I have seen the future, and it works. I didn’t know where the words came
from, but they came to my mind after the first night of our Parish Mission on
Thursday: I have seen the future, and it works.
By which I mean that the vision of the parish we’ve been talking about for
the last six months or so, namely becoming an irresistible parish that puts
evangelization in the forefront, is becoming something visible and fruitful.
The gym was filled, and we had to keep bringing out more tables and
chairs for all those coming through the doors.
The talk by Father Richard Conlin was the perfect beginning to the topic
of the mission, “The Jesus You Never Knew.” He presented the Jesus he has known
and invited us into that friendship. I simply couldn’t imagine a better way to
launch Lent.
Strangely enough, I was also thinking about the word Lent this week. Years
ago, I probably knew where it came from but I’d certainly forgotten; I
suspected it came from the French word lent which means ‘slow.’ Well, I
was wrong. Lent indeed comes from old German and old English words meaning
Spring, or the lengthening of the day.
Quite the opposite of slow. The ancient word probably refers to the
increasing daylight in Spring, helping us realize that each Lent is a new springtime.
That was another word that came to my mind: the new springtime, which Pope
John Paul II spoke of in his apostolic letter on the millennium as a ‘new springtime
of Christian life.’ As it happened, soon after he wrote those words, the Church
became mired in scandal and sadness and it seemed like we were going into a
long winter, certainly not a new springtime.
And yet Jesus and his message is ‘ever ancient, ever new.’ There is
never a time when the Gospel becomes stale, when the Good News becomes old. The
truth is that a season of sorrow, whether in our own lives or in the Church, is
a time to encounter the deepest truths about our Faith.
So it’s wonderful that the Church in her wisdom takes us right back to
the beginning in our readings today. The very origins of humanity, the origins
not only of man and woman but also the origin of sin. The sin of our first
parents, the scar that the human race continues to bear is described in the first
reading, calling us to reflect on the roots of sin in our lives.
Why is it that—blessed as we are, perhaps not exactly as Adam and Eve
were, but blessed with so many riches, so many good things—we choose those
things that are not held out to us by the hand of God?
When we get to the second reading, we have a more complex but more
hopeful teaching on sin. Yes, it came into the world through Adam, and indeed
through sin came death, yet the Fall was as the Easter Exsultet says: a happy
fault, the necessary sin of Adam. It brought us redemption by another man,
Jesus Christ.
So just as the first reading presents us with the source of our
condemnation, so the second presents us with the source of our salvation, which
is, of course, the saving death and resurrection of Jesus Christ the Lord.
The Gospel moves us away from those fundamental, big-picture themes to
something we can immediately apply to ourselves. Which one of us doesn’t know
temptation? If you can say you don’t, I would really appreciate being let in on
the secret.
Temptation is part of the human condition. So much so that we have the
remarkable scene in today’s Gospel of Christ being tempted. Jesus, ‘a man like
us in all things but sin,’ nonetheless endured temptation. Tempted, one would
think, rather severely after a fast of forty days and forty nights. I didn’t
manage to walk by a bowl of peanuts during my fast on Friday.
And so: let’s look ahead. We have listened to the story of sin. St. Paul
has proclaimed the story of redemption. Where does this leave us?
In one way or another every Christian spends some time in the wilderness,
confused and uncertain. Each of us has moments when we doubt God, when we want
him to prove himself. And there are times when we stand on the mountaintops of
ambition and achievement, tempted to worship these and other false gods.
How can we receive what St. Paul calls “the free gift of righteousness”?
How do we gain access to the abundance of grace that leads to justification and
life?
Listening to Father Richard Conlin on Thursday, I was once again
reminded that Jesus must be at the center of our Christian life. He talked
about the powerful, playful, and prodigal love of Jesus for us. That’s what
makes our parish irresistible—the love of Christ for each one of us.
My one-sentence takeaway this week is this: it’s more than a story. We are
being offered a deep personal friendship with Jesus, which is the ultimate
remedy for temptation and the scars of sin. If we’re not looking for that in the
Church, then we are—if not in the wrong place, then certainly not obtaining the
benefits of being in the right place.
I have seen the future and it is working. The future for a renewed
Church, a renewed parish, and the renewal of our own lives, despite the effects
of sin and any weakness that besets us.
People are responding to what we are doing at Christ the Redeemer. Guided
and strengthened by the Holy Spirit, we are going to keep it up.
To end on a slightly humorous note, I never use quotations without
double-checking the source, since I find my memory often plays tricks on me. I Googled
“I have seen the future and it works” only to discover the words were written
by a naïve American journalist who wrote them after a visit to Communist Russia
in 1918!
He lived, of course, to eat his words. But I won’t eat mine: as I said
last week, in person and on video, this Mission can change your life. So if you
weren’t there on Thursday join us, and if you were there come back and invite
someone along with you.
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