The Beatitudes: Teaching for Disciples Only! (OT.4.A)

 

The Ten Commandments are for everyone, even if the atheist philosopher Bertrand Russell said they were like a final exam of ten questions, with the heading “answer only six.”

You don’t need much faith, if any, to recognize that most of the commandments are fundamental to living a decent life.

Not so the nine beatitudes that we have just heard. They are for disciples. Jesus is speaking “to those who are not only ready to listen to him but to accompany him.”

This is particularly clear for the ninth beatitude, which is obviously addressed directly to the disciples.

The great theologian Hans Urs von Balthasar explains why this teaching is not something everyone can understand. Jesus gives the beatitudes as “a self-portrait that invites his listeners to follow him.”

“He is the one who has become poor for our sake, who weeps over Jerusalem. He is the non-violent one against whom all the world’s violence rages and is shattered. He is the one who hungers and thirsts for God’s justice … who has the pure heart who always sees the Father.”

“He is the one who is persecuted by the entire world because he has incarnated God’s righteousness.” (Hans Urs von Balthasar, Light of the World: Brief Reflections on the Sunday Readings, p. 43)

And in all of this, Jesus is blessed by the Father and exults even in the midst of tribulation.

So, the big question for us today is not whether we believe the difficult teaching of the beatitudes. It’s whether we are ready to pay what the Lutheran martyr Dietrich Bonhoeffer called “the cost of discipleship,” which according to the Scottish spiritual writer John Dalrymple is “not less than everything.”

In saying that, I may have put the cart before the horse. The real question is simply ‘are we ready to become disciples?’—not only to listen to Jesus but to accompany him all the way.

Our response to the beatitudes is like a rapid antigen test. Just a few minutes of reflection can tell us where we are on the discipleship path.

For that matter, looking at the beatitudes as Christ’s “self-portrait,” as “the pure expression of his most personal mission and destiny,” can tell us how well we know our Lord and invite us to go deeper with him.

Each of the nine beatitudes needs a separate homily, but today I will focus only on one: “Blessed are you when people revile you persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account.”

For me, this is more difficult than all the others.

But it is also, for me, the beatitude I have felt personally and painfully in the persecution of Cardinal George Pell, who died suddenly earlier this month. Probably because I care too much what others think of me, I can’t imagine any suffering greater than false accusation not to mention imprisonment.

At the same time, only the stories of the valiant martyrs whose blood has watered the Church’s soil from the beginning until now, have moved and challenged me as much as Cardinal Pell’s. When his prison journals came out in three volumes my first thought was “couldn’t he have found an editor?” Even St. Augustine and St. Therese made do with one diary.

Now, halfway through the first book I’m deeply grateful for how this journal paints a daily picture of a man with such faith in Jesus that he was able to put more hope in his vindication in heaven than on earth, even if that was eventually granted also.

His friend George Weigel writes that “Throughout his ordeal, Cardinal Pell was a model of patience and, indeed, a model of priestly character. Knowing that he was innocent, he was a free man even when incarcerated.”

It’s fair to say that a deep faith in Christ’s promise to those who are persecuted was the source of that freedom. The journal also makes clear that he embraced the Gospel teaching of loving and praying for his enemies, of which there were many.

My relatively high-profile position in our Archdiocese could expose me in future to a minor version of what Cardinal Pell experienced; few of you need to fear that. But surely everyone, especially the young, knows what it is to be reviled for their Catholic faith.

Some years ago a parishioner sent an office e-mail describing Holy Week to his fellow employees. He was formally reprimanded by his superiors for a respectful communication that would have been commended coming from someone of another faith.

Although anti-Catholic sentiments run high, actual persecution usually affects people in certain professions or at certain stages in their education or careers. If you are fortunate enough to be spared the worst of this, might I suggest choosing another beatitude—just one—and spending some time with it.

How, for instance, do we seek to be peacemakers, to be pure of heart? How do we imitate Jesus, the Prince of Peace, whose pure heart willed only the will of his Heavenly Father?

So here’s my “one sentence” challenge to disciples: dive personally into one of the beatitudes. Even one will test our willingness to follow Jesus by becoming like him.

And let us pray for all those who are persecuted for righteousness or on account of their faith in Christ and his Church. Let us pray also for the repose of the soul of Cardinal Pell, whose visit to our parish some years ago I now consider a very special grace and blessing.

We can end with a prayer from the martyr St. Teresa Benedicta of the Cross, better known as Edith Stein. Cardinal Pell prays it during his fifteenth week in prison, awaiting the result of his appeal: 

“We know not, and we should not ask before the time, where our earthly way will lead us. We know only this, that to those who love the Lord, all things will work together to the good, and further, that the ways by which our Saviour leads us point beyond this earth.”

Those interested in knowing more about Cardinal Pell can read the recollections of his friend (and mine) Father Raymond de Souza here and here. The internet abounds with accounts of the Cardinal's judicial proceedings, but I find the detailed analysis of the Jesuit priest and civil lawyer Father Frank Brennan particularly cogent.

Read God's Word – Receive His Promises (Ord.3.A)

 

What promises we hear this morning! Light in gloomy times, freedom from our heaviest burdens, an increase in joy. And it’s not even Christmas.

That’s just the first reading. In the Gospel, Jesus repeats the promise of light in darkness, even the darkness of the shadow that death casts on all of us.

“What’s not to like?”, as a 2022 pop song asks.

But where do we find the light? Where’s the freedom? How do we get out from under the things that weigh us down?

Let me answer with a story I heard more than thirty years ago. I don’t even remember if it’s fact or fiction, but it’s stayed with me all this time.

The story is about a young man whose father promised him a new car for his 21st birthday. But when he came down to breakfast on the big day, all he found waiting on the table was a new Bible, nicely wrapped.

The headstrong young man threw it down and stormed out of the house. He was so angry he didn’t return until he received news that his father had died suddenly.

After the funeral he went up to his old bedroom. There, on a shelf, was the Bible that had so deeply disappointed him. He opened it—and his father’s cheque to the car dealership fluttered to the floor.

Fact or fiction, the story reminds us that the Bible contains what we’re hoping for; there’s a treasure within its pages. But we need to open the book.

The Word of God is where we can find the way to all that’s promised us today—light, freedom, joy, and more.

In 2019 Pope Francis decided the Church needed to devote one Sunday each year specially to the word of God to help us experience how the Lord opens up the treasury of his word. So the Holy Father instituted the celebration of Sunday of the Word of God, on the Third Sunday in Ordinary Time.

He pointed out that the Sunday of the Word of God will occur around the time of the annual week of Prayer for Christian Unity. This is no accident: the Bible, which we share with all our fellow Christians, point out “the path to authentic and firm unity.”

As suggested by Pope Francis—not to mention one of our own parishioners—we will bless our lectors at all Masses today “in order to bring out the importance of the proclamation of God’s word in the liturgy.” (Aperuit illis, Pope Francis, 19 Sep 2019)

But not for a moment should Word of God Sunday end on Sunday—any more than our prayer for Christian unity should only last a week. Today, however, the two themes combine beautifully. Our Protestant brothers and sisters give us an excellent example of devotion to the Scriptures, and it is one of the gifts of the ecumenical movement that many Catholics have been inspired by them.

I was out for a walk with a good Catholic friend the other day and I thanked him for sharing something helpful with me. Right away he replied “Simply I learned about Wisdom, and ungrudgingly do I share; her riches I do not hide away”—words from the seventh chapter of the Book of Wisdom, which he continued to quote.

I asked when he’d memorized these words, expecting him to answer ‘religion class.’ Instead, he told me that when he started to pray Morning and Evening Prayer some years back he found himself both consoled and inspired by the Word of God, particularly the Book of Wisdom, (and I quote) “in its beauty, its potent truth and concise clarity.”

He said that he wanted to “carry” the words with him, and so set out to memorize the passage, although that wasn’t something he’d done for years!

He emailed me later to say that memorizing the text has not only been a delight but continues to be a constant inspiration.

How many of us have a text from the Bible longer than a sentence close at hand—or close at heart?

I won’t show off by quoting, but there are several passages in the Letter to the Hebrews that I know from memory, and two in particular remind us of the power of Scripture. The first is probably quite familiar to you: “The word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword…able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart.” (Heb. 4:12)

The second is: “Let us keep our eyes fixed on Jesus, who leads us in our faith and brings it to perfection.” (Heb. 12:2 NJB) How can we keep our eyes fixed on him without looking to God’s word? As St. Jerome has said, ignorance of Scripture is ignorance of Christ.

By meditating on the words of God we enter into the mysteries of Christ’s life, death, and resurrection—not to become theologians but disciples.

A fine Dominican—who was a theologian—said that “a deep and loving knowledge of God, a deep insight into Christ and a loving imitation of him,” will refashion our way of living, and give us courage and power impossible to human nature on its own.

“As a result of such knowledge and love of Christ, discouragement and weakness will be replaced by joy and strength in doing great things for God,” the late Father Paul Hinnebusch, op wrote.

In other words, the answer to the question I asked earlier “Where do we find the light, the freedom and the joy?” is from knowledge and love of Christ. And we obtain that knowledge and love in part from the living and active word of God.

Of course we know Christ in other ways—through the liturgy, the sacraments, prayer, and the example of fellow disciples. But his word plays a key role in all these ways as well.

I can end right there as long as I keep my promise to provide a one-sentence summary for each homily. Today it is simply this: Let us read Scripture and reflect on it more often so that we can receive all that God has promised us in Christ.

Perhaps one last word from the Word of God as we begin the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity, the prayer Jesus made to the Father in the Gospel of John:

I ask…that they may all be one. As you, Father, are in me and I am in you, may they also be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me. The glory that you have given me I have given them, so that they may be one, as we are one, I in them and you in me, that they may become completely one, so that the world may know that you have sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me.

Here is what my good friend actually wrote me; it needed to be shortened in the homily.

“Simply, I learned about Wisdom
 and ungrudgingly do I share—
her riches I do not hide away;
for to men she is an unfailing treasure;
those who gain this treasure win the friendship of God,
to whom the gifts they have from discipline commend them (Wis. 7:13-14).

“As I have been fortunate enough to cultivate the habit of praying Morning and Evening Prayer over the last number of years, I have been greatly consoled and inspired by the Word of God.  The Book of Wisdom has had a particular attraction for me and the above passage really resonated for me, in its beauty, its potent truth and concise clarity.  I wanted to “carry” it with me, and so I was compelled to try and memorize it, although such an exercise had not been something I had been in the habit of doing for some decades!  Committing the passage to memory has been not only a delight but continues to be a constant inspiration. This exercise has also inspired me to the happy task of committing the following passage to memory as well:

Love is patient and kind; love is not jealous or boastful;
it is not arrogant or rude.
Love does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful;
it does not rejoice at wrong, but rejoices in the right.
Love bears all things, believes all things,
hopes all things, endures all things (Cor. 13:4‒7).”

                               

Epiphany: Time, Talent, and Treasure

 

On New Year’s Day, I dropped in on a parishioner for a visit. As I was getting up to leave, he asked me to wait a second while he got something from another room.

When he returned, he handed me a solid gold bar as a donation to the parish. It was only the size of two Purdy’s chocolates, but I realized at once this was a very valuable gift.

I was grateful, of course, but I confessed right away that I had mixed feelings about the timing.

“If only you’d waited a week, I could have brought your gift of gold to the Lord on the feast of the Epiphany!”

Well, nothing’s perfect. I do have some frankincense here, but sadly the gold is already locked away in a safe downtown. And I really wouldn’t know where to find myrrh.

But even if I can’t imitate the Three Kings this morning, we can do some thinking about their three gifts. Much of it you’ve heard before, but it’s worth thinking about again.

The gifts of the magi are all about Jesus, not about them. Gold is a gift for a King. While it’s obvious that you would only give a king something very precious, there’s more to it than that.

The Old Testament makes some important references to how gold is used to pay homage. The Queen of Sheba brings a large amount of gold to King Solomon (1 Kings 10:1-2), while Psalm 72 and a passage from Isaiah both prophesy that the nations will pay homage to the king of Israel, offering him gifts of gold and frankincense. (Curtis Mitch and Edward Sri, The Gospel of Matthew, page 53)

We see here that Jesus is not only King of the Jews, as the magi first refer to him when speaking with Herod. By the time they arrive in Bethlehem, the wise men pay homage to the King of the world.

The gift of frankincense recognizes that this King is divine. Incense was used then, as it is now, in worship. We pay homage not to an earthly power but to the Creator of earth itself.

And of course, myrrh foretells the death and burial of Jesus. St. Mark tells us that Jesus was offered wine and myrrh at his crucifixion (Mark 15:23) and in John's Gospel, Nicodemus and Joseph of Arimathea brought myrrh and aloes to anoint the Lord’s body (John 19:39).

Thus, as Bishop Daniel Mueggenborg says in a fine homily for the Epiphany, the identity of Jesus is shown in the three gifts: “He is King, God (and/or High Priest) and Man (someone who will die).”

He then reaches a powerful conclusion: In one way or another, the gifts we offer from our lives show who Jesus is to us.

“For some, Jesus is a small part of their lives whose reign extends only to an hour on Sunday morning. Such a limited understanding of Jesus will be reflected by an equally limited gift of one’s life to the Lord.

“For others, Jesus is the Lord of their lives twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week.” 

And that understanding of Jesus will be reflected in an all-out gift of one’s life to him. (Daniel H. Mueggenborg, Come Follow Me: Discipleship Reflections on the Sunday Gospel Readings, Liturgical Year A, page 39)

Obviously, I am not going to tell you the name of the parishioner who handed me the gold bar. But I can tell you that for many, many years—long before I came to Christ the Redeemer—he and his wife made an all-out gift of themselves to the Lord.

I’m not even thinking of their generous financial support. However much their support for the church means at this crucial time of change and rebirth, it pales in comparison to all they did in bringing people to Jesus through evangelization and teaching.

Coincidentally—or not coincidentally!—2022 ended the same way 2023 began, with a budget-balancing donation from other two other very generous parishioners. We’ve talked a lot about ‘engagement’ lately following our ME25 Survey. It shouldn’t come as any surprise that the second couple whose gift has made such a difference to the parish are models of engagement—parishioners involved for many years in multiple roles supporting the mission of Christ the Redeemer.

And even though the magi teach us a lot this morning, we can’t lose sight of the humble shepherds. Because as we heard in last Sunday’s Gospel, it was the shepherds who “made known what had been told them about this child.”

The gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh are precious symbols, but only that. Today isn’t primarily about the gifts we bring, but about the Gift we have received—Jesus Christ, true God, and true Man.

Today we are invited to make him known in the darkness of a world beset by war and an attack on life worthy of Herod himself. We pay homage to the Lord in the best possible way when we share in the mission for which he came to earth—the sharing of Good News to all the earth.

There’s the key message of today’s homily. If we sincerely acknowledge Jesus as our divine King and Saviour, we will share our gifts of time, talent, and treasure, always mindful that the greatest treasure is not gold or silver, but Christ himself.

We don’t need angels, camels, or treasure chests to kneel before this Child and pay him homage. We only need to invite someone to kneel beside us. In the simplest and most practical of ways, we do that by inviting someone to Alpha, a modern version of what the shepherds and the magi experienced.

I visited another parishioner yesterday, on the eve of the Epiphany. No gold, but a very tasty cake! She told me, as if she’d failed, about unsuccessfully inviting a family member to Alpha. When I asked about inviting him to Water in the Desert, she said she’d done that too. And she told me she’d eventually just asked him to sit in the empty church with her.

A failure? No, a great success! She had learned the key message we’ve been sharing at Christ the Redeemer for several years and lived it perfectly. The message is not “Succeed” but “Invite.” Make the Lord known in simple ways, and let the Holy Spirit do the rest.

We’ve been talking lately about becoming an irresistible parish. Even if we’re not there yet, it’s been a week for me of irresistible parishioners, loving the newborn King with all their hearts.

The image above is a painting by Alaska artist Kesler Woodward titled “A Small Epiphany.” He explains the work here.