Keynotes for January 2008

January 1, 2008
Mary, The Mother of God

Numbers6;22-27
Galatians4:4-7
Luke2:16-21

There is just no one else like her. So recollected, so calm, so assured of her Lord's love, so at peace with herself amid the turmoil of an arduous trip on muleback to a strange place during the last week of her pregnancy--all without complaint. Of facing rudeness and thievery among crowded streets and rejection at lodges--without protest. Of having to put upwith a smelly, dirty stable for her maternity ward--and not be upset. Of the intrusion from those wild-eyed shepherds driven daft by weird tales of angels in the sky--with a gracious welcome. No one else can handle upheaval, disturbance, shock, worry, and grief the way our Mother Mary did. She is serenity personified, like no other.

Luke says, "And Mary kept all these things, reflecting on them in her heart." All these things. Did he mean "all these tensions"? Luke was referring to the angels' apparition to the shepherds, to the messenger who announced the baby born at Bethlehem, to the chorus who confirmed the herald with heavenly praise. "These things" included the frenzied shepherds dashing about, shouting the good news to anyone who would listen. "These things" also meant their determination to see this child as proof to themselves. For anyone with less tranquillity than Mary, "these things" would have stirred up fear, terror, anxiety, consternation. And should have triggered maternal instincts to hide the child, protect it from potential harm. Aha, but Mary herself had already been visited by a similar angel. Nine months of carrying the child had familiarized her with many of God's ways. It was this bonding with her Lord that brought the inner peace which transcended all the anguish, mayhem, turbulence and joys of childbirth. Mary, Serenity is thy name.

At the Annunciation, when Mary gave her consent to the angel's invitation, did she realize what she was in for? Had she any idea that in becoming mother to God's only Son, He would thereby adopt the rest of us humans, and she would then be mother to the whole human race? Her intimacy with her baby radiated outward, to the shepherds, to the people of Bethlehem, to everyone who snatched a tiny piece of what the Incarnation meant to mankind. Paul awoke the Galatians to this phenomenon by telling them:

As proof that you are sons, God sent the Spirit of his Son into
our hearts, crying out, "Abba, Father!"

In so doing God transformed us from slaves to sin into heirs of his kingdom, a change beyond our abilities to comprehend or believe, but not beyond our Mother's, for she had gotten inured to the ways of her Lord. On Christmas she witnessed how He performed the most violent of upheavals in the stillness of a silent night. If she got any sleep at all that night, hers too must have been the sleep of a heavenly peace. That was the the night when not only Moses and Aaron, but all the prophets and holy ones who preceded her, looked down upon Mary, extended their hands above her head and chanted:

The Lord bless you and keep you!
The Lord let his face shine upon you, and be gracious to you!
The Lord look upon you kindly and give you peace!

In that hour she became our new morning star. Under the tremendous shower of God's grace she gleams diamondlike, a beacon shining forth to all ages. But her brilliance is from a new source, the lightness of Being now bearable in every heart.

January 6, 2008
Epiphany of the Lord

Isaiah60:1-6
Ephesians3:2-3a,5-6
Matthew2:1-12

The scene could have been a page out of John's gospel, beginning with "It was the true light that enlightens every man who comes into the world"(1:9) but more focused on Lazarus' sister Mary breaking the alabaster jar and anointing Jesus' feet and head with a pound of expensive nard, (Jn12:1-5) while Judas protests it should have been spent on the poor. A supernatural light, a house filled with fragrances, some devious counselling. But no, these phenomena first appear in the episode of the Magi, wherein the child Jesus was first introduced to the world. The original light is the star. At its rising this light leads the wise men to King Herod's court and then on to Bethlehem. Herod is the prototype of deceit, pushing his personal agenda years ahead of that latterday disciple of betrayal. Herold coaxes information out of the three visitors on the pretext that he, too, is going to worship. And the first sweet smells are of frankincense, the homage to kings, and of myrrh, the odor of precious burial spice. These aroumas fill the house of Joseph and Mary.

Why such strange gifts, from travelers so unlikely? What could have compelled these foreigners to a journey so arduous, so costly and of so much risk? We have to conclude it was, from their study of the stars, a conviction that a moving heavenly body would guide them to their destination; from having read the Hebrew prophets, a conclusion that the Messiah would arise out of an obscure Jewish tribe; and from their contemporaneous geo-saavy, a determination to be the first among many nations outside Roman rule to send a delegation of welcome. What they were so sure they would find--and did find-- caused quite a buzz among the local Jewish people, ostensibly a hype of idle chatter and pointless speculation. Herod was troubled, says Matthew, and all Jerusalem with him. And well they should wonder at what was causing such a stir. The Jerusalem of Isaiah's vision, we now see by contrast, was an idealized view of a people who would embrace and vaunt their infant monarch, of a shining, radiant city toward which foreign dignitaries would stride, into which the diaspora would return, where hearts would gasp at the influx of wealth from caravans and dromedaries, where an influx of riches from their seaports would gladden their faces---all of this fomented by an indigenous acceptance and hosting and wholehearted worship of the newborn Messiah.

It was the vision that never came to pass.

Only 40-50 years later would the Magi's visit turn into personal epiphany, starting with Paul. He called it a mystery made known to him by revelation, that the Gentiles are coheirs, members of the same body and copartners in Christ's promise.

But to get to the core of this alien intrusion we should, perhaps, return to the scene in John and ask what prompted Mary to perform her equally extraordinary and equally unprecedented action of annointing her Lord as she did. To be sure, it was her way of showing unbounded gratitude for Jesus' having brought her brother back to life. But did it have deeper motive? Maybe one related to man's ageless longing to overcome death itself? Was there in Mary some ache to relieve her beloved Friend of the onus of having to die to remit the sins of mankind? Or upon reflecting how powerless she was to create such a reprieve, did she lavish that ointment to express her wish merely to make his death as painless and bearable as possible? Jesus suggests as much, when he responds:

She has done what she could; she has anointed my body
in preparation for burial (Mark14:8).

The mystery of the Three Kings is explored speculatively yet lucidly in T.S. Eliot's poem "Journey of the Magi." Years later, long after their expedition was over, one of the kings is reflecting:

. . . . were we led all that way for
Birth or Death? There was a birth, certainly,
We had evidence and no doubt. I had seen birth and death,
But had thought they were very different; this Birth was
Hard and bitter agony for us, like Death, our death.
We returned to our places, these Kingdoms,
But no longer at ease here, in the old dispensation,
With an alien people clutching their gods.
I should be glad of another death.

Eliot's sage helps us reach the conclusion that the Feast of Epiphany is no mere ornament to the Christmas scene. The kings' journey to the manger becomes prefigurement of how Jesus' life will change the lives of men. Their salutation and homage take us through the mystery of Incarnation all the way to the mystery of Resurrection. With determination and courage they ratify the debut of the divine infant/king; but it is their outlandish gifts and departure "for their country by another way" that re-prophesy his radiance for future mellenia to all the world.

January 13, 2008
The Baptism of The Lord

Isaiah42:1-4,6-7
Acts10:34-38
Matthew3;13-17

"Then he allowed him" Then who allowed whom to do what? Then John allowed Jesus his request. Then Jesus allowed John to baptize him. Jesus has arrived on the scene. The moment has come for John's disciples, for the Pharisees and Sadducees, for "the whole region [of people] around the Jordan" (Matt3:4) to make allowance for Jesus. One small gesture for the saintly Baptist; one huge concession from all mankind. Notice we say, from mankind. Almighty God has already made His concession for and to mankind. He has so loved the world that He gave over His only begotten Son to be born among men, to live among us and teach us, and then to surrender his life in expiation for our sins. But here, right here on the cusp of Jesus' public life, the time comes for us to begin making our allowances back to him. Today John's act of pouring water over Jesus' head is actually a call to every human on earth, in all ages and eras, to soften our hearts, to do penances, to open ourselves in generosity and let charity flow among us in one grand response to the mercy of our wondrous Creator.

Now that God has made His concession, stupendous and incredible as it may seem, now that He has put in motion the permission for His Son to save us,
now we begin to see that Jesus also has in mind those allowances that He wants from us. The first allowance he asks of us is that we baptize him. What a strange request! If ever there was someone other than his mother who did not need baptism, it was himself. So what is the intent of this reversal? The more we think about it, the more we realize it is consistent with all of Jesus' intentions. Jesus came from Galilee to be baptized by John because he had to conform to that identity of the savior manifested earlier in Isaiah's prophecy, because at the Jordan he could be ratified "by the Spirit of God descending like a dove and coming upon him," because there he would receive the endorsement of a voice coming "from the heavens and saying, 'This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased,'" and because such a baptism would later enable to Peter to verify "how God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and power."

All of the readings today conspire to show us that we, too, are going to have
to make allowances for him.

The figure of Messiah that Isaiah depicts is no loud-mouthed, radical, street-preaching reformer. From his few deft brush strokes we get the picture:

A bruised reed he shall not break,
and a smoldering wick he shall not quench.

Even though this servant will come to launch a wholesale invasion on the minds and hearts, souls and spirits of mankind, he will leave everything physical as it is. The material world will be left untouched. No force or coercion will ever be used, for his approach will be that of a lover's persuasion, enticement and lure. Isaiah promises a savior who will open the eyes of the blind, bring prisoners out of confinement, and establish justice among the nations. But it will take our allowances to bring these about.

The endorsement of the other two person of the Trinity would not have happened without John's first having baptized Jesus. What then will the Godhead visit upon you and me once we open our hearts to the presence of Jesus? submit to his influence? and accept his guidance? Slowly and surely we come to realize what a great disparity exists between the Jesus of our early perceptions, the savior we want him to be, and the Jesus who in reality desires our full submission, the One who comes to take us over. So why do we barricade ourselves behind our fears? Are we refusing to give him an inch lest he take a mile?

Peter reminds his listeners in the house of Cornelius that Jesus came to spread peace throughout Judea.

He went about doing good and healing all those
oppressed by the devil, for God was with him.

This was no subversive plot maker who sought to incite insurrections, overthrow governments, disrupt populations with suicide bombs, or impose new regimes. His fondest desire is for God to be with us as well. But that requires each of us in his own way to let our defenses be pried open, enough at least to permit him a foot in the door.

January 20, 2008
Second Sunday in Ordinary Time

Isaiah49:3,5-6
1Corinthians1:1-3
John1:29-34

Before Christ, holiness for human beings was a notion seldom entertained. Very few of the Old Testament writers even considered the idea that a person could or should be holy. We do find the concept three times in Leviticus.

And ye shall be holy unto me:for I the Lord am holy,
and have severed you from other people, that ye should be mine.
(Lev.20:26; repeated from Lev.11:44 and 19:2).

Only once does the psalmist beg God: "Preserve my soul," and admit as his reason: "For I am holy." (Ps.86:2) Other than these, early Scriptural recognition of personal holiness is rare. This inertia seems to play against God's constant longing to set a people apart to Himself, a people who will be worthy of His companionship. In the readings today we find Paul taking up this notion with the church in Corinth, addressing them with: ". . .you who have been sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be holy." By now the lunem ad revelationem gentium, the Light of revelation to the gentiles has finally come to its full dawning. For at this juncture in history, Christ the Light of the world has already begun to transform thousands into persons of sanctity. Jesus is not physical light so much as grace, energy, intelligence, love, timeless divine life amalgamated to earthly human life. And humans have come, at last, to accept the fact that they were worthy of an exaltation so rich andwondrous.

This realization explains why John the Evangelist gives such an exacting account of the reasoning and motivation and sequence of steps that John the Baptist went through.Who is going to believe a forerunner whose job is to announce "Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world"? Whose lamb, did you say? And he does what? The Baptist himself had previously admitted, "I did not know him." Two cousins who grew up together, whose mothers were supposedly so close? and still he is not sure? John appears to be saying that up until that timehe had been seeking but not finding the signs confirming Jesus as the Messiah. Upon the descent of the Spirit in dove-like form, John is moved to baptize Jesus, and from that sign, which John had been alerted to watch for, he was authorized to declare: "Now I have seen and testified that he is the Son of God." With his declaration came a sense that he had answered his own call to personal holiness.

This realization also explains why, long before Christ, the prophet Isaiah was so preoccupied with glory. Isaiah's vision of an Israel returned to its former state and made glorious in the Lord's sight has become outmoded and no longer satisfying the Lord. Isaiah now realizes that the Lord has a much greater ambition for this people. He wants them to be tribe and family, blood relatives and parents for His only begotten Son. Merely to reassemble is inadequate, says the Lord.

Now I will make you a light to the nations,
that my salvation may reach to the ends of the earth.

Do the Isrealites understand how glorious the begetting of the Savior among their own progeny will make their nation? Do they grasp the call to holiness implied in the prophet's words? Do you and I today really understand why our Savior chose to come and live among us?

For each person the call to holiness must be slightly different. The Lord went to some extraordinary lengths to recruit Sts. John and Paul. He is not asking us to endure the ordeals those two suffered as they went about fulfilling their missions. But each of us can, I believe, achieve our own saintliness by imitating some model of sanctity. At this time of year an appropriate model who comes to mind is John the Baptist's father, Zechariah. Zechariah enjoyed a favored status with the Lord in that he was a priest of the temple. When it came time to burn incense on the altar, he was the one chosen by lot for this privilege. In that same role, we would likely have welcomed it also. But then when the angel Gabriel appeared to him to reveal that he would have a son, Zechariah much like ourselves turned incredulous. For
his refusal to accept the angel's word that the awesome prophecy was true, he was struck dumb. (Do we ever incur similar afflictions?) After the child was born, this father/high priest was asked to name the child. When he wrote on a tablet, "His name is John." then and only then was his voice restored. It was a return to obedience and a joy of compliance that, surely, all of us have experienced at one time or another. So whenever we get the feeling the Lord might be trying to ratchet our personal holiness up a notch, perhaps we should adopt Zechariah's prayer: With a solemn oath to our ancestor Abraham

he promised to rescue us from our enemies
and allow us to serve him without fear,
so that we might be holy and righteous before him
all the days of our life.

January 27, 2008
Third Sunday in Ordinary Time

Isaiah8:23-9:3
1Corinthians1:10-13,17
Matthew4:12-23

For Christ did not send me to baptize but to preach thegospel, and not with the wisdom of human eloquence, so that the cross of Chist might not be emptied of its meaning.

Paul is concerned about rivalries and divisions in the ranks of Chloe's people. The faithful of Corinth are being swayed to allegiances with various preachers, instead of sticking with Christ. Paul knows what charms the wisdom of eloquence can work upon the human soul. But given enough allowance can it rob Jesus' own cross of its meaning? Today's readings help us understand how the cross of Christ fastens down and anchors the whole of the salvation enterprise, from recruitment and evangelization to steadfast allegiance.

In a pamphlet published by Catholic Answers we find this statement:
He offered his life as an act of love for us-- an act so perfect,
so pure, and so valuable that it paid for the sins of the whole
world.

An act so pure. Recruitment to the faith requires from God an act of utter purity. And God delivers with the crucifixion. Watch how Peter and Andrew, James and John respond when they are recruited. Did they have any inkling that this Master was headed for the horrid, revolting gibbet? Had they been tipped off, would they still have joined up? We can say for sure that what they felt must have been some extraordinary summons. No doubt they believed the call of Jesus to be a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. And there were many occasions along the way when the freedom to drop out pulled hard at them. But the notion persisted that they were doing the right thing, and if given start-overs they would do it the same. Adhering to Jesus made everything a pure experience. An ever closer realization of God kept promising more wonders.

An act so valuable. To evangelize us in the faith God had to offer us a treasure worth reaching for. And so He handed over his only begotten Son--to be crucified. We hear from both Isaiah and Matthew that the starting point for Jesus' mission would be "the land of Zebulum and the land of Naphtali." Jesus took up residence in Capernaum, the gateway to the west, to the orient, and eventually to the globe, so that he could look to and point to the sea, beyond which lay the lands of the gentiles, those peoples of gloom, distress and darkness. The faith he was bringing was not to be exclusively for the Hebrews. The fullness of its real value lay in its destiny for peoples all over the world, for all the ages to come. But that fullness of value can be grasped only in terms of a sacrifice. Until they experience that great anguish of losing what most matters to them, humans are not likely to appreciate what someone else--including their God--suffers on their behalf. A crucified Jesus emptied himself in supreme love. His act gave a meaning that no one could deny.

An act so perfect. To sustain our allegiance despite our fickle and vascillating nature God resorted to the one act that gathers in and subsumes all of our imperfections. Even as he is dying Jesus hears the dissatisfaction all around him. The thief on his left demands that he release them all from their tortures. The Sanhedrin want the inscription posted above his head to be reworded. One apostle later on won't believe until he can put his finger into the nail holes. But these are not imperfections on God's part. They are mere evidence of the million ways that we allow ourselves to keep missing the mark, (sin's definition). What Paul is telling the Corinthians is that no men, regardless of how gifted or courageous or eloquent, can strip the cross of its meaning, because for Jesus' act of saving all mankind, the cross was the perfect instrument. It did its job in a way that defies our comprehension, in a way that only God can fully understand.

Factions and rivalries may persist in our ranks today, but the Act so pure, so valuable, so perfect guarantees the final, grand reunion of us all.