A Video on Pentecost? Really?

The readings today are extraordinarily rich. The first reading is the dramatic story of the birthday of the Church. The marvel of the first Pentecost is repeated every day, since the Church continues to speak “in the language of every people.”

The Psalm moved us from that historic and continuing miracle to a personal response. We begged the Lord to send the Spirit on the whole world, but also on us as we meditate and rejoice in the Lord.

Then we heard part of St. Paul’s teaching on gifts. In this short passage, the Apostle uses three different Greek words to discuss the Spirit’s gifts. They get a bit lost in translation, but let’s take a look at each.

He uses the word charismata, which you will recognize from the English words charism or charismatic. These are gifts of grace, which Paul connects with the Holy Spirit. The translation here is simply “gifts.”

He uses the word diakonia, which you will recognize from the English words deacon or diaconate. These are gifts of service, which Paul connects with the Lord. Here the translation is “services.”

Thirdly, St. Paul speaks of energemata. Recognize that one? Of course you do—it gives us our word energy. Translated as “activities.” these are gifts of works. St. Paul connects them with God the Father, the first cause of all things.

Gifts of grace, gifts of service, and gifts of works. All from God, and all from baptism.

Happily, in the divine plan not every Christian is given every gift or called to every work. Each has gifts, though, and each has a call.

At first I was not happy when I realized we’d need to show the Project Advance video on this great feast day. We’ve had technical problems and the new video screens were not ready earlier; even now they’re only temporary. But the campaign is well-underway, and we couldn’t keep putting off the video, which this year is particularly good.

However, when I thought about St. Paul’s teaching on gifts of service and gifts of works, I knew it was meant to be. Gifts don’t exist in a vacuum. They need to bear fruit, to accomplish their purpose. And in our parish and Archdiocese it’s Project Advance that makes these gifts make a difference.

Ascension and Our Call

Many years ago I wrote the story of my vocation for the B.C. Catholic. I showed it to my Mom and asked how she liked it.

“It’s very nice, dear,” she replied kindly. “But I notice your father and I aren’t mentioned.”

I never made that mistake again, and certainly won’t make it on Mothers’ Day!  My parents get full credit for laying the foundation for my call to the priesthood.

For teaching me how to be a priest, I give credit to my seminary, the Pontifical Beda College, and to several priests who were wonderful role models for me.

But one thing is sure: I learned how to be a pastor right here. For more than ten years, the parishioners at Christ the Redeemer have been my teachers and role models as I discovered the difference between being a priest and being a pastor.  In the Catholic Church, of course, all pastors are priests—but not all priests are pastors.

I’ll come back to this, but let’s look briefly at the readings.

The scriptures today offer two accounts of the Ascension. In the Gospel, Jesus is taken up to heaven, and the apostles get to work. It’s typical of St. Mark’s concise style.

But in the first reading, from the Acts of the Apostles, we get a neat detail—the Apostles gazing up at the sky after the Lord has ascended. And we read the famous line, “Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking up toward heaven?” It’s almost comical—as if the angel was a foreman barking at the workers—“what are ya staring at? Get back to work!”

I’ve never had to motivate parishioners who only wanted prayer without action. In fact, it’s the ones who pray who seem to work the hardest.

Before I came, many parishioners had taken part in a program to identify their spiritual gifts, Alpha was launched, and a generous community spirit drove the building of the church and school.

In my years at Christ the Redeemer, these foundations have been strengthened by our emphasis on stewardship and on intentional discipleship.

But the lion’s share of the credit can’t go to any program or concept. Our number one strength is people who truly believe they’ve been called to “proclaim the good news to the whole creation.”  People who don’t think Jesus was talking only to eleven people. Or to priests.

For so long our Catholic missionary culture was about priests, brothers and sisters travelling to foreign lands—and that is an important part of going into all the world to proclaim the good news. But in an age when the majority of our neighbours and co-workers do not believe in Christ, it makes no sense to ignore the mission field next door.

Our parish seems to have a special gift for what St. Paul calls equipping the saints for the work of ministry. Let’s look at this unusual expression. Don’t get confused by the word ‘saints’. All Paul means by saints is holy ones. He’s talking about committed Christians, baptized believers—in other words, all of us. We need to be equipped or made ready if we’re going to proclaim the good news in word and deed.

How do we do this?  First and foremost by inviting people to an active faith and personal friendship with Jesus—what we’ve been calling intentional discipleship. We do this is many ways, particularly by building a worshipping community around the altar.

How can people be sent out as missionaries if the sending community is not strong? We are so blessed to be gathered here as one in hope, in faith, and in baptism. And we bear with one another in love—which is not easy. Family feuds may be great on TV, but they are terrible in church. Our parish has maintained the unity of the Spirit in an exemplary way, avoiding any of the dissension I’ve seen elsewhere.

Even a strong community needs to build up its members.

We do this through the generous service of the countless parishioners who use the gifts God gave them to build up the Body of Christ.

No priest has all the gifts needed to equip his parishioners for the work of ministry, but a parish does. We have prophets, evangelists, pastors and teachers, to use St. Paul’s list. We have people willing to lead Bible studies and faith studies—one of the prime ways to prepare missionaries for the world.

We have comforters, debaters, cooks, catechists, flower arrangers, youth leaders, musicians, singers, sacristans, servers, greeters, lectors, and a host of others.

Today we should add mothers and fathers to the list, for they have a primary responsibility to train and evangelize their children. Perhaps their ministry is the most crucial of all, and our schools exist to help them build up the Body of Christ in their homes.

The work of parents is not only crucial, but difficult in this confused world. One lad gave his mother a note for Mothers’ Day that said “Mom, I just wanted to tell you that Mothers’ Day wouldn’t be possible without me.  I’ll be waiting for my present in the living room. Love, Johnny.”

Whether we’re parents or pastors or any other category of parishioner, it’s not easy to build up the Body of Christ day in, day out.  The task is big. It can seem too big. But look what today’s Gospel says: “the Lord worked with them and confirmed the message.” We’re not working alone!

We’re not alone and we have help. Do you remember the ad for blood donors that said “it’s in you to give?”  In baptism and confirmation we have received the gifts we need bring Christ to the world, according to our particular call.

These truths apply to everyone. St. Paul leaves no wiggle room: “Each of us,” he says, “was given grace according to the measure of Christ’s gift.” And each of us is called and commissioned, today, by Christ. So let’s listen to the angels. “Why do you stand looking up toward heaven?” What are you staring at? You and your parish have work to do!

Expecting More (Easter 6.B)

Fortunately for the parish, I’m a fairly cautious pastor. The rather wild

banner we produced for Project Advance this year is about as far as I go when it comes to experimenting.

But if I really let myself daydream, there are two experiments I’d like to try. The first would be two-hour long Masses. Masses as long as the average movie. What do you think would happen? You don’t need to think very long—we all know that St. Anthony’s and Holy Trinity would be totally packed.

The second experiment is even less likely, because first I’d have to get elected Pope. I would make attending Mass optional for a month of Sundays. And what do you think would happen then?

The answer to that is not so obvious. I really don’t know what would happen.

These ideas sound crazy to Catholic ears. Yet there are evangelical Protestant churches where attendance is not an obligation and the services run two hours—and they’re full.

Let’s look at our readings today with my two experiments in mind. Because I think the Word of God has something to say about our attitude to Mass and particularly to what we call the Sunday obligation.

The first reading speaks of the gift of the Holy Spirit. It’s clearly not the same as the Sacrament of Confirmation, since the Spirit comes down on these folks before they’re even baptized. Rather, the Spirit is poured out on them as they hear St. Peter preach.

We find two significant things here: first, the Holy Spirit “fell upon” the people; the Spirit was “poured out” on them. Listen to the language: this is a dramatic moment, something of an eruption of grace.

Second, “the Holy Spirit fell upon all who heard the word.”  God doesn’t even wait for St. Peter to finish. It’s the first time God ever interrupted a homily!

Let’s test our own experience against this story. Have we experienced anything remotely like it? Has we ever felt the Spirit flooding our hearts, falling on us, poured out on us? No need to leap to your feet—I know there are people in church this morning who have had this experience. But I doubt they had it while listening to someone preach!

Okay, maybe it’s the preachers’ fault. But the Acts of the Apostles gives us the rest of Peter’s words—we get only a bit of his sermon today—and it doesn’t sound particularly brilliant. On top of that, we have the fact that the Spirit comes before the sermon is over. It suggests to me that the power is in the message itself, in God’s Word, in the same great truths we hear preached all the time.

Somehow repetition seems to have dulled the power of the Word to open our hearts to the Holy Spirit and to His gifts.

(This is a good time to remind you that Dr. Ralph Martin, a powerful promoter of the Holy Spirit and his gifts, will be giving our parish mission at the end of the month. Here’s what he wrote about the baptism of the Holy Spirit that we encounter today in the first reading: “There is a temptation to build a little shrine around Pentecost and talk about it as a special moment when the Church first began. But Peter is able to tell us NO, NO, NO, don’t do that! This is a permanent reality that the Lord wants to give each new group of Christians. This is something that Jesus wants to do. It wasn’t just for the Apostles.”)

In our second reading we hear three very famous words from St. John: God is love. Love is what connects everything. We love one another, because love is from God. Everyone who loves, knows God.

How does this fit with our personal experience? Does it seem a bit abstract? But the passage has very practical consequences. First, God sent His only Son “so that we might live through him.” That has to mean something, living through Jesus. Certainly enough for another homily.

Then John says that the big thing is not our love for God but God’s love for us. Let’s be honest, that’s not the way most of us usually think. We’re more concerned with doing a good job in showing God we love him than we are in letting him love us.

The second reading also says that “God sent his Son to be the atoning sacrifice for our sins.” That has many consequences, eternal ones, but it also points us to the Mass. If we believe that the Sacrifice of the Mass makes present the one sacrifice atoning for our own sins, why do we attend as an obligation rather than a joy?

Which brings us to the Gospel reading, where Jesus offers us joy—his joy, complete joy. Do we get that in church on Sunday?

Every so often we peek through the curtain of obligation and see what Jesus wants us to see.  It happened at First Holy Communion yesterday morning. No-one was there as a duty. No-one was fulfilling and obligation. And the joy wasn’t just about the beautiful children. It was about Jesus. I watched more than one parent holding back tears—tears of joy.

One of the greatest joys that Jesus offers us is friendship with him. Imagine telling a friend you’ll spend one hour visiting, and not a moment more. Or that you’d be fulfilling your obligation to him or her by meeting for lunch on Wednesday.

There’s no danger that I’ll start celebrating two-hour Masses and even less danger that I will be elected Pope. But I think we could start today to rethink some of the attitudes we have to Jesus our friend and to Jesus who is love itself.

What might this involve? In two words, great expectations. Why shouldn’t the Holy Spirit interrupt the homily by falling afresh on those who listen with open ears? If we come to Mass to fulfill an obligation, then we’ll experience the limited rewards of duty. What God wants us to expect is an outpouring of his own Spirit, the joy of knowing the love of God and the God of love.

                                                                                     

Moving from MUST to WANT (Easter 5.B)

When I was a kid, one of the most popular TV game shows was called Truth or Consequences. It was so popular that a small town in the States, previously called “Hot Springs,” changed its name. And so to this day, you can visit Truth or Consequences, New Mexico.

And if that isn’t the weirdest fact you’ve ever heard in a homily, I’d like to know what was.

The reason I had the show on my mind wasn’t weird, though. It was just that today’s Scripture readings got me thinking about truth and consequences.

Truth always has consequences. The greater the truth, the greater the consequences. And surely, there can be no greater truth than the fact that Jesus Christ is risen from the dead.

St. John tells us in our second reading that truth leads to action: belief leads to obedience and discipleship. And obedience and discipleship lead to life in the Spirit.

In the Gospel, Jesus tells us that his disciples will bear fruit, for the glory of God the Father.

Every ounce of that is distilled from the truth of the Resurrection.

Few people in church this morning don’t believe that Jesus rose from the dead. But this belief can be inherited and taken for granted. Or it can be strong and life-changing.

So where are we in our discipleship journey? Are we likely to bear the fruit that will give glory to God?

Let’s try a reality check this morning. I have a three-word, twelve letter test we can take together. The three words represent three stages of Christian discipleship. We are meant to move from the first to the third, but we need to know where we are now.

The first word is MUST. For many Christians, and especially Catholics, the demands of faith are external obligations. The classic, of course, is that we must go to Mass. We hear it from parents, teachers, and priests. There are other ‘musts’, often in the form of ‘must nots’. Sometimes, the ‘musts’ and ‘must nots’ are reinforced with sanctions ranging from the fear of parents, to the fear of Hell. The parents can be even scarier!

The second word is NEED. As we get older, or wiser, or more worried, we begin to internalize the call to faithfulness. At first I didn’t my doctor take very seriously when he said ‘you must exercise’. But as I got tired and stressed, I began to see that I needed exercise. More and more Christians are recognizing that a society without morality has dire consequences both for individuals and the common good.

There’s nothing wrong with doing the right thing because you must, or because you feel the need. But Jesus calls us to more. He invites us to discipleship that’s rooted in love for him. He calls us to WANT to be his disciples, because we want to be his friends.

It’s really only this third word that can attract others. Within the family and within the Church, we can talk about what Catholics must do, and what Catholics need to do. But it doesn’t sound very appealing.

On the other hand, what our hearts desire can be shared. Someone who is a branch of the vine who is Jesus Christ has the appeal and magnetism of Christ himself. Those who live their faith as branches of the vine – pruned and cleansed by obedience –are Christians who will truly glorify God by bearing fruit.

I don’t want to startle you by shifting gears, but I have found these three words perfectly fit three categories of donors to Project Advance, our annual Archdiocesan campaign.

We have the reluctant contributors. They feel they MUST give something or the pavement in front of the church will continue to buckle and someone will trip. They know that our regular Sunday revenue is not enough to keep up with roofs and pipes that are almost devilishly prone to leak. Or maybe they must give something so that the hardworking volunteers in the foyer don’t give them a funny look as they walk by the table for the next five Sundays.

There are also those who NEED to give. They have a sense of ownership in the parish, and they’ve experienced the fruits of our successful campaigns. Perhaps they have children or grandchildren at St. Thomas Aquinas and they feel it’s important to support the exciting building project now underway. Maybe they are music lovers who think we need to make sure our aging sound system is kept up to date, as we are planning this year.

But, there’s a third group – not just a group in theory, but individuals I’ve talked with many times.  They are those who WANT to give. People in the first two categories might think I am making this up, because it’s natural to think giving money away is painful. And so it is, except for those who understand Christian stewardship. For them, sacrificial giving is not based on what they ought to do, or even what the parish needs. It is directly connected to their understanding of discipleship.

The members of this group believe that Project Advance helps them bear the fruit God wants. They connect their giving to their call to be disciples. It’s a fact of life that most of us just do not have the confidence and zeal of Ed Zadeiks, who will lean over to someone at the next table at Tim Horton’s and invite them to ALPHA.

So when Project Advance funds the parish’s evangelization efforts, including ALPHA, our donors are responding to their call to fruitfulness. There are those who WANT to be a part of the campaign because they know they can’t evangelize alone.

The theme of our 2018 campaign is “Making Sundays Matter”. We chose it in part because it’s one of Archbishop Miller’s four key priorities for the archdiocese. But we also chose “Making Sundays Matter” because our Sunday Mass is “Easter returning week by week”, as St. John Paul wrote.

Among the many activities of a parish, nothing is as vital or as community-forming as the Sunday celebration of the Lord's Day and his Eucharist.[1] So it wasn’t hard to decide to focus our campaign on aspects of Sunday Mass.

The largest parish project this year may not seem terribly spiritual – replacing the stairs and pavement outside the front doors of the church. But we felt that making sure no one trips on their way to Mass was a very good place to start. We want every worshipper to arrive and leave safely.

Last year’s Project Advance raised funds for a video system. It will be up and running in just a few weeks. Doing it right proved more expensive than we planned, so we’ve earmarked additional money from this year’s campaign. The first thing you’ll see on the screen will be the Project Advance video, which will describe the great things we support with the share of the campaign that goes to the Archdiocese, $69,000 this year. But the projection system exists first and foremost to enhance our prayer on Sunday. We will occasionally use film clips in preaching, but we hope regularly to project the words of some prayers and hymns.

We recognize that Mass has limited value in evangelizing visitors, because they feel lost as the liturgy unfolds. This is true especially at Christmas and Easter. We’re going to use Project Advance contributions to purchase or produce guides to the liturgy for our visitors.

Improvements to the sound system in the choir loft will also enhance Sunday Mass.

But Sunday Mass does not exist in isolation. The Gospel calls us not only to worship, but to work. The tremendously successful parish ministries to prisoners and the poor will also be helped by this year’s campaign.

I hope you will support generously this year’s Project Advance. For our Archdiocese and for our parish in particular, it’s what pays for progress.

But giving sacrificially also helps us meet the deep desire for fruitfulness that is in the heart of each disciple. So I hope and pray that you WANT to be part of the campaign this year.

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[1] John Paul II, Dies Domini

Witnesses of These Things (Easter 3B)

Our 'Easter Event' on Thursday night was a great success. The meeting room was packed with an overflow crowd. But what stood out for me was a single failure, if I can call it that.

During the videos and the first of the three personal faith stories shared by parishioners, I noticed one woman who seemed to be doing everything she could to shrink into the corner. She made no effort to turn towards the front, and even from a distance I thought she looked uncomfortable.

Half-way through the evening, she got up and left.  It's possible she just remembered an appointment, but I felt she was distressed by the message she heard.

I was blocked in by extra chairs, or I would have run after her. Later on, I wondered what I would have said if I had caught up to her in the parking lot. I'm not sure, but when I read today's Gospel, I know what I should have said: "Why are you frightened?"

I might have added "it's okay to be frightened--Christ's own disciples were scared silly when he came back from the dead. And they doubted the same truths that made you so uncomfortable a few moments ago."

The testimonies of faith given by ordinary parishioners were enough to shake up most Catholics; I can't imagine their impact on someone who may have just come by for the dessert.

 Look at the reaction of the disciples to the ultimate proof of the Resurrection--the wounded hands and feet of the Risen Lord. St. Luke says "in their joy they were disbelieving and still wondering..."

How human and real is that? And how close to the confusion many of us feel when we try to absorb the full meaning of Easter?

We're joyful. Christ has risen. But we're still not altogether sure of what it's all about.

 I read a story about a plumber who sent an email to a government agency announcing a great discovery. He'd found that hydrochloric acid did a terrific job of clearing clogged drains.

In due course he received a reply from Ottawa: "The efficiency of hydrochloric acid is indisputable but the corrosive residue is incompatible with metal permanence." 

The plumber obviously misunderstood, because he promptly wrote back to say he was very glad the government agreed with him.

The federal official, alarmed at this response, sent a second email which said "We wish to emphasize that we must refrain from assuming responsibility for the production of toxic and noxious residue from hydrochloric acid, and consequently, we most emphatically recommend some alternative procedure."

But again the eager plumber misunderstood the official and wrote back saying how pleased he was that the government agreed with him.

Finally, in desperation, the bureaucrat wrote "Don't use hydrochloric acid. It eats the heck out of the pipes!"

If we're honest, a lot of our preaching and teaching sounds more like the first two emails than it does like the last. We can sometimes over-complicate the Gospel to the point of obscuring its message.

Easter offers us a chance to keep it simple and powerful. The two disciples had an awful lot to say to the others when they arrived back in Jerusalem after meeting Jesus on the road to Emmaus. We know part of the story they told—it appears in the earlier verses of this same chapter in Luke, and we read it at the evening Mass of Easter.

But we can guess what they said first: Jesus is alive!  He is not dead! It's all true!

The basic fact of the Resurrection is at the heart of all the apostolic preaching. In today's first reading, St. Peter is bold to the point of rudeness, and for one reason only: God has glorified his servant Jesus, raising him from the dead. It’s all the confidence he needs.

The belief that Jesus is risen is also the reason for the confidence St. John shows in our second reading; Jesus is not only the atoning sacrifice for our sins, but the sacrifice that atones for the sins of the whole word--as proven by the fact that the Father has raised him to life.

I'm not giving up on preaching: a good homily can help to open our minds to understand the important truths and teachings in the Scriptures, and can help us apply them in our lives. But I've become convinced that our personal testimonies of faith hold a key to the renewal and the growth of faith in our day.

"You are witnesses of these things," Jesus says in today's Gospel. But not merely witnesses of the Paschal mystery and the forgiveness of sins as history or theology. We are flesh and blood witnesses of the power of Christian faith in our own lives, called to share our story with others.

Let me end with a challenge: take a minute now and ask yourself, “What would I have said to that woman as she rushed out to the parking lot?”

We Love the C&Es! (Easter Morning)

Our parish was saddened a few weeks back by the death of our first pastor.  Father Tim McCarthy was fondly remembered as both a good shepherd and a builder who was committed to Catholic schools.

One thing he wasn't remembered for was humorous homilies. He was a serious preacher who didn't tell too many jokes.

But he did tell a funny story I'll never forget.  It was about the woman who came up to him after Mass on Easter and complained about the flowers.

"This parish has no imagination.  Poinsettias and lilies, poinsettias and lilies. It's all I ever see.”

Obviously, the floral critic was what we like to call a C & E—a Catholic who attends Mass only at Christmas and Easter.

Now contrary to what you might think, we love C & E's.  I admit that I wasn't that fond of them back in the days when I needed a seat in the pews, but now that my seat is guaranteed, I couldn't be happier.

Because in a world that has turned its back on God, people who celebrate his coming at Christmas and his rising at Easter are already half way to the fullness of Christian life. They don't think of themselves as "religious,” yet study after study shows they are—including those done by our own parishioner, Angus Reid, who's been called Canada's most trusted pollster.

Easter is a greater challenge than Christmas for a preacher. Today's feast gets to the heart of the story of salvation, and it's not dressed up with the same sentiment and social customs as Christmas. A preacher can let the C &E's go home happy at Christmas, but he needs to send them away with something of a challenge at Easter.

At the same time, the regular members of the congregation need to focus on the visitors sitting beside them today, whether family, friends or strangers. The reason is simple. At Christmas, the good news of Christ's birth was proclaimed by shepherds and wise men from afar. But the news of his Resurrection of Easter was announced by Christ's own friends.

The Gospel we've just heard tells us what happened that first Easter morning. While the Apostles are licking their wounds after the disaster of the crucifixion, Mary Magdalene remains at Christ's tomb, just as she stood at his cross. And Jesus chooses her, his friend, to be the first to announce the good news.

That's why Pope Francis has called St. Mary Magdalene "the Apostle to the Apostles” and why she is a model of evangelization.

It's obvious that Mary's special role on that first Easter highlights the dignity of women in the Church and their essential role in it. But I think it's equally important that a lay person, not an Apostle, not a priest, was the first to say "I have seen the Lord.” 

So this Easter, and every Easter, challenges the committed Catholic to tell others he or she has seen the Lord—to share the news that Jesus has risen from the dead.

Let's return now to challenging the Christmas and Easter Catholic, or even the casual Christian. Or even the "nones” —not the Sisters in habits but what Angus Reid calls those who answer "no religion" on his survey.  There may well be some "nones” with us today, and they too are welcome.

But the welcome comes with a challenge. Although the story of the first Easter we read this morning is exciting and beautiful and dramatic, the other two readings are all about the consequences of the Resurrection.

In the first reading, St. Peter is giving a very important speech. He's preaching to a centurion—a Roman commander—who had a vision that told him to bring Peter to his house and listen to him. So what is Peter inspired to say?

He doesn't give him the fine details about Easter. No mention of angels, or Mary Magdalene mistaking Jesus for the gardener. Instead, Peter tells him the whole story of Christ and his mission, in condensed form.

Because Easter without the rest of the story—without the message Jesus preached, the message that took him to the cross, and without the forgiveness of sins—is a drama with only one act.

Peter gives Cornelius and his family the whole truth, which is what every preacher must do today.

And the whole truth is what each and every one of us, whether you're a C ≈ E, a curious visitor, or a devout Catholic, is what we have to seek together this morning. 

Our second reading, from the apostle Paul, invites us to do that: to set our minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth. 

I've come to believe that the main reason folks don't come to church regularly is simply that they don't feel the need. And that makes some sense. However, that's short-term thinking, because it only means they don't feel the need right now.

If we "seek the things that are above," as St. Paul says, we aren't just looking for pie in the sky when we die, as the old expression goes. We might just be preparing ourselves for situations we have yet to face.

There's a remarkable editorial in the National Post this week about the death of Colonel Arnaud Beltrame, the French policeman who died after swapping places with a woman held hostage by terrorists. It's far better than any Easter sermon I could preach.

"His widow insisted that his sacrifice could not be understood apart from his Christian faith, nourished by the monks at the nearby Abbey of Lagrasse. It was one of those monks who attended to Beltrame in hospital, administering the last sacraments before he died," the Post reports.

The wise editorial writer at the Post calls Colonel Beltrame the "saviour" of the woman for whom he died. On its own, that's a powerful message. But there's more.

The editorial continues: "Then comes the One who can overcome. Jesus is man, the faithful believe, but also God. And the hostages are freed, not freed by overwhelming power, but because there is One to take their place.

"On Good Friday, Christians look to the Cross and hear just that: 'You may go, He has come,'" the Post says.

Rich and beautiful words, but the writer's final point is the one that challenges us most: "The good news of a Saviour is only good news to those who know they need saving. On that Friday morning in Trèbes, the people did not think they needed a saviour until they needed one. On that Friday morning in Jerusalem, the people did not think they needed a Saviour, even though one was at hand."

We must set our minds on things that are above today, not tomorrow, every week, not twice a year. Otherwise, we will not think we need a saviour, until we need one, even though one is at hand.

Our parish has decided to make this great challenge concrete and actual this year—not just words and ideas. A week from Thursday, everyone here is invited to come back for an Easter evening. We want to share the rest of the story, the part of the story that's personal—the part of the story that can make a difference to the rest of your life.

Otherwise, we may not think we need a saviour until we need one, even though one is at hand.

The Vigil Makes Catechumens of us All

Father Giovanni started his homily on Holy Thursday by saying “On Sundays, I am nervous preaching.” He got a good laugh when he added “But tonight, I am one hundred per cent scared!”

Tonight it's my turn to be scared—though perhaps not a hundred per cent—because Father Giovanni is a world-class expert on the Easter Vigil. Preaching in front of him on this subject is a real challenge.

There's a good reason a young priest knows more than I do about this subject: Father Giovanni belongs to a movement in the Church that is centered on the Easter Vigil. It’s called the Neocatechumenal Way. The movement began in the slums of Spain in 1964, spread to Rome by 1968, and is now found all over the world.

Neocatechumenal Way is a difficult name, but it describes a simple idea: namely, that every Christian, even the majority of us who were baptized as babies, needs to make the same journey of faith that our two catechumens, John and Jeannie, have made.

The movement is dedicated to “the rediscovery of Christian initiation by baptized adults.” (Statutes, art. 5, 1)

And so, not surprisingly, the Easter Vigil and its baptismal spirituality is the focal point of the Neocatechumenal Way, which proclaims that “the brilliance of the Sacred Triduum fills the whole liturgical year with light.” (Statutes, art. 12, 1)

Every Sunday celebration of the Neocatechumenal crowd mirrors the Easter Vigil—their Masses are held on Saturday night, and they are not short.  But their Easter Vigil itself is celebrated in its ancient splendour. There are no shortcuts: all the readings are read, and their liturgy tonight will begin well after ours has ended and continue until well after midnight.

In some places, it begins at midnight and ends at dawn, as it did in the early Church.

So if you want a taste of that, there's still time to join Father Giovanni—he's heading over town as soon as this Mass finishes.

If you are not hardy enough (personally, I'm not too likely to join a movement that starts Mass after my bedtime), I can offer you another opportunity to rediscover Christian initiation with the wide-eyed wonder of catechumens preparing for baptism.

I can offer you that opportunity tonight.

In the first place, you can join me in reflecting with fresh eyes and ears on the readings we've just heard . Let's take the time to step back and think about them like catechumens just waiting to be baptized. Because the readings were chosen for them—and we need to think like them to get the whole message.

Why did we start with a reading from Genesis, a long account of the creation of the world? Talk about starting at the beginning. The reason is clear enough: we're pondering the goodness of creation on the night when we celebrate the even greater marvel of re-creation in Christ.

We all know the part of the Genesis story that we didn't hear tonight: the fall of our first parents, the loss of Paradise, the sin that “brought death into our world, and all our woe,” as the poet Milton wrote.

The next reading, the story of Abraham and Isaac, draws us into the drama of the paschal mystery, which begins with the suffering and death of God's only Son. Abraham provides the catechumens with a model of obedient faith, calling them to sacrifice their will to God's will. 

More powerfully still, the story of Abraham and Isaac reminds us that God did not withhold his own Son but gave him up for us all, as St. Paul later writes in his Letter to the Romans. Baptism is just a ritual if we do not know “that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death,” as Paul says in tonight's Epistle.

I preached on this connection between our baptism and Christ's death yesterday, Good Friday, but tonight our catechumens rejoice in the rest of the story: “For if we have been united with [Christ] in a death like his, we will certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his.” Easter, for those preparing for baptism, is very, very personal; but so it should be for each one of us.

Most of us aren't quite as energetic as Fr. Giovanni—who, by the way, started attending the five-hour Easter Vigil with his family at the age of seven—so the Church allows us to omit some of the seven Old Testament readings tonight. But the instructions says that the third reading is never omitted. And it's obvious why that is: God saves the chosen people from death and slavery by leading them through the waters of the Red Sea; he does the same thing through the waters of baptism so that, as the Epistle says, “we might no longer be enslaved to sin.”

Again I cheated a little in my Good Friday homily by quoting tonight's reading from St. Paul. But there was something I didn't say then that I will say now: the destruction of sin that Christ brought about through his suffering, death and rising is not a promise that we will be sinless people. 

I am sure that more than one newly-baptized person was deeply disappointed the first time he or she fell into an old sin.

What Christ destroyed was the power of sin. The freedom we receive through baptism is a freedom from the bondage and the deathly effects of sin. We remain sinners, but the enemy that is pursuing us no longer has the power to take us captive.

That's what our soon-to-be baptized brother and sister are singing in their hearts together with the prophet Miriam: we belong to the Lord and no longer to the Pharaohs of this world. We no longer rely on ourselves but on the Lord, who is our strength and our salvation.

Those of us who were baptized long ago need to reclaim the victory that is ours through the waters of rebirth. The passage of time should not dim the memory of what God has done for us, lest we go backwards and return to the slavery from which we have been set free.

That Exodus reading is my favourite, since freedom from the slavery of sin is so important to me and to many people with whom I pray. But the reading tonight from Isaiah would probably be my favourite if I was sitting in the pew, waiting for baptism, praying that the homily would end!

In the first place, Isaiah makes the catechumens salivate spiritually, if that's not an indelicate thing to say.  He awakens their appetite with images of food and wine, telling them the Paschal fast is over and the hour of baptism has arrived. But once the prophet has our attention, he creates a sense of great urgency—“seek the Lord while he may be found, call upon him while he is near.”

That's no problem for John and Jeannie, or for Erin as she prepares for Confirmation and her First Holy Communion. But do the rest of us share their longing for the Lord's gifts—for the bread of his Word and the Bread of Life? Do we recognize that there is only one time that matters with the Lord, and that time is now?

Do we recognize that God's way is not our human way, or do we expect him to conform to our way of thinking?  The catechumens have chosen a different way; in the words of the poet Robert Frost, they have chosen to take the road less traveled. Are some of us too comfortable on the well-travelled road of the world?

About 1200 words ago, I said, “in the first place.” Well, I don't intend to continue our vigil until dawn, even if it would make Fr. Giovanni very happy. So I will give you the second place in very few words.

In the second place, we can all live the joy of the newly-baptized by one simple thing—by keeping in mind the fact that Christ has died, risen and will come again. We need to move the events of these three days from history to our hearts—daily, weekly and of course at this sacred time.

A final story illustrates this. We priests heard a fine talk on Wednesday from a young Dominican priest. He told the story of a conversation he had with a Moslem friend.

The Moslem asked him why he didn't join Islam.  Apparently that's a common question Moslems will pose even to Christian friends.

The Dominican didn't answer with elaborate words from St. Thomas Aquinas.  He said simply “because I'm a sinner.”

“I'm a sinner, so I need a saviour. And Jesus Christ is the only one who died to save me.”

That’s the kind of thinking that has brought our two catechumens to the baptismal font. And with such clarity of faith each and every one of us can rediscover the reality, the power, and the purpose of Easter.