paul would say, it is in the Lord. We are not free agents with our own agenda. We belong to Christ and he sets the agenda, including the agenda of death. Now, we do not die for ourselves, we do not die alone. We do not die isolated. We die toward someone, toward the Lord, in the Lord. Death is no longer a separation, a pulling away. It is transformed to become our final yes to the lordship of Christ. We surrender to him. We might ask ourselves how do we look upon our own death? Do we subtly leave it out of any relationship to Christ, Christ who has filled it with meaning?

The second point draws out an implication of this: If Jesus is Lord of the whole spectrum of existence and he is Lord for all who are in him, then I cannot sit in judgment over my brothers and sisters. They are not mine to think bad thoughts about, to look down on, or to consider less. The Lordship of Christ relieves me of having to put others in categories. Judging the behavior of others who belong to the Lord does not belong to me. Their way of acknowledging Christ as Lord may not be mine, but that gives me no authority to determine their status or final outcome.

Judgment is often associated with death and usually negatively. It is often associated with punishment and hence fear. But judgment is really about accountability. I am a servant and I have been entrusted with something from the Lord. What have I done with that? And that something is about relationships in the community.

Accountability is not negative. It is an expression of maturity, of being an adult. And the judgment we will experience is simply whether we have been faithful and good servants in all matters of our lives, including my final days and my final breath. Christ is Lord of my last days as well as of my first days and my in-between days. We are always living for someone else. If we are not, then maybe we are outside the pale of the new humanity the risen Lord has brought.

Commemoration of All Souls

Wisdom 3:1–9
Romans 5:5–11
John 6:37–40

Sometimes when people are offering condolences upon hearing of a death, you hear them say, “Sorry for your loss!” That might be a word used when you really do not know the people involved. It at least offers recognition of the situation and feeling. Admittedly, there is on one level a certain ‘loss’ and with it a grieving over that loss. It would seem that even the color of this day would reflect a sense of losing something, a relationship. Yet, from our Christian perspective, understanding the death of a human being primarily as loss is a very limited view of death. It surely does not do justice to the story of Christ.
As we listen to Jesus speaking today, we find a different take on loss or losing someone. From Jesus’ perspective, which is the Father’s perspective, he has come to make it clear that loss is not an operating category for understanding life. The Father’s will is about saving not rejecting. The will of the one who sent me is that I should not lose anything of what he gave me. You and I and all the faithful departed are a gift from the Father to Jesus. His work is to bring us more closely into his life and presence. To understand death primarily as losing someone is to push death into the realm of “its over”, or the relationship is ended. Loss comes close to saying it is the end.

But our faith will not let us stand in that way of thinking for long. Instead of loss, our faith speaks of love and fidelity. Once brought into a relationship with Christ in baptism, that relationship is permanent. We are baptized into Christ’s death, which is his act of loving us to the end. We are baptized into Christ’s very love. That love of us who are weak and frail does not go away in Christ. The disciples thought they would lose Christ when he died. He had to spend an evening telling them that his death was a going into his Father’s love. And his entering into that love was a preparation for their own coming and entering fully into that relationship. So he basically told them not to cry for him. He was going through the door that would seal their relationship forever; eternal life, he called it. And he also made it clear that love is what is binding them altogether. And that love does not break. It is, as the wisdom lover puts it, stronger than death.
Today we remember all the faithful departed. Our family, confreres and benefactors among them, yes. But also all who came to know Christ. We remember them because we love them even now. Our remembrance of them is an assurance that they are not lost but rather they are now among the found. Yes, we are well aware that sin attracted them as it does us. But our belief in Christ also tells us that his love can and does envelop them. Our faith says that they had a share in some way in Christ. And he will not let them go. They may be departed from us but not into emptiness. They departed from us to enter into the space of love and peace that Jesus Christ went ahead to ready for them. Yes, they were frail and weak, but Christ’s love means forgiveness and hope.

Today is a remembrance of love at its best. Wisdom reminds us: “The faithful will abide with him in love. Because grace and mercy are with his holy ones.” Those abiding in love are not lost, not gone. They are alive in us through love; they are alive in God because he is faithful to what he has formed in his image.
~Prior, Fr. Joel Macul, OSB

Solemnity of All Saints

Revelation 7:2–4, 9–14
1 John 3:1–3
Matthew 5:1–12a

Today as we remember all the holy men and women before us, the Church gives us the gospel of the Beatitudes. We ought not to think that all those holy men and women who come to mind exhibited all these beatitudes. Perhaps they only revealed one of them. Maybe the ones we know were shining lights for one or two times in their lives. But when we remember them today, it is for that light, for the twinkling of goodness, humility and greatness that we once saw and experienced.
We use the word ‘saints’ to speak of the holy ones whose company we stand in awe of today. But Jesus uses a different word. Jesus speaks of blessedness, of being blessed. Blessed are the poor…This is to help us look at the notion of holiness from a different angle. Jesus invites us to see blessedness, to see how people are blessed. Jesus invites us to see that these lives are lives lived in God, grounded in God, in communion with him. In other words, in these areas of behavior God was being revealed in this person in this world.

When the blessed man or woman knows they are poor in their hearts but rich in God, then they are living in the world as God wished them to live, they are living in his Kingdom. When someone mourns because of sin, or loss or the experience of mortality, they are in effect accepting that these are not ultimate and this will lead to consolation. When someone is meek and does not resort to violence or bloodshed, they will live beyond the destruction and inherit the earth created by God. They will see the whole of creation. When the person seeks for a better world, this is not a waste of time. That new world will come. Their hope will not be in vain. When someone shows mercy, reaches out to accept, to hold, and ceases judgement and condemnation, then what they have given will come and envelop them. When you and I cling to God with our hearts, then we will be able to look around us and see God active in the world. To see God in the world, that is a sign of being blessed. When peace governs our approach to people and situations, people will wake up and know that we are related to God as his children. When being blessed means being persecuted because it threatens the ways of our world and our society, it means that we are in truth reflecting the ways of the Kingdom, an alternate way of living. Our life shows a goodness that challenges evil. (see John Shea, The Spiritual Wisdom of the Gospels for Christian Preachers and Teachers: Feasts, Funerals and Weddings (Collegeville: Liturgical Press, 2004).
Being blessed means accepting my life as a gift. For blessings are above all gifts. A blessed person is someone beyond referring to themselves as central. Their “I” is known to come from God. They could say, it is not I who am doing this, it is God within me. What attracts us to them, or should, is the selflessness with which they approach people, the earth and human experience. Blessedness comes from seeing all as gift and responding to it as gift.

Today let us recall those we know or heard about who accepted themselves for who they were, who understood themselves as always in the hands of God. Let us for one day at least rejoice with them that they are in the home of the Father who was not afraid to call them his daughters and sons—the Father who clothes them and gives them a feast because they responded to his blessings and his hope for them.

~Prior, Fr. Joel Macul, OSB

31st Sunday in Ordinary Time - 2021

Deuteronomy 6:2–6
Hebrews 7:23–28
Mark 12:28b–34

Whenever Jesus is challenged, he goes back to basics. We heard this a few weeks ago when Jesus was challenged on the Jewish practice of divorce. He went back to Moses and Genesis. Jesus is not really challenged today. Indeed, the scribe and Jesus agree on the foundation of Israel’s faith, the community’s response and ground for the relationship with the one Lord. But, by Jesus time the Law had become complicated. There were 613 laws on the books. The question of which was important became legitimate. Which of these 613 are basic, are essential. With a detail of laws, it becomes difficult to know what really matters. So Jesus responds by going back to Moses. And he gives as a response what every devout Jew in Jesus’ day and in our day, too, says every morning and evening: “Shema, Israel. Hear, O Israel! The Lord our God is Lord alone! You shall love the Lord, your God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength.” Jesus takes the unity expressed here and brings forward another quote from the Law: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” Jesus takes two and brings them together as one. There is a relationship between the one God and the one humanity.

Love is the essence of the Law. Love is the center of a relationship with God. There is only one God; there is no compromise on this. One God created humans and world alike. One God made promises to the patriarchs and matriarchs. The same God brought the community out of Egypt. In other words, the one Lord saved the community from slavery. That one Lord will act again in his one Son, as we heard in the Letter to the Hebrews. And that One Lord will give us a concrete example of what it means to love with one’s whole being. The one Lord Jesus Christ will be faithful to his people and the human race by dying for us out of love for his one Father, the Lord of all.

Moses begins by saying, “Shema, Israel, Listen, O Israel….” He is asking the community to recall, to listen and hear the story of how God has loved them, how he has made them his own, how they have become his people. How he has spoken to them directly. Listen, listen to how God has shown his love, his faithfulness to you. Listen and see how he has walked with you and not abandoned you to death and evil forces. Listen and see that what he did in the past he continues to do now….

You cannot command anyone to love. You cannot force love. The actions related to love may be there but it will not be love. The heart will not be there in the actions. The heart is the place that gives birth to love. If the heart is not in the actions, then the love may appear so on the surface, but deep down it will not be a love that is in harmony with the one who creates and saves. Any person of faith will tell you that actions must have their roots from within. Love means commitment and fidelity; it has to do with totality of being. This total response to the one God and Lord begins with a listening heart. And that listening is seen in hearing the word coming to us about how we are loved first by our God. Even in our liturgy, before we give thanks over bread and wine, we must first sit and listen to the Word. We have to hear again how God is working and transforming our lives. We must hear how and where that transformation has appeared before and become permanent. We must be taught where that word needs to come alive in our hearts. When that word enters our hearts, then the words about a gracious love forming us from the foundation of the world can move our hearts to love in return.

We can love the one who has loved us. Love can respond to love. And is precisely that love responding with love that Moses and Jesus place before us. Love the one who has loved you into existence. Knowing and standing in that love will mean a response that is total: love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, with all your mind and with all your strength. Heart, soul, mind and strength each refer to parts of our human self. Each reflects an essential dimension of who we are. But notice that the response to love is not half-hearted, soulless or mindless or feeble. The command Jesus gives us says love with all you are—as the one Lord loves us totally, so we are to respond with our total selves.

The love of God is reflected in mercy, kindness, gentleness, patience, being slow to anger, forgiveness, long suffering, along with a profound awareness of those around you as the beneficiaries of that love. God is all that to us and for us. If we are in a relationship with him, then what else can we do but offer the same love back in return. Our relationship with God began with love: a word and hands that raised us from the earth…and a promise that even in death that word about us being beloved will still be there to raise us up into a life where love never fails.

This command, this word calling us to love remains essential in our day. In Jesus time, there were only 613 laws….a maze of words that had accumulated as the community had a variety of experiences over the years. How to assess what is the core the heart of it all, the scribe asks. It is no less so today. We live in a world that has had life experiences far beyond Moses or even Jesus could imagine. We have done much to make sense of it all, to find our way through it. But where is the key in our faith that can guide us? It would seem that love, love from God toward us, our love of God and love of neighbor, remains at the heart of how to approach life’s experiences with their new questions. It is the rock on which we can stand firm.

What do we do when dealing with the questions of our age: nuclear power, for instance, with its potential for good as well as evil? What about globalization, the awareness of how the world is interrelated. Is the relationship to be governed only by economic factors, devoid of a human face? What about technology? Does it serve us or does it rule us? Is it meant to estrange us by word and image? How do we live with developments in the area of sexuality? What and who will be with us as we walk through all this? How do we find our way through the maze of happenings in our days?

Listen, O people of God, shema! Love is what has called you forth. Now listen to it again and allow it to root in your heart. When love is abiding in our hearts, then our actions will flow from a source that comes from the One Lord and God. Shema, Israel: “The Lord, your God is a God gracious and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in love and fidelity, continuing his love for a thousand generations and forgiving wickedness, rebellion and sin.” “Shema, Israel. Listen, Israel: You love the Lord, your God, with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, with all your strength.”

If we need a model, it is to be found, we heard today, in Jesus, God’s beloved Son. He loved his Father to the end, despite all temptations not to be faithful to the Father’s command of love. Yes, he loved his own to the end; he died for them. And he left us this Eucharist as a sign of that love. By sharing in it, we are sharing in love that embraces all and holds all together. For that, we can only humbly give thanks and take of the food so that we, too, can love from our hearts.

~Prior, Fr. Joel Macul, OSB

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