Over the
past two months we have begun an effort to"unfold
the mystery" of the Mass, to talk about
what we baptized people do when we gather
and when we attend to the Word. We did
this in the context of specific Sundays of
May and June. What follows is directed toward
Sunday, July 3, 2005, the Fourteenth Sunday
in Ordinary Time, Year A. It is of course
also the Fourth of July weekend. That can't
be ignored. So here we tackle the whole context:
the Ordinary Time scripture proclaimed in
the eucharistic liturgy on a Sunday that is
already loaded with content - and also
subtly continuing to talk about the liturgy
expected of all of us every Sunday. For that
last, we are still talking about elements
of the Liturgy of the Word. Note also that
the homilist should be seeing the flow of
scriptures and should be able to look back
at recent weeks or forward to what is coming
(in this case, next Sunday's first reading,
Isaiah 55:10-11).
Gabe Huck
Sunday by Sunday, the church gathers here, and
when we are ready to engage ourselves in hard
listening and pondering, we sit and we open
the book of scriptures and we give attention.
When we have read briefly or at length from
the Hebrew scriptures, the letters of the New
Testament and finally the Gospels, we have this
time called the homily, or the sermon, or the
preaching. This homily is to ponder the holy
scriptures we have heard, and it is to draw
on anything else that is done here this morning,
and with this, to engage this flesh-and-blood
church of ours in a conversation. That is not
a conversation among ourselves only, but a conversation
with God, to whose word we have given our full
attention.
As the homilist, I have the responsibility to
spark this conversation. I prepare to do that
when I listen through the previous week many
times to those readings, when I seek what others
have said about them, when I let them come to
my heart and mind fresh and strong and with
power. I ponder these scriptures always within
the place where they live, this Sunday gathering
where we, the church, have met to hear God's
word to us and to do our best to gather our
intercessions and our thanks and praise and
so come to share holy Communion. The words of
the scriptures are of a piece with all that
we do here.
I don't do this preparation work alone.
I do it with eyes and ears open to the church,
all of us here, and to the world where this
church is living, struggling. That"world," of
course, is not something other than ourselves.
We are ourselves that world, some bit of it.
So it is our business here to note that we meet
today just before a national holiday, the Fourth
of July, and that this comes in a troubled time
when life-and-death matters are being debated
in relation to wars, occupations, trade, jobs,
health care, the environment, the use of economic
and military power. All of this and more is
on our minds, in our hearts, when we attend
to the scriptures and figure out how to enter
into this homily. The homilist does not speak
only as a teacher here, but as a member of the
church responsible for engaging the church and
its scriptures. I may do this well or badly,
but in any case I, along with all homilists,
need your attention here and your conversation - not
just your criticism - all through the
week.
So today, though I am speaking, enter with me
into a conversation. Begin with the words of
Jesus in Matthew's Gospel that are read
today, for these are words cherished by many
people. In some Christian churches, especially
in Eastern and Southern Europe, they are seen
again and again in the image of Christ holding
a book or scroll. Written on that book or scroll
is today's Gospel:"Come to me,
all you who labor and are burdened, and I will
give you rest." Here are words held dear
especially by those with little power over their
own lives: by people whose daily work is hard
and long and little rewarded, by people who
have no work at all, by people bearing the burdens
of debt for life's necessities; words
held dear by people addicted, people who are
developmentally disabled, people weakened by
sickness or by AIDS or by old age. Come to me
and I will give you rest. How prisoners
and women and harshly treated minorities have
clung to those words!
They are words that have somehow seemed to many
to sum up the whole of the Gospel of Jesus.
They seem true to the one who could say:"Blessed
are you who are poor now, blessed are you who
are hungry now, blessed are you who weep now." They
seem true to the one who by word and touch would
heal the sick. They seem true to the one whose
mother sang the praise of God bringing down
the powerful from their thrones and lifting
up the lowly. But above all, these words"Come
to me, all you who labor and are burdened" seem
true Gospel of that Jesus who did not back off
when the people of power came for him - the
religious leaders, the military, the bullies,
the civil authorities. He became the burdened
one.
The words of Jesus that begin today's
reading are a prelude to this"come to
me" summons. These opening words are a
prayer, a praise of God spoken by Jesus. Jesus
began this prayer with words that all his listeners
would know well for they were part of everyone's
daily prayer:"I give praise to you, Father,
Lord of heaven and earth."
They are still part of Jewish daily prayer and,
in fact, are the way we pray when we come together
to the table and begin our eucharistic prayer.
For what is Jesus giving thanks and praise to
God, to the Father?"You have hidden these
things from the wise and the learned and have
revealed them to little ones."
Don't we seem to know at once exactly
what Jesus is talking about? Who can the"little
ones" be? Children, yes. But also all
those others who have no say, those whose faces
are not seen in places where power is exercised,
whose voices are not heard when decisions are
being made or when the loot is being divided.
Those, we say today, with no access. Those
who don't even know who the"gatekeepers" are.
Jesus is saying: Praised are you, God, that
you have been hiding from those with plenty
of money and power and education, and have been
showing yourself to those at the other end,
those at the short end of the stick. Today the
short end is shorter than ever and there are
more people trying to cling for dear life.
These Gospel words call to mind that old summons
to the preacher: Comfort the afflicted, and
afflict the comfortable. They may have a sharper
edge because of the weekend when we hear this
Gospel. In 1776, a group of wealthy white males
signed onto a document that put their lives
and fortunes at risk. This was an assertion
that when any government abuses the very reasons
for there being a government, then the people
(and yes, by"people" they meant
only the wealthy white male people) have the
right to change that government. Such ideas
had been talked about, but here were people
putting it in a Declaration of Independence,
signing their names. That is what we remember
this weekend: that governments are given power
by the people, and when a government begins
to do more harm than good, the people not only
can but must take its power away. Of course
there are questions: Whose harm? Whose good?
What power? Jefferson and the other signers
tried to answer those questions - for
their place and time -
very concretely. The heritage would best be
honored not just with fireworks and parades
but with soul searching and boldness.
Many today confuse their Christianity with their
citizenship, always a mistake. But it is no
mistake to say that as citizens who listen to
the word of God in our church, we come to our
citizenship with our eyes -
and often our mouths, too - wide open.
From our Gospel and our communion here we learn
where to look and where to pay attention. And
if we try to do that, we are always, always,
always going to confront those powers in this
world - political powers, economic powers,
military powers, even institutional church powers - that
trample the earth and the poor. We who were
baptized are either those little ones, the burdened
of the world, or we are their faithful advocates,
their voices, their servants somehow.
What is asked of us as Christians who happen
to be citizens of the United States? Where should
our eyes and thoughts and voices be this weekend
especially? We could listen harder to those
few words from the prophet Zechariah in this
morning's first reading. This prophet
too lived in troubled times when economic and
military power were rampaging. The temptation
then, as now, was to get on board the strongest
chariot, the most expensive tank; to back the
brutality and torture as long as it was happening
to somebody else; to tighten the borders and
draw clear lines between us and them. If we
don't do it to them, they might do it
to us, right? Later Jesus would challenge how
there could be a"them" and an"us."
But Zechariah takes another sort of stance,
a lot like prophets before him who spoke of
beating swords into plows and studying war no
more. Zechariah says:"The messiah/king
will banish the chariot from Ephraim, and the
horse from Jerusalem; the warrior's bow
shall be banished."
Is it pie in the sky or is it our Gospel duty
to speak of banishing the instruments of war
and oppression - chariots and horses,
bows and arrows? How have we as a church let
our prophetic voice be shushed even in a society
that is founded on the need for prophetic voices?
Standing as we do in the tradition of Zechariah
and Jesus, how engaged are we here - we
who this weekend remember a time when some people
said power comes from the people and the people
must stay very clear about that? How uncomfortable
are we that it takes so many horses and chariots
and bows and arrows to keep our gasoline supply
flowing and our shopping centers full? How uncomfortable
are we that those horses and chariots and bows
and arrows cost so much money that the schools
and veterans and so many others are left with
the scraps?
This is the conversation to which we are summoned
today. God's word has challenged us. When
we gather here next week and open our book,
we are going to hear this: Thus says the Lord,"Just
as from the heavens the rain and snow come down
and do not return there till they have watered
the earth … so shall my word be that goes
forth from my mouth; my word shall not return
to me void, but shall do my will."
Copyright © Gabe Huck. Used by permission.
Originally written for Celebration,
the worship and preaching resource of the National
Catholic Reporter (visit their Web site at www.celebrationpublications.org). |