One night in 1983, over 100 million television viewers saw the movie The Day After. Filmed in Lawrence, Kansas, it portrayed what that city would be like after a nuclear attack.
Just before the film began, a warning flashed on the screen, saying, “Because of graphic portrayal of nuclear war, this film may be unsuitable for children. Parental discretion is advised.”
The warning was well given. For during the next 128 minutes, the movie showed shocking scenes of death and destruction. The script, too, was shocking and disturbing. It made us realize that the possibility of a nuclear attack was greater than we had ever imagined.
The words and images of today’s gospel are reminiscent of the words and images of that film.
Jesus portrays for us, graphically, the destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple. For Jews, the destruction of these two things was equivalent to the end of the world.
Precisely for this reason, the Church uses this gospel passage as one of its readings for the end of the liturgical year. It wants us to reflect on the end of the world.
It wants us to reflect on that moment when the world, as we know it, will pass away.
It wants us to ask ourselves, “How prepared will we be for that moment when it comes?”
A few stories to help us reflect…
John was a building contractor for a construction company. His specialty was large luxury homes.
To increase his income, John routinely cheated on the materials that went into the homes. He was so clever at concealing these shortcuts that he joked to a close friend that even he couldn’t detect his own shortcuts.
Sometimes his cheating reached such a proportion that the homeowners were in fairly serious danger because of the under constructed electrical systems and the like.
The building contractor’s shortcuts were especially dangerous in the final home he built. Even he worried about some of the things he did in that home.
You can imagine his utter consternation, therefore, when the company gave the contractor this home as a retirement gift. It would be the home in which he and his wife would spend the rest of their years.
How is this story a parable of life? What corners are we cutting in our life, figuring nobody will be the wiser for it? Speak to God about the shortcuts in our life.
In April 1987, Hall of Famer Mickey Mantle was returning by plane to his home in Dallas. Suddenly he began to sweat and have difficulty breathing. The thought flashed into his mind: “I’m having a heart attack!” He summoned a flight attendant and was given oxygen. When the plane landed, he was rushed to a hospital.
Later, Mantle told an Associated Press correspondent about a dream he had while he was in the hospital.
“I dreamed I died and went to heaven. Saint Peter greeted me. I said, ‘I’m Mickey Mantle.’ He said, ‘Really? Come in, God wants to see you.’
“I went to see God, and he said, ‘We can’t keep you here because of the way you acted. But do me a favor and sign six dozen baseballs.’”
When the humor of Mantle’s dream subsides, truth emerges: No one will escape God’s judgment, and no one will get VIP treatment in that judgment.
What frightens us most about standing before God in judgment? Speak to God about this fear, and ask God how we can overcome it.
I would like to close with these few words, think of them when you start worrying too much about anything. Especially about when the end of the world might happen.
If God were to drop us a postcard today, I think he might write, “My dear sons and daughters I love you in Jesus more than you can ever know. Through the human nature of my son I share all of your life with you – even the sickness and failure and pain, even the final cross and the knowledge of death. Not all, or even many, of the crosses you will put up with in life are of my making. Believe me, I grieve over them just as much as you do. But in the midst of it all, I will be there. I will be there with you. I will be there for you. And a relationship will be forged between us that earth and time and heaven and hell will never be able to break. I love you. True, bad things are bound to happen – but never the worst. I will always have you, and you will always have me. Count on it!”
Archive for the ‘Cycle C’ Category
Count On It 11-14-2010
Sunday, November 14th, 2010Lord, Have Mercy! 11-7-2010
Sunday, November 7th, 2010A writer had a dream in which she visited hell.
To her surprise, this hell had no infinite fire or bottomless burning chasms of tormented souls. It was not like the hell she had pictured at all; in fact, it was rather “church-like.” She was led through some dark passages lined with the doors to many cells. Each cell she passed was identical. The central piece of furniture in each cell was an altar and before each altar knelt a sickly, weak, greenish-gray, ghostly figure in intense prayer and adoration.
“But whom are they worshipping?” the visitor asked her guide.
“Themselves,” was the reply. “This is pure self-worship. In their worship of their own beings, in placing their hopes and dependence on themselves and their own dreams alone, they are feeding on themselves and exhausting their own spirits. That is why they look so sickly and emaciated.”
The writer was appalled and saddened by row upon row of cells, small prisons for their pathetic, non-communicating inmates, who were doomed to spend eternity in solitary confinement, themselves their first, last and only object of worship.
God, as revealed by Christ, is not the vengeful Judge or cosmic Tyrant who takes cruel delight in our failures; the God taught by Jesus in our Gospel is the God of life, a God whose limitless love put us and all of creation in motion. God will love us for all eternity – but there always exists the possibility that we will refuse that love. That refusal to accept God’s love, the refusal to respond to God’s love, is precisely the meaning of hell. Hell is not a place where God puts us – it’s a place where we put ourselves. But to become “children of the God of life” is to dismantle the hells we create and set in their places the justice, peace and forgiveness that are the building stones of the kingdom of God.
Worshiping at our own altars. Lord have mercy!
What Is The Best Way To Become A Saint 10-31-2010
Sunday, October 31st, 2010I realize a lot of you will not be able to be at Mass tomorrow on the Feast of All Saints, so I thought I would share a reflection of All Saints with you.
Phyllis McGinley is a modern American poet. She wrote a book called Saint Watching. In it she says:
“When I was seven years old, I wanted to be a tight-rope dancer and broke my collarbone practicing on a child’s-size high wire. At twelve, I planned to become an international spy. At fifteen, my ambition was the stage. Now in my sensible declining years, I would give anything…..to be a saint.”
As we celebrate the Feast of All Saints, we are reminded that every one of us—without exception—is called to be a saint. Not one of us in this church today is called to be anything less than a saint.
This poses a knotty question: What is the best way to become a saint in 2010?
Is it to do what St. Anthony did in the fourth century: turn our backs on the pleasures of this world and live apart from society?
Is it to do what St. Francis did in the thirteenth century: turn our backs on material wealth and preach the Gospel wherever we can find a crowd and a soapbox?
Or is it to do something like St. Elizabeth Seton did in the nineteenth century: raise a family and spend the rest of our lives working with societies sick and needy?
The answer to these questions is no. And the reason that its no is obvious.
You don’t become a saint by doing what God made somebody else to do. You become a saint by doing what God made you do.
Practically speaking, this means that if you are a parent at this moment in your life, that’s exactly the way God intends you to become a saint: by being the best parent you can be – not perfect – just the best.
And, practically speaking, if you are a student at this moment in your life, that’s exactly the way God intends you to become a saint: by being the best student you can be.
Or, if you are an elderly couple or single person at this moment in your life, that’s exactly the way God intends you to become a saint: by being the best elderly couple or best single person you can be.
Let me illustrate what I mean with an example. Some years ago, an elderly couple lived on a large corner lot near an elementary school.
The children from the school had the habit of cutting across the corner of their lawn, wearing an ugly path through it. At first this merely annoyed the couple, but after a while it angered them. The couple realized that something had to be done. The situation was poisoning their attitude toward the children and destroying their peace of mind. The couple hit upon a solution. First they put crushed gravel on the path. Then they lined it with flowers. After that they set a bench along the path. On afternoons when school let out, the couple sat on the bench and greeted the children as they passed by.
The response of the children was amazing. They stopped and thanked the couple for the path. They even asked the names of the flowers and sometimes, sat down to talk to the couple. In short, the couple turned an unhappy situation into a happy one.
That charming little story is also a beautiful illustration of what Jesus meant in today’s gospel when he said, “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God.” It means to turn a potentially angry situation into a delightfully happy one.
And that leads us to our final point.
If you are still in doubt about what it means to be a saint in today’s world, reread the Beatitudes in today’s gospel. The Beatitudes spell out in simple terms the guidelines that we should use to live our lives. And if we live out these guidelines, as the elderly couple did, Jesus will someday say to us what he said to the people of his time in the Sermon on the Mount:
“Blessed are you, the kingdom of God is yours!”
