"Caught Up in Love": the Catholic "Rapture" of Christmas

FYI, I fumbled the ball as I crossed the goal line; the last part was supposed to be "...the God who is Love itself, being made lovable to us." And today I stumbled across this marvelous two-line poem by Michael Longley (see attached picture) posted on Twitter by @EmilyKath319 which seemed like the perfect summary of the concept "so that as we recognize in Him God made visible, we may be caught up through Him in love of things invisible." Merry Christmas, one and all. 

Two Advent Homilies

 Here ya go; Happy Advent!

2nd Sunday of Advent

3rd Sunday of Advent

Like a Thief, Like a Fire, Like C.S. Lewis' Dwarfs

St. Paul to the Thessalonians has some scary imagery, but Paul is full of hope. Why? It all comes down to our disposition to God's flaming heart of love and mercy. We can burn or we can be burned. 

Ten Virgins, Purgatory, Prayers for the Dead

Yesterday's sermon on dying: What we do for the living, how should we understand Purgatory, the origin of indulgences, and prayers and Masses for the Dead.

Beauty And Reverence

Sermon about how loving and using beauty and reverence isn't remotely against the gospel call to humility, simplicity, and care for the poor. Star-witness St. Francis of Assisi takes the lead, as he did back in 1200 A.D. when he led the original Eucharistic Revival (see here and here and here). I'm including pictures of St. Joseph's in 1970 and today, not to wag any fingers (I think the parish in the last 20 years has done great work to recenter Jesus and make a beautiful church) but because I specifically mentioned the original detail work being turned to a beige ocean. Also, the 5:30 Mass missed the story that's on here now at 19:45, so I want to draw attention to that.

Vineyard Restored, Vindication Of The Son

The parable of wicked tenants and the vineyard is told as a prophecy and a promise, not as a perennial life lesson for all people. For us today it is a lesson about how Israel is God's family, but how God also reconstituted Israel around Jesus, who is both the murdered Son and the rejected Cornerstone of the story. After the vindication of the Stone in the Resurrection, the vineyard (God's family) is under new management, the Son, and not under the tenants anymore. The people of Israel are still invited back into the vineyard, but with the new badge or passcode*, for there is "salvation for everyone who believes, the Jew first and then also the Greek." (Rom 1:16)

The horrific news out of the Holy Land this weekend, and the horrors that have afflicted that region for years, remind us of real, physical struggles that have marred the Promised Land for millennia. These were contests about land, ethnicity, power, independence, historic rights...the very concerns on the minds of many visitors to Jerusalem during that first Holy Week. We always must "pray for the peace of Jerusalem." (Psalm 122) But love and solicitude for the people living "between the Sea and the River" must not make us uncomfortable to tell the story of Jesus, the Jewish Messiah, for the Prince of Peace and His family are the greatest hope to end discord in our world, even two thousand years later. 

* “Therefore let all the house of Israel know for certain that God has made Him both Lord and Christ, this Jesus whom you crucified.” Now when they heard this, they were pierced to the heart, and said to Peter and the rest of the apostles, “Brothers, what are we to do?” Peter said to them, “Repent, and each of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins; and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. For the promise is for you and your children and for all who are far away, as many as the Lord our God will call to Himself.” (Acts 2:36-39)

The Kenosis Creed

Good Friday before Easter Sunday. Crucifixion before Resurrection. Fast before Feast. Darkness before Light. Weeping before Rejoicing. Death before Life. 

These pairs, and their this-before-that emphasis, sum up the Christian mindset on many things. They also contain (implicitly or explicitly) the sum of the good news, which we call the kerygma, the distilled and powerful proclamation of the apostles: "For I handed down to you as of first importance what I also received: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, that He was buried, and that He was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures." 

Philippians Ch. 2 adds more terms to the pairs: Humility before glory, debasement before exaltation, human scandal before divine vindication. It also takes the kerygma and widens the timeline of cross-before-crown. An eternal God surrendering his majesty and emptying himself, becoming a weak baby and a crucified rebel, but his Father loving the Son's humility and sacrificial love, exalting him not just in time and on earth, but for ages unending throughout the whole universe. 

And while St. Paul is telling the story of the paschal mystery, he ends up giving us a creed as well, the Creed of Kenosis, a tableau of a self-denying diety as proof of God's power, of a Father glorifying a Son for his abject defeat. This, he says, is the inner life of God. Paul pens a creed, proclaims a scandal, and tells his dearest companions to imitate that scandal because they cling to that creed. 

(The last part is me wrapping this back around to our annual appeal to support our seminarians, in case that part is confusing.)