No homily this week... as the following message from this week's bulletin explains to the parishioners, I am in Ottawa, doing a whole lot more than looking at the beautiful autumn colours. The "apologia" below is an effort to respond to concerns that individual parishioners express, usually unintentionally, about my busy-ness when at home, and my not-infrequent absences from the parish. Not sure how successful the letter is, but it's a sincere effort to help folks understand the fact of, and need for, my duties and activities away from the parish.
When I was a boy, I loved my father’s business trips—we always got a small gift on his return. (Many years later I learned that some of the souvenirs we received from exotic places were actually purchased much closer to home, to make the trip a little less pressured!)
I’m not so sure that the parishioners are equally pleased by my travels, or indeed by my apparent “busy-ness.” Some say “away again?” while others seem surprised that they cannot always get same-day appointments. Even the most understanding often preface a request with “I know you are awfully busy…”
Unfortunately, I cannot afford to bring souvenirs back for all of you! So I thought a few words of explanation might be helpful. A conversation today with a friend who is a doctor gave me a few thoughts about this “problem” that I’d like to share with you as I prepare for a week’s absence.
This hard-working physician told me that he will be in Victoria next week to give a talk, returning to Vancouver in time to run a course for other doctors, just before leaving on vacation. This means no office hours for a significant period, which distresses both him and his patients. But as we talked over his situation, we realized there is no “solution” to it. He is an excellent doctor because he is a constant learner; medicine in our province is better because he is a committed medical educator. Yet, if he doesn’t take time off, he will soon be a patient rather than a doctor.
There’s a parallel with my situation. As most of you know, I have spent five years studying canon law. I have an obligation to provide some return on the Church’s investment in me by assisting whenever I am asked; at the same time, I must keep up the knowledge that I have acquired by a certain amount of ongoing study.
Among the responsibilities the Archbishop has given me are membership on the College of Consultors and the Presbyteral Council, bodies that provide advice to him through regular meetings. I am also a member of the national boards of Catholic Christian Outreach and Renewal Ministries, two Catholic organizations that do much good with which I have been associated for many years.
In every way that is consistent with the Archbishop’s wishes and my own sense of responsibility to the Church at home and elsewhere, I put the parish and parishioners first. I routinely decline requests to be involved in other groups and activities that do not involve canon law. But I am convinced that my work and study outside the parish help to make me a better pastor, and better able to serve you.
“You’re soooo busy.” Yes, I am busy. But my doctor friend and I chuckled when we talked about this, wondering what people would say if I wasn’t busy... We also wondered whether parishioners would want doctors, counselors, and other helping professionals who have lots and lots of spare time—it might suggest they aren’t much in demand, which doesn’t seem like a very good sign!
Yes, I am busy. But I am busiest when seeing parishioners, attending parish meetings, and preparing and delivering homilies and talks at the parish. I always have the time to meet parishioners about any issue that concerns them, to hear confessions (scheduled and not), to anoint the sick, and to offer spiritual direction. It’s simply that arranging an appointment sometimes takes several days, especially since I have to prioritize requests according to urgency.
My latest duties takes me to Ottawa, where I will spend three days doing research at St. Paul’s University, and then attend a Catholic Christian Outreach function, before returning early next week.
When I get back on Wednesday I’ll be… busy! But happy to see you.
Friday, October 23, 2009
Sunday, October 18, 2009
Secondhand Suffering (29th Sunday, Year B)
Some of you in church this morning are dear friends of mine. Others are active members of the parish for whom my heart is filled with thanks. Still others are parishioners I don’t know personally. But everyone here is my brother or sister in the Lord.
It’s not surprising, then, that I pray for your wellbeing and happiness. I wish you good health, I wish you freedom from financial worry, and I wish you peace.
But I do not wish you never to suffer. For never to suffer means never to have loved.
Does that sound shocking? It shouldn’t. It’s possible, with good fortune and good genes, to get through life without ever facing serious illness. I heard someone complain once that her mother died in perfect health!
Getting through life without financial worry is getting tougher, but it’s still possible. The best way, I’m told, is by inheriting a lot of money. I haven’t tried that myself, but I have the blessing of a very secure job, which is the next best thing.
Finding peace and keeping it in our hearts is not easy. However, many people do achieve this through prayer, positive attitudes, and the practice of acceptance.
But avoiding all suffering is impossible: because even if you are spared personal suffering—even if your own life is running like a well-oiled machine—the odds dictate that someone you love will experience illness or misfortune. And their suffering will become yours. Unless you have a very small family, a very limited circle of friends—worse, unless you keep others at an emotional arms-length—you will experience suffering vicariously.
Vicarious suffering occurs when another’s suffering becomes our own. And sometimes that’s worse than anything that could happen to us directly. We’d be happy, in fact, to be the one with the cancer or the one battling depression—especially when we’re bound to the sufferer by family ties.
Someone said that when we marry, we give hostages to fortune.* What that means is that marriage and family—the place where most of us love most—is a place where suffering is almost inevitable.
So what do we make of “secondhand suffering” in light of the Scripture we have heard this morning?
It’s a key question. Even the Catechism notes that suffering is one of the experiences that seem to contradict the Good News and can shake our faith and become a temptation against it (CCC 164). I think we’d all agree with that—it’s used as a standard argument against Christianity. When the one who suffers is a child, it’s even easier to see the problem.
But if suffering does contradict the Good News, then we are in deep trouble. This really is one of the questions we can’t afford to ignore—because if we’re not facing it now, we’re going to, sooner or later. So let’s see what the Lord is trying to teach us.
Because it seems to me this a problem only Christ can solve. You can make a pretty good case for the existence of God using your head alone—in other words, with the tools of reason or philosophy. Try to do that with the suffering of children or the torture of innocents, or the maddening experience of unanswered prayer for healing of a loved one. It won’t work. Only Jesus can answer the problem of pain.
I was quite surprised, to tell you the truth, to find that the Catechism says very little about human suffering. Then I figured out why: it says little about suffering but lots about Jesus. And he is the answer.
Notice I say that “He is the answer,” not “He has the answer.” Jesus resolves the apparent contradiction between suffering and the Father’s love more by what he does than by what he says.
Who is the suffering servant crushed with pain in our first reading this morning? The Church has always identified him with Jesus.
We cannot know our Lord or understand his mission if we will not know or understand his suffering. Isaiah’s prophecy contains a simple statement of this truth: “The righteous one… shall make many righteous, and he shall bear their iniquities.” His life is an offering for sin.
It sounds so dark. Yet “Out of his anguish he shall see light,” the prophet tells us, and “he shall see his offspring and prolong his days.”
This is not human reasoning. Anguish is anguish. Being crushed with pain is not a good thing. But this is the way God chose to ransom the world.
And although Jesus has redeemed the world, he has chosen to allow us to share in his work of redemption until the end of time. As St. Paul says, “in my flesh I am completing what is lacking in Christ’s afflictions for the sake of his body, that is, the church” (Col. 1:24).
So the first answer Jesus gives to our heartfelt question about why he can allow human suffering is “because it permits us to drink the cup that he drank.” To suffer—firsthand or secondhand—is an invitation to become a partner in the saving mission of Christ.
Suffering that is offered to God is a work of atonement—for our own sins, the sins of others, and sin in the Church. We’re still reeling from the thought that a bishop right here in Canada could fall so far from grace; yet we can’t forget the example of Cardinal Bernadin—falsely and publicly accused, he spoke only kindly of his accuser, and gently forgave him everything before he died. Cardinal Pell, who visited our parish last year, was similarly the victim of a false accusation, which he bore with courage and grace.
(I am not saying this by way of comment or contrast with the present case, but rather to illustrate the fact that atonement is a powerful and necessary force in the Church, wounded by the sins of her members.)
While thinking about my homily yesterday afternoon, I asked myself this question: Can we know Jesus without knowing suffering?
I’m not sure—it’s a difficult question. But the more I thought about it the more one thing struck me: Jesus himself said the disciple is not greater than the master. I think, then, that Jesus’ second answer to why God permits suffering is “so that you might know me.”
The passage we heard from the Letter to the Hebrews is both consoling and instructive. We do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who has in every respect been tested as we are… Jesus was not Superman, unfeeling and immune; he wept, he bled, he grieved. To know his sacred humanity is essential to knowing his divinity.
In other words, Jesus stands beside all who suffer, in complete solidarity. Knowing this is a huge help to knowing him.
I have used a lot of words to say much less than a crucifix does about Christ’s answer to our questions about suffering.
One final word about unanswered prayer—because that topic often comes up when we’re talking about suffering, especially of loved ones.
The foot-in-mouth disease of James and John in today’s Gospel reminds us that we sometimes pray for things without knowing what we’re asking. Let’s give the two brothers a break, and assume they really didn’t have a clue. Perhaps they just wanted to be close to Jesus. They asked for crowns, he gave them the cross. They got what they really needed, not what they asked for.
I will never tell anyone not to pray for miracles, especially for others. But as the years go by, I’m more and more convinced that our first prayer in tough times should be for greater understanding of the mystery of suffering—and for the grace and courage to accept it.
----
* In fact, it was Sir Francis Bacon, who wrote in Essay 8 “He that hath wife and children hath given hostages to fortune; for they are impediments to great enterprises, either of virtue or mischief.” He was actually talking about the consequences of celibacy in society, but the quotation is now used more in the sense in which I have paraphrased it.
It’s not surprising, then, that I pray for your wellbeing and happiness. I wish you good health, I wish you freedom from financial worry, and I wish you peace.
But I do not wish you never to suffer. For never to suffer means never to have loved.
Does that sound shocking? It shouldn’t. It’s possible, with good fortune and good genes, to get through life without ever facing serious illness. I heard someone complain once that her mother died in perfect health!
Getting through life without financial worry is getting tougher, but it’s still possible. The best way, I’m told, is by inheriting a lot of money. I haven’t tried that myself, but I have the blessing of a very secure job, which is the next best thing.
Finding peace and keeping it in our hearts is not easy. However, many people do achieve this through prayer, positive attitudes, and the practice of acceptance.
But avoiding all suffering is impossible: because even if you are spared personal suffering—even if your own life is running like a well-oiled machine—the odds dictate that someone you love will experience illness or misfortune. And their suffering will become yours. Unless you have a very small family, a very limited circle of friends—worse, unless you keep others at an emotional arms-length—you will experience suffering vicariously.
Vicarious suffering occurs when another’s suffering becomes our own. And sometimes that’s worse than anything that could happen to us directly. We’d be happy, in fact, to be the one with the cancer or the one battling depression—especially when we’re bound to the sufferer by family ties.
Someone said that when we marry, we give hostages to fortune.* What that means is that marriage and family—the place where most of us love most—is a place where suffering is almost inevitable.
So what do we make of “secondhand suffering” in light of the Scripture we have heard this morning?
It’s a key question. Even the Catechism notes that suffering is one of the experiences that seem to contradict the Good News and can shake our faith and become a temptation against it (CCC 164). I think we’d all agree with that—it’s used as a standard argument against Christianity. When the one who suffers is a child, it’s even easier to see the problem.
But if suffering does contradict the Good News, then we are in deep trouble. This really is one of the questions we can’t afford to ignore—because if we’re not facing it now, we’re going to, sooner or later. So let’s see what the Lord is trying to teach us.
Because it seems to me this a problem only Christ can solve. You can make a pretty good case for the existence of God using your head alone—in other words, with the tools of reason or philosophy. Try to do that with the suffering of children or the torture of innocents, or the maddening experience of unanswered prayer for healing of a loved one. It won’t work. Only Jesus can answer the problem of pain.
I was quite surprised, to tell you the truth, to find that the Catechism says very little about human suffering. Then I figured out why: it says little about suffering but lots about Jesus. And he is the answer.
Notice I say that “He is the answer,” not “He has the answer.” Jesus resolves the apparent contradiction between suffering and the Father’s love more by what he does than by what he says.
Who is the suffering servant crushed with pain in our first reading this morning? The Church has always identified him with Jesus.
We cannot know our Lord or understand his mission if we will not know or understand his suffering. Isaiah’s prophecy contains a simple statement of this truth: “The righteous one… shall make many righteous, and he shall bear their iniquities.” His life is an offering for sin.
It sounds so dark. Yet “Out of his anguish he shall see light,” the prophet tells us, and “he shall see his offspring and prolong his days.”
This is not human reasoning. Anguish is anguish. Being crushed with pain is not a good thing. But this is the way God chose to ransom the world.
And although Jesus has redeemed the world, he has chosen to allow us to share in his work of redemption until the end of time. As St. Paul says, “in my flesh I am completing what is lacking in Christ’s afflictions for the sake of his body, that is, the church” (Col. 1:24).
So the first answer Jesus gives to our heartfelt question about why he can allow human suffering is “because it permits us to drink the cup that he drank.” To suffer—firsthand or secondhand—is an invitation to become a partner in the saving mission of Christ.
Suffering that is offered to God is a work of atonement—for our own sins, the sins of others, and sin in the Church. We’re still reeling from the thought that a bishop right here in Canada could fall so far from grace; yet we can’t forget the example of Cardinal Bernadin—falsely and publicly accused, he spoke only kindly of his accuser, and gently forgave him everything before he died. Cardinal Pell, who visited our parish last year, was similarly the victim of a false accusation, which he bore with courage and grace.
(I am not saying this by way of comment or contrast with the present case, but rather to illustrate the fact that atonement is a powerful and necessary force in the Church, wounded by the sins of her members.)
While thinking about my homily yesterday afternoon, I asked myself this question: Can we know Jesus without knowing suffering?
I’m not sure—it’s a difficult question. But the more I thought about it the more one thing struck me: Jesus himself said the disciple is not greater than the master. I think, then, that Jesus’ second answer to why God permits suffering is “so that you might know me.”
The passage we heard from the Letter to the Hebrews is both consoling and instructive. We do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who has in every respect been tested as we are… Jesus was not Superman, unfeeling and immune; he wept, he bled, he grieved. To know his sacred humanity is essential to knowing his divinity.
In other words, Jesus stands beside all who suffer, in complete solidarity. Knowing this is a huge help to knowing him.
I have used a lot of words to say much less than a crucifix does about Christ’s answer to our questions about suffering.
One final word about unanswered prayer—because that topic often comes up when we’re talking about suffering, especially of loved ones.
The foot-in-mouth disease of James and John in today’s Gospel reminds us that we sometimes pray for things without knowing what we’re asking. Let’s give the two brothers a break, and assume they really didn’t have a clue. Perhaps they just wanted to be close to Jesus. They asked for crowns, he gave them the cross. They got what they really needed, not what they asked for.
I will never tell anyone not to pray for miracles, especially for others. But as the years go by, I’m more and more convinced that our first prayer in tough times should be for greater understanding of the mystery of suffering—and for the grace and courage to accept it.
----
* In fact, it was Sir Francis Bacon, who wrote in Essay 8 “He that hath wife and children hath given hostages to fortune; for they are impediments to great enterprises, either of virtue or mischief.” He was actually talking about the consequences of celibacy in society, but the quotation is now used more in the sense in which I have paraphrased it.
Sunday, October 11, 2009
I Get By With a Little Help From My Friends (28th Sunday, Year B)
I got a little bit emotional listening to a Canadian politician the other day. It’s been a long time since that happened!
During my political youth, I listened spellbound from the gallery of the House of Commons to legendary figures like John Diefenbaker and Pierre Trudeau. But on Friday, I listened with equal admiration to Stephen Harper—singing a Beatles’ song!*
And, believe it or not, I was moved by the song and by the singer. (I can’t say his piano-playing did that much for me!)
When it was written, “I Get By With a Little Help From My Friends” was probably about drugs. But it is also a modern anthem to the fact that we can do nothing alone. In this light, it can be seen as a hymn to community—to our basic human need for others.
And when a Prime Minister who is considered by many to be a bit of a loner, who rarely hears a flattering word from the media, can take to the stage in front of the Ottawa elite, you have to figure he might just mean what he’s singing.
On this Thanksgiving weekend, I thank the Prime Minister for his moment of vulnerability, and for accidentally reminding us of one of the central truths of Christian faith: we can’t live it on our own. We get by, with a little help from our friends.
Brothers and sisters in the Lord are one of the greatest gifts God gives to us. Jesus promises Peter he will not lack brothers and sisters just because he has left home to follow Him. The Church is a family—a big and sometimes dysfunctional family—but a family nonetheless. Experts say that the first sign of a healthy parish is the sense of belonging.
Each brick of this building and the school next door tells a story of belonging. The generosity and sacrifice of individuals made it possible, while the recent renovations remind us that the story of stewardship continues.
The parish spiritual committee suggested that Thanksgiving weekend would be a good time to pray and give thanks for the benefactors, living and dead, who built and sustain our community.
I wonder whether the committee had read today’s Gospel before they got this idea. Because whether you call them benefactors, donors or stewards, those who made and make this church possible are first and foremost our brothers and sisters in Christ. They are men and women who felt part of a parish family. It is rarely philanthropy or community service that prompts people to support a parish; it’s usually the sense of belonging that gives birth to stewardship.
Do you know, for instance, that one of the largest donors to our parish is someone who has been unable to attend Mass here for years?
Our Gospel gives another reason why we should be thankful to those whose sacrifices built and sustain our parish. Many of them display the spirit of detachment from this world’s goods to which Jesus invited the rich young man. Whether in a family or in a parish, sacrificial giving means letting go.
Sometimes it means letting go of money. Benefactors of our parish have asked themselves the tough question “What do you own and what owns you?” And their answer was stewardship and sharing their resources.
But let’s never forget that a parish needs much more than money: the stewardship formula of time, talent and treasure puts the financial in third place. One of the best parts of being a pastor is watching our small army of volunteers help people make the jump from being “members” of the parish to being brothers and sisters in Christ.
I wish there were time to tell some stories, but I can only say that those who organize and perform the many ministries of the parish, those who serve coffee, those who calm down the parking lot, those who calm down the pastor—all of these and more are helping Christ fulfill his promise to Peter. They’re helping Christ provide brothers and sisters for each one of us. There are no only children in the Body of Christ.
On this Thanksgiving Day, our first priority is to thank God for His many blessings, and to renew our commitment to share them with others. But let’s make it our special prayer to thank God for those who have shared with us.
We do much more than “get by,” and we receive much more than "a little help" from our friends. They are a sign of God’s love for us, and part of the promised reward for those who follow Christ.
During my political youth, I listened spellbound from the gallery of the House of Commons to legendary figures like John Diefenbaker and Pierre Trudeau. But on Friday, I listened with equal admiration to Stephen Harper—singing a Beatles’ song!*
And, believe it or not, I was moved by the song and by the singer. (I can’t say his piano-playing did that much for me!)
When it was written, “I Get By With a Little Help From My Friends” was probably about drugs. But it is also a modern anthem to the fact that we can do nothing alone. In this light, it can be seen as a hymn to community—to our basic human need for others.
And when a Prime Minister who is considered by many to be a bit of a loner, who rarely hears a flattering word from the media, can take to the stage in front of the Ottawa elite, you have to figure he might just mean what he’s singing.
On this Thanksgiving weekend, I thank the Prime Minister for his moment of vulnerability, and for accidentally reminding us of one of the central truths of Christian faith: we can’t live it on our own. We get by, with a little help from our friends.
Brothers and sisters in the Lord are one of the greatest gifts God gives to us. Jesus promises Peter he will not lack brothers and sisters just because he has left home to follow Him. The Church is a family—a big and sometimes dysfunctional family—but a family nonetheless. Experts say that the first sign of a healthy parish is the sense of belonging.
Each brick of this building and the school next door tells a story of belonging. The generosity and sacrifice of individuals made it possible, while the recent renovations remind us that the story of stewardship continues.
The parish spiritual committee suggested that Thanksgiving weekend would be a good time to pray and give thanks for the benefactors, living and dead, who built and sustain our community.
I wonder whether the committee had read today’s Gospel before they got this idea. Because whether you call them benefactors, donors or stewards, those who made and make this church possible are first and foremost our brothers and sisters in Christ. They are men and women who felt part of a parish family. It is rarely philanthropy or community service that prompts people to support a parish; it’s usually the sense of belonging that gives birth to stewardship.
Do you know, for instance, that one of the largest donors to our parish is someone who has been unable to attend Mass here for years?
Our Gospel gives another reason why we should be thankful to those whose sacrifices built and sustain our parish. Many of them display the spirit of detachment from this world’s goods to which Jesus invited the rich young man. Whether in a family or in a parish, sacrificial giving means letting go.
Sometimes it means letting go of money. Benefactors of our parish have asked themselves the tough question “What do you own and what owns you?” And their answer was stewardship and sharing their resources.
But let’s never forget that a parish needs much more than money: the stewardship formula of time, talent and treasure puts the financial in third place. One of the best parts of being a pastor is watching our small army of volunteers help people make the jump from being “members” of the parish to being brothers and sisters in Christ.
I wish there were time to tell some stories, but I can only say that those who organize and perform the many ministries of the parish, those who serve coffee, those who calm down the parking lot, those who calm down the pastor—all of these and more are helping Christ fulfill his promise to Peter. They’re helping Christ provide brothers and sisters for each one of us. There are no only children in the Body of Christ.
On this Thanksgiving Day, our first priority is to thank God for His many blessings, and to renew our commitment to share them with others. But let’s make it our special prayer to thank God for those who have shared with us.
We do much more than “get by,” and we receive much more than "a little help" from our friends. They are a sign of God’s love for us, and part of the promised reward for those who follow Christ.
Saturday, October 3, 2009
Good News About Sex and Marriage (27th Sunday, Year B)
Two kinds of disasters made the news this week. The first kind were natural ones: typhoons and earthquakes that threatened the lives and welfare of people in the Philippines, Indonesia, and the South Pacific. The second disaster was closer to home—allegations in Antigonish that once again send Catholics reeling, asking ‘what’s next?’
There’s no avoiding the fact that these are difficult and painful days.
The natural disasters will, judging by past experience, have a positive side amidst the terrible human tragedy. Generous people will bring material aid and comfort to the victims, making visible the basic goodness of the world even in the face of suffering.
Moral disasters, however, rarely have an upside. They bring only discouragement and confusion, and when they involve the Church they make it that much more difficult to carry on the saving work of Christ.
The failures of Church leaders—and in the current case it’s important to mention that we’re dealing with charges still to be dealt with—lead both believers and non-believers to ask many question.
Today, I’d like to tackle just one set of questions: Why is the Church so concerned about human sexuality, about the institution of marriage, about what people do in their private lives? Why can’t the Church—and its celibate clergy—stick to a “religious” message? Why does it need to make an issue of “political” things, things like same-sex “marriage” and the like?
Aren't we just setting ourselves up for a fall, for the charge of hypocrisy?
I’ve heard these kind of questions often enough, even from loyal Catholics. So today I want to answer them by speaking about the Church’s mission; calling; duty; and obligation to preach a message about human sexuality and its place in securing the good of both individuals and society.
Of course we all know folks who consider themselves Catholic but disagree with various moral teachings of the Church. I’m not really talking to them today, but to rather to those Catholics who don’t see that the Church is compelled by her Founder to preach a message about the plan of God for all creation.
Do I fault people for that? I certainly do not. I can tell you that much of what I know about the Church’s divine calling to preach about God’s plan, about the natural order, about the natural law, I did not know until well into my seminary years and even later. We don’t do a good job of getting this message out.
As a result, there are sincere Catholics who think that the Gospel message is an exclusively — in quotation marks — “religious message.” They don’t realize that the Good News of Jesus Christ embraces both the truths we tend to think of as religious — forgiveness of sins or the saving sacrifice of the Mass, for example — and truths which are more broadly speaking natural, indeed pre-Christian.
Much of what the Church teaches about God’s plan for man and woman is found in the Book of Genesis. In the Hebrew scriptures—in the scriptures given to the Chosen People. Certainly we have in the New Testament an expanded and enriched understanding of the Genesis teaching. But foundationally, what is true at the order of creation, at the moment when God brought this world into existence, belongs to the deposit of Faith that the Church must preach in season and out of season.
I can’t underscore this simple point enough. The Church is called to preach the whole truth. And the Church is called to preach that truth to the entire world.
Many well-intentioned Catholics think that we should keep our nose out of public debates, and preach to our own. Many Catholics do not recognize that the Church has a mission to the world. We do not go out to the world and say, “Jesus Christ is Lord; be baptized so you can come to Mass and receive the Eucharist with us.” We say: “Jesus Christ has come to bring life, and to bring it to the full. To you, in every aspect of your being.”
There’s no such thing as a purely religious truth. Things are true or they are not true. And if they are true, if they bring life, then they are part of what the Church proclaims.
Both the first reading and the Gospel at Mass today present the divine plan written into our bodies: the creation account of Genesis reveals the distinct order of nature—man and woman we were created. Man and woman. And man and woman were created that they might be one. One flesh in the divine perfect plan of creation.
The Church must proclaim this. We cannot step back from these truths, for fear of consequences. They belong to the Gospel. They come to us from Jesus—how many times have I heard people say that the Catholic Church is against divorce and remarriage. This is not a teaching of the Catholic Church but of Jesus himself, as our Gospel passage today makes clear.
If our moral teaching is only rules and regulations, it can’t be understood as Gospel, surely. Yet I have a book on my shelf entitled “The Good News About Sex and Marriage”, and it’s remarkably popular with young adults in the parish.
Still, many Catholics have never heard a word about this kind of good news, and for that we preachers must apologize. In our defense, unless priests did nothing but talk year-round about issues of sexuality and creation and marriage, they couldn’t present from the pulpit a full and comprehensive explanation of why the Church’s teaching is wholesome and good and Good News.
It’s impossible first because we only have your attention for twelve to fifteen minutes a week—and sometimes we’re lucky to get that! Secondly, there are many other truths that must be shared in the course of a year. Finally, it’s impossible because there are limits to what one can say in a group that includes all ages. (Even today, if you’ve listened carefully you’ll notice I have used roundabout expressions to limit the questions that may come up on the drive home!)
And in fact, not everyone needs to hear every thing. At different stages in life we face different moral challenges.
The teaching on divorce, particularly, and the complex area of annulment is worthy of homily all to itself, but I’m not going to give it today. The Church’s teachings on responsible parenthood and artificial contraception … that’s really worth an entire sermon, and I will manage it someday soon, because these teachings are sometimes rejected by people who really haven’t heard them; no-one’s ever told them the reasons that might help them accept freely and joyfully what the Church proposes.
I’ll never forget Archbishop Carney talking about the controversy over Pope Paul VI’s letter on artificial contraception. “I didn’t obey Pope Paul,” he snorted. “I agreed with him!”)
This is a good moment to remind you that I’m not talking here about people who break moral laws. That’s quite a different issue. It’s possible to break moral laws—to commit sin—without rejecting the truth of the teaching or the authority of the teacher. We can choose what we know to be bad — I do it every time I go to McDonald’s!
But the fact remains: knowing and understanding is an aid to acceptance and obedience.
So let’s seek knowledge and understanding together. Give the Church a chance to share the good news about men and women and the family. Read. Talk. Express your doubts and ask your questions. Let’s exchange e-mails or have a visit. Contact our parish coordinator for natural family planning, Karen Magee; her number’s in the bulletin.
Whatever we do, let’s not let the daily paper and the other media distort the good news of the Church’s teaching. It’s enough that it has to be the source of bad news about the Church’s problems.
If I had the time, there's more I'd like to say at this painful moment for the Church in Canada. It is painful, certainly. But it’s a reminder that the times in which we live make it increasingly tough to remain a complacent Catholic. If we doubt that the Church has a message of truth from the Creator, and if out of embarrassment or sheer frustration over human failures in the Church we want to shrink Catholic truth to things around the altar, we will soon, I think, be dissatisfied with the broader, and indeed, true notion of Church.
Maybe more to the point, if we allow ourselves to conclude that the Church is just plain wrong about these important things, we’ll eventually love her less and perhaps stop loving her at all.
Let’s not allow that to happen. As a first step, many of us need to know a whole lot more about what the Church teaches, and why. To help with that, there’s an attractive booklet inserted in this week’s bulletin. It’s called Marriage in the Catholic Church: Frequently Asked Questions.* It tackles a whole lot of tough issues in a positive way, ranging from the Church’s view on sex to the best ways to strengthen a marriage. For the most part, it uses plainer language than most Church publications.
It offers a lot of solid information, nicely packaged, and it really deserves to be read by everyone sixteen years of age and up.
Most of all, the booklet needs to be read by all who want to understand Catholic moral teachings, particularly those most attacked today. Let’s discover for ourselves the good news about sex and marriage. And let’s be glad, not sad, that the Church can proclaim a liberating, holistic, helpful, and healing message… even in her human frailty.
-------------
*A pastoral document from the Australian Catholic Bishops Conference, adapted for Canada by the Catholic Organization for Life and Family (COLF), which is co-sponsored by the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops and the Supreme Council of the Knights of Columbus.
There’s no avoiding the fact that these are difficult and painful days.
The natural disasters will, judging by past experience, have a positive side amidst the terrible human tragedy. Generous people will bring material aid and comfort to the victims, making visible the basic goodness of the world even in the face of suffering.
Moral disasters, however, rarely have an upside. They bring only discouragement and confusion, and when they involve the Church they make it that much more difficult to carry on the saving work of Christ.
The failures of Church leaders—and in the current case it’s important to mention that we’re dealing with charges still to be dealt with—lead both believers and non-believers to ask many question.
Today, I’d like to tackle just one set of questions: Why is the Church so concerned about human sexuality, about the institution of marriage, about what people do in their private lives? Why can’t the Church—and its celibate clergy—stick to a “religious” message? Why does it need to make an issue of “political” things, things like same-sex “marriage” and the like?
Aren't we just setting ourselves up for a fall, for the charge of hypocrisy?
I’ve heard these kind of questions often enough, even from loyal Catholics. So today I want to answer them by speaking about the Church’s mission; calling; duty; and obligation to preach a message about human sexuality and its place in securing the good of both individuals and society.
Of course we all know folks who consider themselves Catholic but disagree with various moral teachings of the Church. I’m not really talking to them today, but to rather to those Catholics who don’t see that the Church is compelled by her Founder to preach a message about the plan of God for all creation.
Do I fault people for that? I certainly do not. I can tell you that much of what I know about the Church’s divine calling to preach about God’s plan, about the natural order, about the natural law, I did not know until well into my seminary years and even later. We don’t do a good job of getting this message out.
As a result, there are sincere Catholics who think that the Gospel message is an exclusively — in quotation marks — “religious message.” They don’t realize that the Good News of Jesus Christ embraces both the truths we tend to think of as religious — forgiveness of sins or the saving sacrifice of the Mass, for example — and truths which are more broadly speaking natural, indeed pre-Christian.
Much of what the Church teaches about God’s plan for man and woman is found in the Book of Genesis. In the Hebrew scriptures—in the scriptures given to the Chosen People. Certainly we have in the New Testament an expanded and enriched understanding of the Genesis teaching. But foundationally, what is true at the order of creation, at the moment when God brought this world into existence, belongs to the deposit of Faith that the Church must preach in season and out of season.
I can’t underscore this simple point enough. The Church is called to preach the whole truth. And the Church is called to preach that truth to the entire world.
Many well-intentioned Catholics think that we should keep our nose out of public debates, and preach to our own. Many Catholics do not recognize that the Church has a mission to the world. We do not go out to the world and say, “Jesus Christ is Lord; be baptized so you can come to Mass and receive the Eucharist with us.” We say: “Jesus Christ has come to bring life, and to bring it to the full. To you, in every aspect of your being.”
There’s no such thing as a purely religious truth. Things are true or they are not true. And if they are true, if they bring life, then they are part of what the Church proclaims.
Both the first reading and the Gospel at Mass today present the divine plan written into our bodies: the creation account of Genesis reveals the distinct order of nature—man and woman we were created. Man and woman. And man and woman were created that they might be one. One flesh in the divine perfect plan of creation.
The Church must proclaim this. We cannot step back from these truths, for fear of consequences. They belong to the Gospel. They come to us from Jesus—how many times have I heard people say that the Catholic Church is against divorce and remarriage. This is not a teaching of the Catholic Church but of Jesus himself, as our Gospel passage today makes clear.
If our moral teaching is only rules and regulations, it can’t be understood as Gospel, surely. Yet I have a book on my shelf entitled “The Good News About Sex and Marriage”, and it’s remarkably popular with young adults in the parish.
Still, many Catholics have never heard a word about this kind of good news, and for that we preachers must apologize. In our defense, unless priests did nothing but talk year-round about issues of sexuality and creation and marriage, they couldn’t present from the pulpit a full and comprehensive explanation of why the Church’s teaching is wholesome and good and Good News.
It’s impossible first because we only have your attention for twelve to fifteen minutes a week—and sometimes we’re lucky to get that! Secondly, there are many other truths that must be shared in the course of a year. Finally, it’s impossible because there are limits to what one can say in a group that includes all ages. (Even today, if you’ve listened carefully you’ll notice I have used roundabout expressions to limit the questions that may come up on the drive home!)
And in fact, not everyone needs to hear every thing. At different stages in life we face different moral challenges.
The teaching on divorce, particularly, and the complex area of annulment is worthy of homily all to itself, but I’m not going to give it today. The Church’s teachings on responsible parenthood and artificial contraception … that’s really worth an entire sermon, and I will manage it someday soon, because these teachings are sometimes rejected by people who really haven’t heard them; no-one’s ever told them the reasons that might help them accept freely and joyfully what the Church proposes.
I’ll never forget Archbishop Carney talking about the controversy over Pope Paul VI’s letter on artificial contraception. “I didn’t obey Pope Paul,” he snorted. “I agreed with him!”)
This is a good moment to remind you that I’m not talking here about people who break moral laws. That’s quite a different issue. It’s possible to break moral laws—to commit sin—without rejecting the truth of the teaching or the authority of the teacher. We can choose what we know to be bad — I do it every time I go to McDonald’s!
But the fact remains: knowing and understanding is an aid to acceptance and obedience.
So let’s seek knowledge and understanding together. Give the Church a chance to share the good news about men and women and the family. Read. Talk. Express your doubts and ask your questions. Let’s exchange e-mails or have a visit. Contact our parish coordinator for natural family planning, Karen Magee; her number’s in the bulletin.
Whatever we do, let’s not let the daily paper and the other media distort the good news of the Church’s teaching. It’s enough that it has to be the source of bad news about the Church’s problems.
If I had the time, there's more I'd like to say at this painful moment for the Church in Canada. It is painful, certainly. But it’s a reminder that the times in which we live make it increasingly tough to remain a complacent Catholic. If we doubt that the Church has a message of truth from the Creator, and if out of embarrassment or sheer frustration over human failures in the Church we want to shrink Catholic truth to things around the altar, we will soon, I think, be dissatisfied with the broader, and indeed, true notion of Church.
Maybe more to the point, if we allow ourselves to conclude that the Church is just plain wrong about these important things, we’ll eventually love her less and perhaps stop loving her at all.
Let’s not allow that to happen. As a first step, many of us need to know a whole lot more about what the Church teaches, and why. To help with that, there’s an attractive booklet inserted in this week’s bulletin. It’s called Marriage in the Catholic Church: Frequently Asked Questions.* It tackles a whole lot of tough issues in a positive way, ranging from the Church’s view on sex to the best ways to strengthen a marriage. For the most part, it uses plainer language than most Church publications.
It offers a lot of solid information, nicely packaged, and it really deserves to be read by everyone sixteen years of age and up.
Most of all, the booklet needs to be read by all who want to understand Catholic moral teachings, particularly those most attacked today. Let’s discover for ourselves the good news about sex and marriage. And let’s be glad, not sad, that the Church can proclaim a liberating, holistic, helpful, and healing message… even in her human frailty.
-------------
*A pastoral document from the Australian Catholic Bishops Conference, adapted for Canada by the Catholic Organization for Life and Family (COLF), which is co-sponsored by the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops and the Supreme Council of the Knights of Columbus.
Anniversary of Cathedral Dedication
Today we celebrate the anniversary of the dedication of the central church of our archdiocese, Holy Rosary Cathedral.
It’s clear that this is a very significant day, since the liturgical calendar ranks it as a feast throughout the diocese.
Why is that?
An obvious answer would be the importance of the cathedral to the life of the local church. It’s there that the archbishop has his chair, or cathedra, and it’s there we celebrate great moments in the community of faith. Many of us have gone to confession there thanks to the dedicated ministry of the Cathedral priests. Holy Rosary is a symbol of the unity of the diocesan family.
But that answer alone really wouldn’t explain this feastday. After all, when we celebrated yesterday the gift of our Guardian Angels, that liturgy was a ‘memorial’, a less important rank than feast.
The reason for this is deeply theological. In all religions, the temple is the place where the divinity is thought to make itself present to worshippers. By means of the temple, they enter into communication with the world of the gods.
We see this in paganism, we see this in Buddhism, and we saw it in the Old Testament, where the temple at Jerusalem is the sign of the presence of God among his people.
But that Old Testament sign was “provisional” and passing, destined to be replaced with a sign of another sort—not, however, a building, but the Body of Christ and his Church (Xavier Léon-Dufour, Dictionary of Biblical Theology [2nd ed.]594).
That’s why the Church is the New Jerusalem—itself a sign of God-with-us. We, as members of the Body of Christ, form a spiritual temple not built by human hands. Together with Christ, St. Peter tells us, we are one building (1 Pt 2:4).
So our feast today celebrates the invisible richness that eclipses even the most beautiful art and architecture of the great cathedrals of Europe. We recall the dedication of Holy Rosary as a shining symbol of the Church with a capital C, built on Christ, the foundation and cornerstone.
We rejoice in the presence of God in our midst—not just within four walls at Richards and Dunsmuir, but in the Body of Christ, which is at one and the same time, temple, sacrifice, and priest (Xavier Léon-Dufour, Dictionary of Biblical Theology [2nd ed.]594).
At the same time, as members of this local Church, the anniversary of the dedication of our cathedral to God’s praise and glory reminds us today of our call to work together in faith and charity for its growth and upbuilding.
It’s clear that this is a very significant day, since the liturgical calendar ranks it as a feast throughout the diocese.
Why is that?
An obvious answer would be the importance of the cathedral to the life of the local church. It’s there that the archbishop has his chair, or cathedra, and it’s there we celebrate great moments in the community of faith. Many of us have gone to confession there thanks to the dedicated ministry of the Cathedral priests. Holy Rosary is a symbol of the unity of the diocesan family.
But that answer alone really wouldn’t explain this feastday. After all, when we celebrated yesterday the gift of our Guardian Angels, that liturgy was a ‘memorial’, a less important rank than feast.
The reason for this is deeply theological. In all religions, the temple is the place where the divinity is thought to make itself present to worshippers. By means of the temple, they enter into communication with the world of the gods.
We see this in paganism, we see this in Buddhism, and we saw it in the Old Testament, where the temple at Jerusalem is the sign of the presence of God among his people.
But that Old Testament sign was “provisional” and passing, destined to be replaced with a sign of another sort—not, however, a building, but the Body of Christ and his Church (Xavier Léon-Dufour, Dictionary of Biblical Theology [2nd ed.]594).
That’s why the Church is the New Jerusalem—itself a sign of God-with-us. We, as members of the Body of Christ, form a spiritual temple not built by human hands. Together with Christ, St. Peter tells us, we are one building (1 Pt 2:4).
So our feast today celebrates the invisible richness that eclipses even the most beautiful art and architecture of the great cathedrals of Europe. We recall the dedication of Holy Rosary as a shining symbol of the Church with a capital C, built on Christ, the foundation and cornerstone.
We rejoice in the presence of God in our midst—not just within four walls at Richards and Dunsmuir, but in the Body of Christ, which is at one and the same time, temple, sacrifice, and priest (Xavier Léon-Dufour, Dictionary of Biblical Theology [2nd ed.]594).
At the same time, as members of this local Church, the anniversary of the dedication of our cathedral to God’s praise and glory reminds us today of our call to work together in faith and charity for its growth and upbuilding.
Sunday, September 27, 2009
Preaching to Beat Hell? (26th Sunday, Year B)
A group of American tourists was visiting Mount Vesuvius, the great volcano east of Naples. The volcano was quite active, and from the lookout they could see a seething mass of lava and steam.
At the sight of this, one of the Americans cried out “It is just like hell!”
An Italian standing nearby turned to her friend and said “Dio mio! These Americans—they’ve been everywhere!”
And speaking of Italians, Americans and hell, there’s the story of the famous Italian tenor Beniamino Gigli who was appearing in a production of the opera “Faust” in Boston. The stage had a trap door that sank down as his character descended to hell.
Unfortunately, it was a small trap door and Gigli was not a small man. Half way to hell, he got stuck and could descend no further. This prompted a member of the audience who’d had one too many glasses of champagne at the intermission to exclaim “Thank God—I’m safe at last. Hell is full!”
Those are lighthearted stories about a very serious subject, but today’s second reading and Gospel are actually rather grim: both talk about eternal fire, and in pretty blunt terms.
The timing is interesting. I read the paper on Saturday morning, before I looked at the readings for this Sunday, and I was annoyed—as I so often am—by an ill-informed opinion column, even though it made a few good points.
What got my goat was this statement: “Sunday morning pulpits are reserved for fire-and-brimstone sermonizing.”
Say what?
When’s the last time you heard a fire-and-brimstone sermon? Some of you have never heard one. Others maybe remember one from a Redemptorist parish mission in 1951. If the Sunday morning pulpit is reserved for fire and brimstone, the reservation must have been made a long, long time ago—and never claimed.
I’d go so far as to say that we do not hear enough about hell, considering that it is a truth of our faith, and one with pretty serious implications for all of us.
The other day I was chatting with someone who more or less apologized for keeping God’s law because of fear of God. That’s a perfectly good reason to keep God’s law! It shouldn’t be the only reason, since the law of God is the path to peace and many other good things. But God should be feared—over and over again, Jesus, in all his gentleness and meekness, lets us know that.
The Letter of the Hebrews puts it plainly: “It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God” (Heb. 10:31).
I came across a story this week about a priest who came to Mass with a Band-Aid on his chin. He explained to the congregation that he’d been thinking about his homily and had cut himself. After Mass a rather outspoken parishioner suggested that next Sunday he should think about himself and cut the homily.
With that in mind, I think I can wrap this homily up rather briefly. The Catechism of the Catholic Church reaffirms the existence of hell and its eternity. While we speak of hell as “eternal fire,” the chief punishment of hell is eternal separation from God, in whom alone we can have the life and happiness for which we were created and for which we long. (CCC 1035)
Is this just bad news? On the contrary: it’s good news. We have a right to know the consequences of our choices. The Catechism says that the teachings of Scripture and the Church on the subject of hell are a call to responsibility. These teachings invite us to make use of our freedom in view of our eternal destiny. (CCC 1036) In other words, Christ and his Church have let us know what’s at stake in the choices we make.
At the same time, the teachings of Jesus about hell are an urgent call to conversion. He says “Enter by the narrow gate; for the gate is wide and the way is easy, that leads to destruction, and those who enter by it are many. For the gate is narrow and the way is hard, that leads to life, and those who find it are few.” (CCC 1036)
No matter what nonsense we may have heard in the sixties, no matter what we think is “fair,” hell is real… and it is not full.
And we shouldn’t need fire and brimstone sermons to help us figure out what this means for us as Christians—no matter what the religious ‘experts’ at the Vancouver Sun think.
At the sight of this, one of the Americans cried out “It is just like hell!”
An Italian standing nearby turned to her friend and said “Dio mio! These Americans—they’ve been everywhere!”
And speaking of Italians, Americans and hell, there’s the story of the famous Italian tenor Beniamino Gigli who was appearing in a production of the opera “Faust” in Boston. The stage had a trap door that sank down as his character descended to hell.
Unfortunately, it was a small trap door and Gigli was not a small man. Half way to hell, he got stuck and could descend no further. This prompted a member of the audience who’d had one too many glasses of champagne at the intermission to exclaim “Thank God—I’m safe at last. Hell is full!”
Those are lighthearted stories about a very serious subject, but today’s second reading and Gospel are actually rather grim: both talk about eternal fire, and in pretty blunt terms.
The timing is interesting. I read the paper on Saturday morning, before I looked at the readings for this Sunday, and I was annoyed—as I so often am—by an ill-informed opinion column, even though it made a few good points.
What got my goat was this statement: “Sunday morning pulpits are reserved for fire-and-brimstone sermonizing.”
Say what?
When’s the last time you heard a fire-and-brimstone sermon? Some of you have never heard one. Others maybe remember one from a Redemptorist parish mission in 1951. If the Sunday morning pulpit is reserved for fire and brimstone, the reservation must have been made a long, long time ago—and never claimed.
I’d go so far as to say that we do not hear enough about hell, considering that it is a truth of our faith, and one with pretty serious implications for all of us.
The other day I was chatting with someone who more or less apologized for keeping God’s law because of fear of God. That’s a perfectly good reason to keep God’s law! It shouldn’t be the only reason, since the law of God is the path to peace and many other good things. But God should be feared—over and over again, Jesus, in all his gentleness and meekness, lets us know that.
The Letter of the Hebrews puts it plainly: “It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God” (Heb. 10:31).
I came across a story this week about a priest who came to Mass with a Band-Aid on his chin. He explained to the congregation that he’d been thinking about his homily and had cut himself. After Mass a rather outspoken parishioner suggested that next Sunday he should think about himself and cut the homily.
With that in mind, I think I can wrap this homily up rather briefly. The Catechism of the Catholic Church reaffirms the existence of hell and its eternity. While we speak of hell as “eternal fire,” the chief punishment of hell is eternal separation from God, in whom alone we can have the life and happiness for which we were created and for which we long. (CCC 1035)
Is this just bad news? On the contrary: it’s good news. We have a right to know the consequences of our choices. The Catechism says that the teachings of Scripture and the Church on the subject of hell are a call to responsibility. These teachings invite us to make use of our freedom in view of our eternal destiny. (CCC 1036) In other words, Christ and his Church have let us know what’s at stake in the choices we make.
At the same time, the teachings of Jesus about hell are an urgent call to conversion. He says “Enter by the narrow gate; for the gate is wide and the way is easy, that leads to destruction, and those who enter by it are many. For the gate is narrow and the way is hard, that leads to life, and those who find it are few.” (CCC 1036)
No matter what nonsense we may have heard in the sixties, no matter what we think is “fair,” hell is real… and it is not full.
And we shouldn’t need fire and brimstone sermons to help us figure out what this means for us as Christians—no matter what the religious ‘experts’ at the Vancouver Sun think.
Saturday, September 19, 2009
Small Sins, Big Results (25th Sunday, Year B)
A priest friend of mine called yesterday afternoon and asked what I planned to say this Sunday.
I told him “I'm preaching for six minutes on rudeness, taking my cue from the second reading [James 3:16-4:3]. Simple subject, simple sermon.”
And that was my honest intention. But I failed—for a good reason. As I reflected on what St. James says, I became convinced that it’s not simple at all. In fact, it’s deadly serious stuff, and needs a very careful look.
In the first place, the readings tell us that how we treat one another reflects what’s going on inside our hearts. There are a whole lot of good reasons to avoid conflicts and disputes and selfishness, but for the Christian the number one reason is spiritual.
When we act in ways that aren’t peaceable, gentle, merciful and fruitful we not only harm our neighbor, we turn away from God. We know this because St. Paul describes life in the Spirit in almost those exact words.
St. James also reminds us that small sins lead to bigger ones. Weren’t you a bit startled when he went from talking about conflicts and disputes to murder in just a sentence or two? It’s true: most of us won’t kill each other because we’re not getting along. And yet disordered desires and ambitions are actually the root of both minor squabbles and fatal fights.
You can see proof of this in the first reading. The godless have nothing more serious against the just man other than the fact he makes them feel uncomfortable. But that’s enough to lead them to torture and kill him, because nothing checks their hatred.
Jesus was not crucified by psychopaths or sociopaths or bloodthirsty murderers. He was condemned by religious folk like you and me who failed to deal with their personal issues—envy, ambition, and pride.
The root of some horrendous crime is mental illness, certainly, and at other times unadulterated evil. But often enough the source of great wrongs is much less dramatic and much more ordinary. It can even be petty.
One of the best books I have ever read was Eichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on the Banality of Evil by the sociologist Hannah Arendt, who had attended the trial of Adolf Eichmann, the Nazi official responsible for organizing the details of Hitler’s “final solution.”1
Arendt argues that Eichmann showed no trace of anti-Semitism or psychological illness. Her use of the phrase the “banality of evil,” refers to Eichmann's claim that he bore no responsibility because he was simply “doing his job.”
But we’ve all heard that excuse. For me what was really astonishing about the book was Arendt’s discovery that Eichmann was less of a monster than a clown—he was a boring little man who helped with some of the worst things ever done in human history because he wanted to fit in, and he wanted to impress his superiors.
Even a team of Israeli psychologists had to conclude that in most respects Eichmann was “normal.”
If this is even partly true—and Professor Arendt’s conclusions aren’t universally accepted—we get an idea of how “ordinary” sins can deform the person and lead to the very heart of evil. There are, in other words, no harmless sins—sin by definition is harmful.
Let me take you from the drama of the death camps to more familiar places—perhaps to a staff meeting at work, or a family dinner, or even a parish council meeting. Does it matter if we commit ordinary sins in these settings?
Academic studies published this year have shown that just witnessing rudeness can reduce your performance of both routine and creative tasks.2 The researchers also found that witnessing rudeness decreased citizenship behaviors—that’s a fancy term for acting kindly and thoughtfully. On top of all that, it “increased dysfunctional ideation.”
“Dysfunctional ideation” is just a really fancy term for “stinking thinking.”)
All that from just listening to people being rude. And the study looked at both rude authority figures and rude peers. Same result.
On top of all that there’s the research I cited a few weeks back that showed how sitting next to co-workers who bad-mouth your employer makes you more cynical, less trustful of your bosses, and more likely to engage in bad-mouthing of your own.3
Small sins. Big results.
Just before the passage we listened to this morning St. James talks about “taming the tongue.” I don’t know why we don’t read these verses as well—they are very practical, and St. James pulls no punches. He points out that a great forest is set ablaze by a small fire. To do great harm it doesn’t even take a fiery tongue: sometimes a spark will do the trick.
He adds that when we put a bit in the mouth of a horse, we guide the whole horse; similarly, when Christians hold their tongues, they control themselves. The tongue is like the rudder of a ship—very small, but it determines where you’re going.
It’s hard to think of any sin more common than sins of speech—whether we’re talking about gossip, criticism, slander, anger, detraction, rudeness or insincerity. There are pastors who need to tame their tongues, there are parents who need to tame their tongues, and there are children who need to tame their tongues.
There are seven year olds who sin by what they say or how they say it, and eight-seven year olds who do the same. I won’t say anything about ninety-seven year olds in the hope they have the problem licked.
So let’s take this lesson seriously, all of us—young and old, at home, at work, and at church— so that together we can enjoy the “harvest of righteousness that is sown in peace.”
1.Eichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on the Banality of Evil (1963). (Rev. ed. New York: Viking, 1968)].
2.Christine L. Porath and, Amir Erez, “Overlooked but not untouched: How rudeness reduces onlookers’ performance on routine and creative tasks,” Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes 109 (2009) 29–44.
3.J.M. Wilkerson, W.R. Evans, and W.D. Davis, “A Test of Coworkers’ Influence on Organizational Cynicism, Badmouthing, and Organizational Citizenship Behavior,” Journal of Applied Social Psychology, 2008 (38) 2273-2292.
I told him “I'm preaching for six minutes on rudeness, taking my cue from the second reading [James 3:16-4:3]. Simple subject, simple sermon.”
And that was my honest intention. But I failed—for a good reason. As I reflected on what St. James says, I became convinced that it’s not simple at all. In fact, it’s deadly serious stuff, and needs a very careful look.
In the first place, the readings tell us that how we treat one another reflects what’s going on inside our hearts. There are a whole lot of good reasons to avoid conflicts and disputes and selfishness, but for the Christian the number one reason is spiritual.
When we act in ways that aren’t peaceable, gentle, merciful and fruitful we not only harm our neighbor, we turn away from God. We know this because St. Paul describes life in the Spirit in almost those exact words.
St. James also reminds us that small sins lead to bigger ones. Weren’t you a bit startled when he went from talking about conflicts and disputes to murder in just a sentence or two? It’s true: most of us won’t kill each other because we’re not getting along. And yet disordered desires and ambitions are actually the root of both minor squabbles and fatal fights.
You can see proof of this in the first reading. The godless have nothing more serious against the just man other than the fact he makes them feel uncomfortable. But that’s enough to lead them to torture and kill him, because nothing checks their hatred.
Jesus was not crucified by psychopaths or sociopaths or bloodthirsty murderers. He was condemned by religious folk like you and me who failed to deal with their personal issues—envy, ambition, and pride.
The root of some horrendous crime is mental illness, certainly, and at other times unadulterated evil. But often enough the source of great wrongs is much less dramatic and much more ordinary. It can even be petty.
One of the best books I have ever read was Eichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on the Banality of Evil by the sociologist Hannah Arendt, who had attended the trial of Adolf Eichmann, the Nazi official responsible for organizing the details of Hitler’s “final solution.”1
Arendt argues that Eichmann showed no trace of anti-Semitism or psychological illness. Her use of the phrase the “banality of evil,” refers to Eichmann's claim that he bore no responsibility because he was simply “doing his job.”
But we’ve all heard that excuse. For me what was really astonishing about the book was Arendt’s discovery that Eichmann was less of a monster than a clown—he was a boring little man who helped with some of the worst things ever done in human history because he wanted to fit in, and he wanted to impress his superiors.
Even a team of Israeli psychologists had to conclude that in most respects Eichmann was “normal.”
If this is even partly true—and Professor Arendt’s conclusions aren’t universally accepted—we get an idea of how “ordinary” sins can deform the person and lead to the very heart of evil. There are, in other words, no harmless sins—sin by definition is harmful.
Let me take you from the drama of the death camps to more familiar places—perhaps to a staff meeting at work, or a family dinner, or even a parish council meeting. Does it matter if we commit ordinary sins in these settings?
Academic studies published this year have shown that just witnessing rudeness can reduce your performance of both routine and creative tasks.2 The researchers also found that witnessing rudeness decreased citizenship behaviors—that’s a fancy term for acting kindly and thoughtfully. On top of all that, it “increased dysfunctional ideation.”
“Dysfunctional ideation” is just a really fancy term for “stinking thinking.”)
All that from just listening to people being rude. And the study looked at both rude authority figures and rude peers. Same result.
On top of all that there’s the research I cited a few weeks back that showed how sitting next to co-workers who bad-mouth your employer makes you more cynical, less trustful of your bosses, and more likely to engage in bad-mouthing of your own.3
Small sins. Big results.
Just before the passage we listened to this morning St. James talks about “taming the tongue.” I don’t know why we don’t read these verses as well—they are very practical, and St. James pulls no punches. He points out that a great forest is set ablaze by a small fire. To do great harm it doesn’t even take a fiery tongue: sometimes a spark will do the trick.
He adds that when we put a bit in the mouth of a horse, we guide the whole horse; similarly, when Christians hold their tongues, they control themselves. The tongue is like the rudder of a ship—very small, but it determines where you’re going.
It’s hard to think of any sin more common than sins of speech—whether we’re talking about gossip, criticism, slander, anger, detraction, rudeness or insincerity. There are pastors who need to tame their tongues, there are parents who need to tame their tongues, and there are children who need to tame their tongues.
There are seven year olds who sin by what they say or how they say it, and eight-seven year olds who do the same. I won’t say anything about ninety-seven year olds in the hope they have the problem licked.
So let’s take this lesson seriously, all of us—young and old, at home, at work, and at church— so that together we can enjoy the “harvest of righteousness that is sown in peace.”
1.Eichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on the Banality of Evil (1963). (Rev. ed. New York: Viking, 1968)].
2.Christine L. Porath and, Amir Erez, “Overlooked but not untouched: How rudeness reduces onlookers’ performance on routine and creative tasks,” Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes 109 (2009) 29–44.
3.J.M. Wilkerson, W.R. Evans, and W.D. Davis, “A Test of Coworkers’ Influence on Organizational Cynicism, Badmouthing, and Organizational Citizenship Behavior,” Journal of Applied Social Psychology, 2008 (38) 2273-2292.
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