Easter, the Victory of Wheat Over Weeds

The following is my bulletin column for Easter Sunday.

Dear Friends in Christ,

When I was in seminary, often enough during Holy Week, some major controversy or another would inevitably arise.  One spiritual director used to say that the seminary was a prime target for the Devil because if he undermines what happens there, he undermines the whole Church.  Since then, I’ve always had a greater sense of how the Devil diligently works to destroy what is good and holy.  At certain moments, he seems relentless in his efforts. 

I imagine that if there are books written about what are best practices for an Easter Sunday bulletin column, chapter one might be entitled “Don’t Mention the Devil,” but I’m going to charge ahead anyways.  In many of his homilies thus far, Pope Francis has referred to the Devil and his attempts to steal from us our life and our joy in Christ.  I figure it is never a bad thing for a priest to speak in union with the Pope!

Many of you that I will greet this Easter morning, I know well, some not so much, and some who are reading this, I know not at all.  I do know, however, that you were bought at a price.  God loves you so much that He gave His Only-Begotten Son up to death for you.  Whether you’ve been faithful to God, faithful to His Gospel, Faithful to His Church, and Faithful to the Sacraments or not, God loves you.  He has paid the highest price for you.

When we are weighed down by anguish and suffering, we might think that God has forgotten us.  Illness, unemployment, family discord, betrayal, and hosts of other sufferings can perhaps make us feel discouraged.  So too, our own sinfulness can convince us that we have no hope of ever living near to God.  The Devil uses all of these things to separate us from God.  He plants tares in our fields, hoping to discourage us in our Christian life.  In a way, his intense effort to destroy us is itself a testimony to the extraordinary love that God has for us.  If God did not love us so much, His Enemy would not be taking aim at us.

The Enemy Sowing Tares

Satan can unleash the powers of Hell against us, but he is victorious only if we permit him to overcome us.  Psalm 27 tells us, “Though an army encamp against me, my heart does not fear; Though war be waged against me, even then do I trust.”  Sometimes in life, we might stand on the city wall and see the devastation that surrounds us.  Whether it be our own failures or, like the man who planted wheat in his field and discovers in the morning that an enemy has come during the night and sowed weeds among the wheat, we can be tempted to discouragement.  In these moments, let us trust Jesus even more.

Today, perhaps there are many people at Mass who, in one way or another, are perplexed by the situation in which they find themselves.  Easter Sunday is for you.  The announcement of Christ’s Resurrection is not only an announcement of a past event.  It is an announcement of a present reality and of a future glory.  Christ is defeating sin and death today.  He has crushed the serpent’s head and has purchased you at a costly price.  So, do not be discouraged.  Even if tomorrow you should awake and discover that weeds have been sown among the wheat; even if tomorrow you should sin greatly; even if tomorrow you should experience the pains of illness, the loss of work, or the rupture of relationships; even if an army encamp against you and all out war be waged against you, do not yield to discouragement.  Today, Easter Sunday, is the Day of Victory.  It is the day of your victory.  He has conquered sin and death.  He died for you and He rose for you.  You don’t have to wait for victory.  It has already happened.  Don’t let the Devil steal from you the victory that has already been won. 

To all who may feel distant from God, to all who feel weighed down by their past, to all who feel the assaults of the Evil One, to all who have awakened to discover that an enemy has sown weeds among your wheat, I wish you a Happy Easter because this New Day and the joy of victory belong to you.

Your Brother in Christ,

Fr. David Barnes

Living in the Gaze of His Tenderness

"And the people stood by watching" (Luke 23:35).  This line in today's Gospel really struck me.  Today, our parish's 10:30 Mass was packed.  It was a crowd.  So often, we can live our Christian life as members of the crowd.  We vacillate according to the way in which the wind is blowing.  We think of ourselves as Catholic, but in that kind of remote, distant way.  There's nothing overly personal about it.  When we hear about the Catholic Church, we think about something extrinsic to ourselves.  This is one of the great threats to the Christian life.  When we simply get absorbed into the crowd, the Gospel loses its hold upon us.

Compare this to what happened with Peter.  Yes, he denied the Lord.  He betrayed him by his cowardice.  And St. Luke tells us that after the third denial, "The Lord turned and looked at Peter."  Peter fell, but this did not end his relationship with the Lord.  Jesus looked at Peter.  He gazed upon him with the eyes of tenderness and mercy.  This is what Jesus wants for all of us.  He looks at us with love.  

We might be like Peter.  Maybe we have denied and betrayed him many times.  He still looks at us.  Some may try to escape this gaze by blending in with the crowd.  But, to disappear into the crowd is to lose the key to our life.  True life is discovered in his merciful gaze.  A gaze that is not dependent upon our own goodness.  Jesus looked at Peter immediately after his betrayal. 

As a pastor, I want my churches filled with gigantic crowds this Holy Week.  But, not the crowds of anonymity or the crowds who are easily persuaded.  No, I want my parishes to be crowds that consist of individuals who know that they live every moment (even their failures) in the tender gaze of Christ.  Jesus wants every person in the crowd to live in the awareness of this gaze. 

Let's not stand by and watch.  Let's make it personal.  Even if we are filled with failures, let's live in his tender gaze.

A Brief Word from the Pope

The following was taken from the Palm Sunday Homily of Pope Francis today:

"Jesus is God, but he humbled himself to walk with us. He is our friend, our brother. Here, he enlightens us on the journey. And so today we welcome Him And here the first word that comes to mind is “joy!” Do not be men and women of sadness: a Christian can never be sad! Never give way to discouragement! Ours is not a joy that comes from having many possessions, but from having encountered a Person: Jesus, from knowing that with him we are never alone, even at difficult moments, even when our life’s journey comes up against problems and obstacles that seem insurmountable, and there are so many of them! It is at this time that the enemy comes, the devil comes, often disguised as an angel who insidiously tells us his word. Do not listen to him! We follow Jesus!
We accompany, we follow Jesus, but above all we know that he accompanies us and carries us on his shoulders. This is our joy, this is the hope that we must bring to this world of ours. Let us bring the joy of the faith to everyone! Let us not be robbed of hope! Let us not be robbed of hope! The hope that Jesus gives us!"

"You Are My Son." This Alone We Keep.

At the beginning of his public ministry, Jesus was baptized in the Jordan by John the Baptist.  Immediately after that baptism, where Christ's sonship was proclaimed aloud by the Father, Jesus went out into the desert.  There, he was tempted by the Devil who tried to undermine Jesus' confidence in his filial relationship with the Father.

During these intense last days of Lent, this scenario is lived out again in the Church's liturgy.  Yesterday, as the crowds picked up stones in order to kill Jesus, he escaped them and went across the Jordan to the place where John originally baptized. Jesus seems to be returning to the beginning, not simply chronologically, but also existentially.  He returns--as he so often does throughout the Gospels--to his relationship with the Father.  Yesterday, found Jesus at the place of his baptism.  Today, as the people plan to kill Jesus, Jesus returns to the desert.  Baptism, desert, Cross.  It seems that this final tour of Jesus' earthly life finds him returning to the places where his filial relationship with the Father were most strongly confirmed. 

Everything is being taken from Jesus.  His ability to teach and heal is being curtailed.  His reputation, destroyed.  His support among the people, diminishing.  His safety, in jeopardy.  His friends, on the verge of betraying and abandoning him.  In a sense, Jesus' Cross has already begun.  Already, the sacrifice has begun.  The last drop of blood will complete the sacrifice, but already he is being poured out like a libation.

Jesus teaches us something in his pre-Holy Week liturgical tour.  He returns to the place where his sonship was publicly confirmed by the Father and to the place where he fought the Devil who tried to undermine that filial relationship.  In doing this, Jesus teaches us how we are to embrace the Cross in our own life.

The opening antiphons for the Liturgies this week reveal the depth of Christ's agony.  Today's, for instance, reads: "O Lord, do not stay afar off; my strength, make haste to help me!  For I am a worm and no man, scorned by everyone, despised by the people."  In the depth of his agony, only just begun, Jesus returns to the only thing he has that is dependable and certain: his sonship.  Proclaimed at the baptism and affirmed in the desert, the sonship of Christ is sufficient to endure all things.

The Christian disciple follows Christ to the Cross.  As we approach, we perhaps search in vain for something upon which to depend; something to steady us. We cannot rely upon the passing things of this world no matter how good they might be.  Jesus healed. Jesus forgave.  Jesus treated each human person with dignity and respect.  And now, what does he receive?  He is beaten, betrayed, scourged, mocked, spat upon, humiliated, and condemned.  This is the path for his disciples.  How are we to endure such treatment?  How are we to walk upon this path? 

Jesus shows us.  We are to walk this path as sons and daughters of the Father.  Physical strength will depart from us.  Exterior supports will disappear.  Reputation will fade.  And, sometimes our moral strength will fail. What remains is God's fidelity to us.  We are chosen to be his sons and daughters not because of our success, not because of our own moral rectitude, not because of our good standing in the community, and not because of our human talents.  We are chosen because God has ordained it such.  When everything else is gone, we remain chosen by Him. 

In the days before the completion of his final agony, Jesus takes us to the place of baptism and to the place of temptation in order to strengthen us in our confidence in our Divine adoption.  No matter what happens, no matter what lies ahead, no matter what we endure, we are chosen by Him.

And, it is with the confidence of being chosen--adopted by God--that the Church can pray as it did in this morning's blessing over the people: "Do not allow, we pray, those you have redeemed by the Death of your Only Begotten Son, to be harmed by their sins or weighed down by their trials."

Going Back Across the Jordan With Jesus

As we enter more deeply into Passiontide and Holy Week, the readings build in their intensity.  On today, the Friday of the Fifth Week of Lent, Jeremiah writes "I hear the whisperings of many, 'Terror on every side!  Denounce him!  Let us denounce him!'"  The Gospel begins with the words of Jeremiah finding their full import as the crowds pick up rocks to stone Jesus. 

The rejection that Christ experienced must have been intensely painful, especially when it came from his own people.  Jeremiah says, "All those who were my friends are on the watch for any misstep of mine."  The rejection that Christ experiences must pierce more deeply than any of his physical wounds.  As Lent progresses, Christ's mission seems to be more and more a failure.  Everywhere, he is rejected.  We hear these magnificent accounts of the man born blind, the woman at the well, Lazarus, and the woman caught in adultery, and they are indeed beautiful.  But, from a numbers perspective, they are the few.  The crowds who are rejecting Jesus far outnumber the few.

Jesus must feel this in his soul. It is not simply a matter of them rejecting him.  No, they are seeking to destroy him.  It always hurts us when we say something that is true and somebody doesn't believe us.  It would be all the worse if, when we speak the truth, someone would denounce as a liar.  Imagine, Christ is the Truth and is denounced as a liar.  This must hurt him greatly. 

Jeremiah's description of this trial makes the hatred and rejection almost tangible.  And as the intensity of hatred and rejection build to fever pitch, there is all of a sudden a moment of lightness.  "But, the Lord is with me," says Jeremiah, and just like that, things change.  The Lord's closeness makes everything different.

At the end of the Gospel today, St. John tells us something that seems unimportant (and I'm not scripture scholar), but that I think is very significant.  He writes that Jesus "went back across the Jordan to the place where John first baptized, and there he remained."  Why does John tell us this?  I think it is so we would do likewise.

All of us who are Christians occasionally will experience rejection, denunciation, abandonment, and the appearance of failure. Like Jeremiah, we want to remember that "the Lord is with me."  Perhaps, the reason that Jesus went back across the Jordan to where John baptized is because that was the place where Jesus was baptized too.  All of us, who experience temptation, rejection, denunciation, and failure should go back to the place where we became God's son or daughter.

When Jesus was baptized, God announced, "This is my Son."  When we were baptized, we too became children of God.  In that moment, we could say, "The Lord is with me."  Jesus perhaps returns to the place of baptism to remind us that when we experience the Cross, we need to have confidence in God's nearness to us.  If we were to be rejected by the whole world--even our friends--we would still be chosen by God.

Lent is about preparing catechumens for baptism and about preparing the baptized for greater fidelity. 
Perhaps Jesus returned to the place of his baptism to teach us. The Way of the Cross may be marked by terror on every side, the whisperings of many, false accusations, violence, and rejection.  If the Christian disciple is to walk this road with Christ and experience the intensity of the rejection, he must first go back across the Jordan and remember his baptism and have confidence in the grace of his baptism.  No matter if the whole world rejects me, on the day of my baptism, God said, "You are my son."  "The Lord is with me."  God has chosen me.  With this knowledge, I can embrace the Cross.

As we approach Good Friday, let us make a brief pilgrimage with Jesus back across the Jordan to the place of our baptism and remember he has chosen you and you are his child.

The Cross, Veronica's Veil, and the Logic of Love

In large part, when I've considered the Cross in my own life, I've thought mostly about those things in my life that are imperfect, sinful, and displeasing to God and must be put to death.  But, this Lent has been less about that type of dying and more about participating in the Cross in a new way.  When Christ stood before Pilate and was condemned, when he was beaten, stripped, and humiliated, and when he poured out his blood on Golgotha, he gave what was good.  Christ who knew no sin, became sin.  This was the ultimate injustice.

As Christians, we are all called to die to sin and to experience the pain that comes with such a death.  But, Christianity isn't just about self-improvement.  When we are called to surrender our sinfulness, we can make sense of that.  But, Christian discipleship often requires that we surrender and sacrifice good things.  And those sacrifices can make absolutely no sense at times.  And, those sacrifices might never--in this life--be returned.  They might remain an absurdity and we might never be given the opportunity to look back and say, "Oh, now that sacrifice makes perfect sense."  Part of the sacrifice may well be enduring the absurdity of it.

In the past eight years or so, seven men associated with this parish will have either been ordained to the priesthood or will have entered the seminary.  Their connection with the parish varies.  Some were received into the Catholic Church through our RCIA, some were lifelong parishioners, and some found their way here for some reason or another.  No matter what, to have seven priestly vocations associated with one parish in such a short period of time is not common.  And yes, it is something in which I've taken a lot of pride.  Additionally, I've been happy that our parish has become a home to so many seminarians along the way.

Now, I have to sacrifice that.  Some say, "Oh, you will do that again in a new parish."  Maybe.  But, it is entirely possible (likely?) that the door now closes on that special grace that God had given in this particular place and time.  Maybe this parish will continue to flourish with vocations.  Maybe it won't.  Maybe my next parish will flourish with vocations.  Maybe it won't.  What I know is that the life shared by this particular priest with these particular parishioners in this particular time and in this particular place was a fruitful seedbed for vocations.  Maybe I will someday look back and joyfully comprehend the hidden wisdom in all of this.  Then again, I may never comprehend its wisdom, and it may even prove in the long run to be lacking in wisdom.  Who knows how it will all play out?  Therein lies the sacrifice. 

Beyond the external sacrifices--and far more wounding to the soul--are the internal sacrifices. When we walk the Via Crucis, like Christ's image left upon the veil of Veronica, we leave something of ourselves behind.  If all we left upon the Way of the Cross were our sins, then there would be little merit in that. We sometimes are called to leave behind our own image--our good name, our reputation, and our confidence in earthly standards.  Veronica's Veil may irrevocably take from us things that had, up to this very moment, been at the service of the Gospel.  At the Cross, we leave not only our sins, but everything.

Walking the Way of the Cross with Christ may produce immediate fruits in our life; fruits that make things comprehensible. Perhaps it makes us more sensitive to the sufferings of others, more credible in preaching forgiveness, better able to relate to the spouse who feels betrayed, and better able to guide others in their own Via Crucis.  Then again, maybe none of this will occur.  Part of the suffering that the Cross entails is--at times--its total incomprehensibility.  It was only in the very last moments of Jesus' agony that the good thief came to repentance.  And, it was only after Jesus breathed his last that the soldier came to faith.  Some sacrifices, difficult though they may be, are nonetheless comprehensible in their logic and in their results.  There are other sufferings that are notable for their lack of justice or for their lack of rationale.  In these latter instances, deprived of even the satisfaction of seeing the greater good, all we are left with is Christ.  We are left knowing (as almost every Catholic church in the world has hanging along its walls) that Christ walks this way with us and before us.  Unlike the rest of us who bring to the Cross some mixture of good and evil, he only brought to Calvary good things.  Only his love makes his sufferings comprehensible.

In the face of the Cross, sometimes we seek to comprehend the logic of suffering.  But, such logic is often lacking.  At other times, we are inundated with trite spiritual platitudes.  Such platitudes tend to reduce the reality of things.  In the end, the only thing that makes the Cross comprehensible is love.  The logic of love doesn't explain away the absurdity of the Cross.  It swallows it up and defeats it. 

   

The Ideology of the Middle: Suffocating the New Evangelization

The New Evangelization faces external obstacles such as secularism, atheism, and just plain indifference.  But, it also faces internal opposition.  Almost every day, I check out various Catholic blogs that represent two ends of the ideological spectrum.  One of those blogs daily bemoans the fact that the Catholic Church is still . . . well . . . Catholic.  The other one bemoans the fact that the Catholic Church is no longer Catholic. 

Neither of these, however, is the greatest threat to the New Evangelization.  Conservative and liberal ideologies certainly attempt to hijack the gospel for their own purposes, but these won't amount to much.  The greatest threat is not from the extremes, but from the middle.  Approaching the gospel as  "coming from the middle," is still to think of the gospel in an ideological way.  The "middle" is just a third ideology that exists between the two extremes.  But, in this instance, the virtue is not found in between the extremes.  When it comes to the gospel, the virtue is found in its full, unhindered, zealous proclamation.  The gospel is not located on an ideological spectrum.

Unfortunately, so many who have been entrusted with the gospel feel as though the right thing to do is to live in the middle.  It's a way of governing and exercising pastoral care that doesn't consider the good of souls, but rather the good of appearance.  The New Evangelization, if it is to be effective, needs to be unchained from the prison of the "middle."  But, there are those who have been lifelong adherents to the "middle theory," and it is difficult to break their stranglehold on the New Evangelization.

One can see why in the Book of Revelation, Jesus condemns the lukewarm and says, "How I wish you were either hot or cold."  At least the extremes have a fire in the belly.  The middle is always about trying to make Catholicism saccharine and nondescript.  The middle ideology is the, "let's make Christianity bland" approach.  It fears the new movements in the Church because those seem to have too particular a vision and are not bland enough.  It fears the "new peoples," because they are too different and their devotional life seems too old fashioned.  It fears evangelical preaching because it sounds too decisive.  To the middle ideology, everything is "too" something.

Recently, George Weigel wrote a book (which I've been reading) entitled, "Evangelical Catholicism."  In the book, Weigel speaks at length about what is happening in the Church and how this "Evangelical Catholicism" is the path of the future.  Thus far, however, (I'm only halfway through the book) Weigel has not addressed the reality that this Evangelical Catholicism is going to meet with tremendous opposition from the proponents of a middle of the road, lukewarm, nondescript Catholicism.  To them, the New Evangelization is not primarily about a renewed, joyful, and forceful preaching of the person of Jesus Christ and friendship with him.  No, for them, the New Evangelization is often about having greeters at the entrance to the church and making sure that the bulletin tells new arrivals where the bathroom in the church is located.  Are those things helpful? Sure, but the middle tends to make these things central.

In going after the middle ideology here, I am not endorsing the conservative or liberal ideologies either.  They are all the wrong starting point for the New Evangelization.  The New Evangelization has to be about Jesus Christ.  Jesus Christ who told Matthew to get up and follow him.  Jesus Christ who told the rich young man to go and sell everything, give it to the poor, and follow him.  Jesus Christ who suffered and died for our sins and who rose from the dead.  The New Evangelization is about friendship with that Jesus Christ, a friendship that is engaging, demanding, and joyful.

We always think of ideologies as being from the left and from the right.  But, this middle ideology is like a sleeper cell in the life of the Church because it appears to be in the place where we often think that virtue lives--in the middle.  But, this middle is a prison for the Gospel.  I'm willing to bet that the parishes that are dying off the fastest are those who pride themselves on being in this middle.  In the middle, the goal is to make everyone comfortable.  Eventually, people figure out that they don't need to go to church to feel comfortable. They can stay at home and be comfortable. 

Those who live out of the ideology on the right want to freeze the Church back in the 1940's.  Those on the left want to lead the Church right out of Christianity.  But, I think it is this middle that is the most dangerous.  This ideology would have had no room for an Ignatius, a Catherine of Sienna, or a St. Francis of Assisi.  They would have all been far too radical for bland Catholicism.  It isn't just about the demands of Christianity that the middle finds unappealing.  Anything that seems too lofty or beautiful gets jettisoned too.

It is easy to define the right and the left as ideologies, but very few would ever admit that the middle is also an ideology.  And, a great many people who exercise power in the life of the Church probably find themselves in the middle.  The middle is the place where the New Evangelization will meet its strongest opposition.  While the left and the right would likely slay their opponents outright, the middle doesn't work that way.  The middle will simply attempt to suffocate the New Evangelization.  Unlike the ideologues on the left and the right who usually arrive scowling and dressed for battle, the ideologues in the middle usually show up smiling and dressed in neutral colors.  In their mind, they are not ideologues. They think of themselves as the anti-ideologues.  But, as long as they are dwelling on that plain, they are ideologues.

The New Evangelization is about extricating us from that "conservative, middle, liberal" plain so that we can announce the Gospel in all of its beauty and magnificence.  But, as great as I think the New Evangelization is, I think opposition to it is going to be fierce.  Christianity is always a radical choice.  The last thing the middle wants is for anybody to be faced with a radical choice.  That is just . . . too . . . radical. The middle wants Christianity to be nondescript and bland.  I think that they are probably all good people who really think that they are performing a great service when they kill with kindness.

In large part, in many dioceses, parishes, and institutions, the proponents of the bland, nondescript, lukewarm Catholicism wield a lot of power.  So, large scale victory for the New Evangelization is unlikely in the short-term.  The agents of the New Evangelization will have to focus their energies on smaller communities and on one on one evangelization.  This method may seem underwhelming and disappointing to those who are afire with the desire to evangelize, but this is how it began with the apostles.  For today, we might have to give up on the dreams of widespread New Evangelization successes and instead settle for individual conversions and small pockets of victory.