Deacon Steve's Homily - Listening to God - 21st Sunday Ordinary – B

A few weeks ago I had the honor of taking part in a mass presided by a Cardinal.

Cardinal Edwin O’Brien is a past Archbishop of Baltimore and of the Military.

Currently he is the Grand Master of the Equestrian Order of the Holy Sepulchre of Jerusalem.

Cardinal O’Brien resides in Rome as he carries out his duties.

One of those duties is to take part in papal conclaves to elect a new pope.

Cardinal O’Brien was part of the conclave a few years ago that elected Pope Francis.

During his homily at the mass a few weeks ago, the Cardinal shared a few of his experiences at that conclave.

He told the congregation that all of the Cardinals gathered on the first day and were seated around tables discussing who they thought our next Pope should be.

He said that there were many names brought up with no clear consensus.

In fact, there were almost as many names as there were attendees.

That evening, the Cardinals gathered for prayer to ask God to open their hearts and minds to the will of God.

The prayer went on for hours before they finally retired for the evening.

Cardinal O’Brien shared that the next morning when he awoke the name Jorge Bergoglio was on his mind.

He said that prior to that he didn’t even know who Jorge Bergoglio was.

The Cardinal said that as they were walking to the conclave, there was a mist hovering over the ground that seemed extraordinary.

When the Cardinals gathered, there was an overwhelming peace and sense among many of the Cardinals that one man should be our next Pope.

That man was Jorge Bergoglio, a Cardinal from Argentina.

What a contrast from the first to the second day of the conclave.

After intense prayer and listening to God, the Cardinals voted and elected Jorge Bergoglio as Pope.

Cardinal O’Brien told the congregation that this man was handpicked by God to be our Pope,

to be our pope for this particular time and place in the history of our church and world.  

<pause>

What a great example of listening to God, of listening to the Holy Spirit.

My friends, who is it that we listen to?

We may need to listen to others when seeking advice for finances, what kind of car to buy, what school to attend, or how to deal with a certain situation.

Of course, there are many other areas in which we seek advice and need to listen. 

We seek advice from family, from friends, from professionals, and from our pastors.

As I reflected on today’s readings, I thought about who it is that we listen to.

In our first reading, Joshua challenges the people of Israel to make a decision about who they were going to serve.

He  says to them: ‘Decide today whom you will serve. The Lord our God, or the gods of the Amorites?’  ‘Which is it going to be?’

He then goes on to say: ‘For me and my household, we will serve the Lord.’

Now that was great advice!

The people listened to Joshua and answered: ‘We also will serve the Lord, for he is our God.’

The people made the right choice, didn’t they? They listened to Joshua and followed his advice.

The last few weeks we have been reading from John’s Gospel - what’s known as the Bread of Life discourse.

Jesus made some radical statements about the Eucharist – about eating his body and drinking his blood. 

These were difficult words for the people to accept.

In this week’s gospel we continue reading from John chapter 6.

Jesus says in today’s reading: ‘It is the spirit that gives life, while the flesh is of no avail. The words I have spoken to you are Spirit and life.”

What happens then?  Many of his followers left when he said these words.

They probably left because they were confused and didn’t fully understand what he said.

But the bottom line is that they didn’t listen to his words and they left anyway.

And Jesus asks the apostles: ‘Do you also want to leave?’

Simon Peter answers him: ‘Master, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life. We have come to believe and are convinced that you are the Holy One of God.”

You see, Peter and the other apostles listened to Jesus and began to understand  and live out his words.

They began to live and share the Good News of Jesus.

The Good News, my friends, is really not good news - it’s Great News!

The Great News is that all of us can have ‘eternal life’.

We have a God who loves us beyond our wildest imagination.

We have a God who wants each of us to spend eternity with Him.

Imagine what eternity will be like in the heavenly kingdom in the presence of God himself.

Surrounded by God, surrounded by the one who is pure love!

What can be better than that?

<pause>

Today’s readings remind us that we have a choice to follow God or not.

Do we listen to and take the advice of Joshua and Jesus and follow the Lord?

Or do we follow those who walked away from Jesus?

These are good questions for us to think about today.

My friends, in just a few short minutes, as we come forward to receive our Lord in Holy Communion

Let’s be thankful for the gift of the Eucharist.

And may it strengthen us so that we always listen to and follow Jesus

As we remember Peter’s words to Jesus:

‘Master, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life.’

Do we have the same faith in Jesus as the Twelve? - Deacon Ron's Homily, 21st Sunday of Ordinary Time – Cycle B– 8/24/15

Today’s Gospel starts out with the Jesus’ disciples having a hard time accepting what he proclaims.  We hear his words are shocking.  Are we ready to embrace the demands of Christian discipleship and accepting the hard sayings that come from Jesus as well? We’ve been reading over the past four weeks from John Ch 6, a section that’s known as the Bread of Life discourse. I think it’s worthwhile to review a bit in order to understand why his disciples may have had a hard time accepting what he was saying.

At the beginning of this chapter Jesus and had just performed the miracle of the feeding of the five thousand people and the people continue to follow him because they wanted more of the food to satisfy their physical needs. Jesus tells them they should “not work for food that perishes, but for the food endures for eternal life which the Son of Man will give you, for on him the Father has set his seal” and that they should seek the “bread of God which comes down from heaven and gives life to the world”.  Jesus then says: “I am the bread of Life. I came down from heaven, not to do my own will but the will of the one who sent me”.

The disciples’ probably had a very hard time believing that Jesus came down from heaven.  They know him as the son Joseph and also know his mother as well.  How can he say he came down from heaven if they know where he came from?

Jesus also tells them “I am the living bread that came down from heaven, whoever eats this

bread will live forever” and “Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life and I will raise him on the last day”.  This saying was especially hard. Jews were forbidden to eat meat that contained blood. Suggesting, “to drink blood”, would be totally contrary to a Jew at the time.  On top of this it sounded like they were to eat Jesus flesh in a way that animals eat.  The original Greek word used for eat in John’s Gospel meant to “gnaw” the way animals eat. Eating Jesus flesh also sounds like they were to be cannibals.    Of course this would be hard to accept.  The disciples did not have the hindsight that we have in that Jesus was referring to the bread and wine being turned into his body and blood of the Eucharist.

Jesus is speaking from his divine nature and his disciples did not understand.   They want to be fed to satisfy their physical hunger, but Jesus wants to feed them spiritually to nourish them for eternal life.  His perspective was from the Spirit of God, the creator of the world. He tells them that “The words of I have spoken to you are Spirit and life”.   These disciples needed to stay with him and have faith in him to fully understand what he was saying, but they were not there yet.  They’ve seen him do some tremendous miracles up to this point: raising a young child to life, curing a man who was crippled for 38 years, and feeding 5000 people. Wasn’t this enough to have faith in Jesus?  For many of them it wasn’t.    It was too hard to break from their way old ways of thinking and understanding in their Jewish tradition that a God had actually come down among them in the person of Jesus.  In their familiarity with Jesus in his human nature they were not able be open to what Jesus was talking about and many of his disciples left.

Jesus then turns to the Twelve and asks them if they want to also leave him. These are the ones that he personally called to follow him.   In one of the most dramatic parts of the Gospel Peter responds on behalf of the Twelve, “Master, to whom shall we go? You have the words of Eternal life.  We have come to believe and are convinced that you are the Holy One of God.”   The Twelve had been with Jesus from the very beginning of his ministry and had developed a deeper relationship with him, except for one, Judas.  These sayings of Jesus were probably hard for them as well, but their faith was stronger and gave them the strength to persevere. This was a grace from God. 

Do we have the same faith in Jesus as the Twelve?   Are we convinced that Jesus has the words of eternal life and if we eat his body and drink his Blood we can have eternal life?   Last week our priests explained the concept of Transubstantion and how the substance of the bread and wine is transferred into the body and blood of Christ.  This is a hard thing to understand and believe, but it has been our belief since the beginning of Church.   Belief that Jesus is present in the Eucharist gives us strength and hope to persevere in our struggles of living in our world.  By maintaining this belief we’re able to benefit in receiving the Eucharist weekly to nourish our spirit for eternal life.  

What if you’re struggling to believe in Jesus presence in the Eucharist and that his words bring eternal life. What can you do?  Spend more time developing your relationship with Jesus.   Take time daily to read about Jesus in the Gospels. The daily Mass readings are a good way to do this. 

     Spend time in prayer and ask God for the grace to believe.  Praying with Jesus in his Eucharist presence is especially powerful.  You can do this in the Chapel anytime but it’s especially powerful when the Eucharist is exposed for adoration on Wednesdays and first Fridays. Take some time to learn what our faith teaches about the Eucharist. The Catechism is a great resource and there are plenty of good books out there. We have several in the parish library.  We even have a study going on now on the Eucharist on Wednesday evenings. 

How can we all respond to follow Christ in Christian discipleship? By spending some time giving of your self in service to others in love.   Christ did this for us by giving his life. We’re fed weekly and spiritually nourished through the Eucharist by Jesus. By responding in service to others with love it will nourish the Body of Christ and strengthen our relationship to Christ to lead us to eternal life. God bless you.