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April 24, 2005
Fifth Sunday of Easter: Out of Variety, Unity
I think one of the things that astonished me when I first came to Alaska in 1993, was the great variety of cultural and ethnic groups who lived here. I’m not sure what I expected to find, but I imagined Alaska to be a place where mostly Native people and a mixture of Anglo Saxon folks lived, people who could withstand the intensely cold winters and who knew how to “drive” dogs across the frozen tundra. That’s what I had always heard was most unique for Alaska, naïve as I was.
Imagine my surprise when I arrived and found people from the South Pacific or at least the warmer places in the world! “Why would they come to Alaska, this cold and barren place,” I said to myself? Well, they had obviously come for the same reason all the other people in Alaska had come: To make a living, to be free, to be respected for their unique background, ethnic, religious and cultural. So, I had to get used to that diversity pretty fast. It was actually no big problem for me, even though I grew up as a youngster where all the folks were white, European.
Interestingly, what I remember best from my growing-up days was the fact that many of the folks who lived around us were of the same ethnic and racial background, but they did not go to our church. They practiced a different religion: They were mostly German-Norwegian Lutheran. Of course, that did not prevent us from associating with them. We did not know much about their churches in those days and, unfortunately, we didn’t much care. There were other things that bonded us together. We knew one thing for sure, however: we could not attend their church, not even for weddings or funerals. “They are not like us”, our pastor warned, “don’t go there!” We never could understand how different they were, but we never had the courage to ask either. That was a different day and a different time, of course. Today, Catholics and non-Catholics have no problem associating closely with one another. We even worship with one another on special occasions.
What is even more unique today, of course, are the number of ethnic groups that worship together in the same church. I have read, for instance, that in Los Angeles, there are some 30 or more different language and cultural groups, and most of them are all mixed in together on a Sunday morning, worshiping in different languages and getting along well with one another. This is a far-cry from the “old days” when each ethnic or cultural or language group had its own church and its own pastor who spoke the mother tongue. There is really something beautiful about the fact that we can have such different backgrounds but can still worship together without any question.
Interestingly, this is the way it has been in the Church of Jesus Christ from its earliest days. In the beginning, of course, all were Jews but within a short time after Jesus death and the time of the first missionary journeys of Peter, Paul and the other apostles, Gentile people gradually began to flock into the church, mostly Greeks.
How do we know all that? Well, we know it because the scripture for the liturgy of this Sunday tell us about a minor flare-up that happened in the early Church. The community was growing faster than they could manage it. The big problem was how the non-Jewish converts, the Greek-speaking people, could be integrated into the Christian flock. They were afraid of discrimination. Some Greek-speaking widows (the helpless) were not being cared for in the distribution of food.
So, how did they work that out? It is called the discernment and distribution of ministries, much as we choose and distribute ministries today. Everyone is invited to contribute their individual gifts. The apostles, in this instance, decided that they would dedicate themselves to the ministry of the Word, preaching and catechizing, while the deacons (servants at table) would make sure that the entire community was cared for in terms of food and housing. It seemed to work out then even though it was a smaller and simpler community. It still works today: Look at all the different ministries that are active in this very church.
You will have noticed in the scriptures just read that the theme centers around the idea of unity in diversity, out of many one. What is the scriptural foundation for our unity as Christians? We just talked about the problem they were having in the early church, mentioned in the Acts of the Apostles. What brought that diverse community together eventually was their common desire to hear God’s Word, to share Eucharist together and be cared for. Isn’t that what Church is all about? Isn’t that what we look for in our churches? That’s, in fact, what makes Church to be what it is.
Secondly, we have a nice little sermon in the First Letter of Peter we just heard read a moment ago. Remember, Peter is talking to lots of different folks and he uses a lovely metaphor. He tells them that they should think of themselves as “living stones” of all different sizes, colors and shapes, but all joined together on the cornerstone which is Christ. A great metaphor and I’m sure the folks all understood it without difficulty.
So, Peter was really just trying to explain to all these different folks how, despite their differences, they could be Church: “Just think of Christ as your corner stone and yourselves as living stones attached to Christ, the one who holds all things together.”
Then Peter uses a beautiful phrase to describe who they are together as Christians: He says: “You are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people of God’s own so that you may announce the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light.” Can you think of anything more beautiful to say to a Christian community about what it means to be Christian and community? In fact, these are the very words which the bishops of the Second Vatican Council used in their document called The Constitution of the Sacred Liturgy to describe who we are when we celebrate Mass together.
And, finally, we have some good words from John the Apostle about being Church: John tells his folks that in God’s house there are many rooms, room for everyone, no matter what their ethnic or cultural background. “Christ is going back to prepare a place for you,” he says. “You will never need to be afraid of being left out in the cold.”
So, you see, from Christianity’s earliest times we have been trying to figure out how we can be different and still one in the same Church. We have found out over the years that in variety there is beauty, in diversity, unity. This is exactly what James Joyce, the famous Irish novelist once said: “Catholic means here comes everybody.” You can’t argue with that!
The scriptures:
Acts of the Apostles 6: 1-7; 1 Peter 2; 4-9; John 14: 1-12
Posted by Deacon Eric Stoltz at 02:54 PM.
April 17, 2005
Fourth Sunday of Easter: Of Leaders and Followers
I have never been a great advocate of sheep or sheepherding. It’s nothing personal, you know. It’s just that I was brought up in a cattle family. Our family had a cattle company; we raised cattle for a living, but it was also a labor of love.
Unfortunately, in the 1860’s and thereafter, sheep men began to invade the Great Plains which until then had been cattle country. No doubt, you have seen movies about the great cattle and sheep wars, about fences and free land. As you might imagine, there was not much love lost between sheep herders and cattle men. It was all about making a living.
It was not until I was a young adult and, with my friends, began to take vacations in the high mountains of Wyoming that I began to appreciate the role of shepherds or herders, as we called them. Each spring these herders, mainly Basque men from Spain or France would bring thousands of sheep up into the high meadows and keep them there until the snow began to threaten in early September again.
It was no soft life these men lived. They were single men, mostly, and they lived for four months in a canvas-covered wagon, cooking for themselves, guarding the sheep against coyotes and rustlers with their trusty dogs and “Thirty-Thirty” rifles.
It occurred to me that this was a lonely and dedicated life inasmuch as the sheep were not their own. They belonged to rich businessmen in Denver or Cheyenne. And yet, they seemed to act as though they had a personal stake in these sheep.
Part of it, of course, had to do with the nature of the sheep: They are wayward creatures, constantly running after the next patch of green grass or pool of water. Hardly any wonder then that the shepherds needed to have a kind of personal concern for these aimless animals. Every individual sheep was worth a considerable amount of money at that time.
I imagine that this has been the case for as long as sheep have wandered the earth. Sheep and goats have seemingly been the basic stock in desert lands for as long as we can determine. Both the Jewish and Christian scriptures speak of them in many places, not only because they were a basic food source but also because they were “part of the family” pets as it were, much like our pet dogs or cats today.
Even Jesus goes to great lengths to describe for us the close relationship between shepherds and sheep: Like a pet dog, the sheep knows the master’s’ voice. Knowing their vulnerability the shepherd made sure that the sheep were corralled each evening and that he himself actually slept under blankets on the ground at the door of the stone enclosure to keep away the threat of wild animals. Yes, I suppose there was a kind of economic interest in the sheep, but I am sure that there was also a personal interest as well. As Jesus himself notes: “The shepherd knows his sheep by name and they know him.”
We can begin to understand, therefore, why Jesus would refer to his disciples both as friends and as the sheep of his flock. People would immediately and instinctively have realized the implication of those words. It was something personal between them. We today might not use that sort of language, but in those days it had a special meaning, a meaning of personal endearment. We are still using that term today because there does not seem to be any better way to describe the relationship between Christ and ourselves, the church.
Nonetheless, in this age of Christian “sophistication”, some Catholics are put off by being called “sheep of the flock.” It seems to have a sort of demeaning quality about it, especially when you think of sheep as wayward creatures with a mind of their own, constantly getting lost, constantly needing to be brought back into the fold. We don’t think of ourselves in that way today constantly needing someone to remind us to stay close to the church and not take the risk of losing our faith. We feel a certain personal responsibility for our faith and like to make up our own minds in regard to conscience.
But I think there is something more personal involved when Jesus calls us “sheep of the flock.” Jesus always gave his disciples the complete freedom to go their own way. But you also get the sense that Jesus was always deeply concerned about his disciples on a very personal level as well.
So, we could say that our church can truly be called a place of safe haven. We come there in any circumstance to seek help, consolation, forgiveness. We can know that that if we come there we will not be turned away, no matter how far we may have wandered from the fold. Someone will always be there to welcome us home. I think that is what Jesus meant when he calls us by name, “sheep of the flock.”
It is not purely by accident either that our popes from earliest times in the church have been called the Chief Shepherds of the Flock. We can assume that the pope has a personal interest in each of us even though he may never meet us personally. It is his job to be our pastor and shepherd.
As I read about Pope John Paul’s health difficulties these days and his insistence that he accepts his sufferings for the sake of the entire church, I think to myself, here is a man who has learned from Jesus himself that his role is to be our guide and shepherd, even though it may cost him some pain and suffering.
Posted by Deacon Eric Stoltz at 02:51 PM.
April 10, 2005
Third Sunday of Easter: Getting the Word Out
It always arouses my interest as I drive by various non-Catholic churches and notice the title of the forthcoming Sunday sermon displayed on a sign-board out front. Some are puzzling, others humorous, but they are always eye-catching and clever. I’ve always wondered why we Catholics do not follow the same practice. We might well attract a few more possible parishioners. Perhaps the assumption is that Catholics are obliged to come to church each Sunday anyway, no matter what the sermon might be! Inasmuch as Protestants are not obliged to attend services each Sunday, perhaps the sermon title is meant to serve as a bit of free advertising or a “come-on” for people who may be driving by and become interested. Anyway, it’s a thought. Nonetheless you can tell that these Protestant ministers have already done some homework on a sermon if the title comes up on the sign around Tuesday or Wednesday of the current week.
Selling religion or publishing your “spiritual wares” may not seem very appropriate, but if you want to attract listeners, you need to get the word out some way. Actually, this has been the normal practice in Christian churches from earliest times: its called proclamation: Proclaiming the good news of Jesus Christ.
The question is how to get the message out there in this age of modern communication. There was once the assumption that people would flock to churches to hear a good sermon, but even back as far as the “fifties” we already were beginning to see a change in proclamation when good old Bishop Fulton Sheen, of happy memory, who followed the example of Milton Berle, the comedian, and did his preaching on television for the first time. If you look hard enough, you can still find video tapes of some of his TV sermons. He was not only a dynamic speaker, but he knew how to sell his “goods” by dressing up in his brightly colored robes and using his chalk board with the mysterious angel who erased it clean every few minutes. See, he knew what it took to proclaim the gospel.
Today, of course, there is a lot of competition for preachers with the advent of so many other means of communication: Mother Angelica’s Eternal Word Television Network, cable television, electronic mail, the Internet, et cetera.
One form of public communication, for sure, which you will not find very much today is the preacher who stands and preaches on a street corner somewhere, or in a town square as used to be done so frequently in English towns years ago.
In today’s busy times, of course, you probably would not find a half dozen people who would stop and listen even for a few minutes to this sort of preaching. Today, people hardly even have time to read the daily news paper, much less stand on a street corner listening to a preacher. They would rather check out Cable News Network at the head of the hour; it’s always faster. Of course, they are not going to get much spiritual satisfaction from Ted Turner’s Cable News Network, but there are other religious services available on the Faith Network, Channel 16.
Now, if you would like to have an example of a typical sermon given in the public square, you only need to go as far as the first reading in today’s liturgy. Peter is giving this sermon outdoors somewhere in the city of Jerusalem and whether you believe it or not, he gives the whole story of Jesus’ life, suffering, death and resurrection in about fifty lines. You might wish that all sermons were that short. We call that sort of preaching Kerygma, a Greek word which means a public proclamation of the good news of God’s saving activity in the life of Jesus Christ. In short, this is an early form of street catechism or theology.
There are two interesting things to notice in this short sermon of Peter. First of all, this is what we would call today the Liturgy of the Word, the first part of our modern Mass: Basically, a scripture reading and a homily. Secondly, right at the end, Peter says: “All this is true, my friends: I was there, I saw it all happen, I was an eye-witness. This is no second-hand story.” I imagine anyone who heard Peter say those words must have thought, wow, here is someone who knows what he is talking about. I think I’ll stick around and hear some more. Wouldn’t it be great if modern-day preachers could attract an audience like that? Being an eye-witness always helps (Eye-witness News)!
Now, let’s take a look quickly at the gospel. This is one of my all-time favorite passages, the story of two people (perhaps a husband and wife) who are on their way home from Jerusalem after Jesus’ death. They are walking along, talking about all that had happened over the past few days, and as they walk along, a stranger catches up with them and casually asks what they are talking about. So, they relate to him the news of Jesus’ death.
The stranger listens to all this without a word. Finally, he says: “My friends, let me explain to you what all this means, why it happened like this. It was all in God’s plan.” In other words, the “stranger” gives a short sermon on why Jesus had to suffer and die on the cross. Now, of course, they still have no idea who it is.
Finally, they arrive at the village of Emmaus; it is around dinner time. The stranger just keeps walking on; so they stop him and invite him to come and have dinner with them. The waiter brings them a loaf of bread (perhaps a bottle wine as well, but that is not mentioned.) The “stranger” takes the loaf of bread, says a blessing over it, breaks it and gives them some. “Suddenly,” the text says, “their eyes were opened” and they realized it was Jesus they were listening to and with whom they were eating. They realized this because this is exactly what he had done at the Last Supper and perhaps at other times as well. It was a kind of “deja vue all over again”! And then, mysteriously Jesus disappears from their sight, and they are left scratching their heads over the entire incident.
But they are also convinced that it was Jesus because of what he said and what he did. They walk back to Jerusalem immediately and tell the rest of the disciples: “We’ve seen the Lord. We recognized him when he explained the scriptures to us and when he broke bread with us.”
Now, what’s that all about? The scripture scholars today insist that Luke, the author of the gospel, is telling us that this was a form of early Christian worship; in other words, an early form of the Mass we have today: First, the Scriptures are publicly read and explained and then bread is broken, the wine also blessed and handed out to everyone. In an abbreviated form, that is a description of what we do each Sunday: Someone reads he scriptures, a homily or explanation is given and then bread is blessed, broken, wine is blessed and distributed to all. This is Eucharist that we know so well from experience.
Interestingly, we are, in a sense, in the same situation as those two people who met Jesus; they said they recognized Jesus when he gave the homily and when he broke bread with them. May I suggest that this is exactly how we meet Jesus each Sunday at Eucharist? We also recognize Jesus present when the scriptures are read and when bread and wine are blessed and distributed. That’s what the Mass is all about: Recognizing Jesus again, still present in signs.
Now that I think about it, if I were to put up a sign in front of a Catholic church with the title of the following Sunday’s sermon I might put up these words: “Jesus is back folks, come in and check it out!” If that does not bring in some folks off the street, I don’t know what will.
The scriptures:
Acts of the Apostles 2: 14, 22-33; 1 Peter 1: 17-21; Luke 24: 13-35
Posted by Deacon Eric Stoltz at 02:45 PM.
April 03, 2005
Second Sunday of Easter: A Card-Carrying Member
It has always seemed to me that people with imagination are a great gift to the world: writers, inventors, philosophers, poets, ordinary folks who are not afraid to say, “what if, what if, for instance?
As a person who spends a lot of time in church, at least on Sunday, I have often wondered, imagined what it might be like if Jesus happened to walk in some Sunday morning looking for a seat. If he were not wearing the long brown Middle Eastern cloak but, say, a blue, three-piece suit, I might not even take a second look. “Just one of the parishioners,” I might say.
In our multicultural churches today there are many people of different backgrounds and we never give them a second thought. If they are Catholic, they deserve to be there with the rest of the assembly. We never ask questions.
Sometimes, of course, street people, folks who are down on their luck also come to church and then we may look up and notice that they are a little “different.” But beyond that we seldom think about it any further.
Obviously, Jesus is not going to “show up” some Sunday in one of our churches, but it is an interesting notion to explore, if, indeed, Jesus did decide to fulfill his Sunday obligation in a Catholic church. He could do that, of course. It’s his church, after all. We believe that he is our founder, the reason why we ourselves “show up” each Sunday morning.
Seriously, however, and theologically, we need to say that Jesus does not have the option of walking into a church any longer. The historical Jesus does not live any longer as he once did in Palestine thousands of years ago. Even when he lived at the time he did, he was limited by the same constraints as all other human persons: We do not read, for instance, that Jesus appeared in two separate places at the same time. We know too that he had to put up with the same human frailties that all of us do: Heat and cold, hunger and thirst, irritation with the disciples’ slowness to learn. We know that Jesus sometimes got angry but that he also had compassion for the sick, that he cried when one of his friends, Lazarus, died, that he was scared to death in the Garden of Gethsemane. All that tells us that Jesus was truly human and that he was limited by human nature as well. So, given that Jesus died, he would not be able to sign up as a parishioner in any church today.
But if we were to insist that Jesus Christ could not be recognized in any form in our churches, then we would have some theological problems to deal with. The fact is, Jesus is present with us when we come together to celebrate Eucharist each Sunday.
We have an interesting proof of that in our first reading from the Acts of the Apostles today. It’s a short history of the early Christian church. It tells us a little bit about what they did on Sunday and why they did it: Here is what Luke, the author of Acts says: “They devoted themselves to the communal life, to the breaking of bread and to the prayers. They met together in the temple area and devoted themselves of breaking bread in their homes. Every day the Lord added to their number.”
All this tells us that the Christian community still believed that Jesus Christ was with them, even though he was not with them physically as he once had been. In other words, it was their faith in Christ that made him present.
We experience something similar when we have photos of friends or relatives prominently displayed in our home. They are not there physically but their presence is felt when we look at the photo.
So, it is not the Jesus of Nazareth who returns to church each Sunday, but rather the Christ of faith who is always present when we gather for the Eucharist which he instituted for us.
Unfortunately, I think we do not always realize how present Jesus Christ truly is when we come together like this on a Sunday because it’s all about recognizing signs. We’re often like folks who live in Missouri: “Show me,” we say. “We want physical evidence.”
But there are some real signs that help us recognize Jesus Christ. The bishops at the Second Vatican Council back in the 1960’s taught us that. Here is what they said: “Christ is always present in his Church, especially in her liturgical celebrations, not only in the person of his minister, but especially in the Eucharist. He is present in his word when the holy scriptures are read in church. Lastly, he is present when the Church prays and sings, for he promised, ‘where two or three are gathered together in my name, there I am in the midst of them.’”
So, that is the teaching of our Church: We believe Jesus Christ is present, not physically, bodily, flesh and blood, but rather in the signs he left with us: Word and Eucharist, in the priest who leads us in prayer and even in our presence to one another here in our pews each Sunday. It is truly Jesus Christ, just in a different mode or form.
So, what should all that mean to us when we are in the middle of the celebration of the liturgy? I think it’s something really simple: It’s a matter of paying attention to little (or not so little) things: When the gospel is read, for instance, it is really Jesus speaking to us. When we come to the table for Communion, it is Christ we receive. When we notice the person next to us, praying with us, it is a sign of Christ still present.
When you think about it, Jesus Christ is still dependent on the body to be with us, but this time he depends on what we call the mystical body, the Church to make him present.
So, if we are a hospitable people, as I am sure we are, and then our task is to welcome Jesus into our (and his) church every Sunday. He depends on us to do that. All it takes is for us to keep our eyes and ears open to what is happening when we come here to pray and sing and even after Mass to share coffee or a soft drink and something to eat. That’s what those early Christians we just read about were doing: Breaking bread and praying. Nothing much has changed over the years, at least I hope it hasn’t.
The scriptures:
Acts 2: 42-47; 1 Peter 1: 3-9; John 20: 19-31
Posted by Deacon Eric Stoltz at 02:42 PM.
