July 2, 2006 At Saint Mark Church in Norman, OK

Wisdom 1.13-15; 2.23-24 + 2 Corinthians 8.7, 9,13-15 + Mark 5.21-43

After twenty minutes of driving around the parking lot, a desperate shopper looked heavenward and said: “Lord if you help me find a parking place, I will go to Mass every Sunday for the rest of my life.” At that moment, a parking spot opened. The shopper looked to heaven and again said: “Never mind, I found one.” And with that thought, we are face to face with two desperate people: a highly placed, influential synagogue official and a woman who for twelve years has been isolated, untouchable, and helpless because of a flow of blood which in her culture made her unclean, impure, and totally isolated from human contact.

Again, this week we hear of astonishment at what Jesus does and wonder about what has happened and who is in our midst. The stories of today’s Gospel come after another sea journey from one shore to the next. These sea stories are numerous and important in Mark’s Gospel. The miracle stories today belong together, and the little subtle link is the number twelve. For twelve years the woman has suffered – exactly the age of the synagogue officials’ daughter. Desperation is all they seem to have in common; this powerful influential man and this poor isolated, helpless woman; except for their faith which gives them both access and the attention of Jesus. He does not see wealth or poverty, power or helplessness. He sees only their faith. They both fall down at his feet – one in front of everyone at the face of Jesus, the other crawling through the crowd behind him. In both stories, the power of human touch is unmistakable. “Lay hands on her.” begs the official, Jarius. “If I can just touch his garment……” thinks the woman.

What Mark puts before us after that sea journey across the sea is a contrast of faith. “Little faith” last week on the part of the disciples in the boat who need to be calmed down; and great faith on the part of a desperate man and a desperate woman. The two teach us something about death. Untouched for twelve years, unclean, and now penniless, the woman for all practical purposes has been dead; and death has come to the home of Jarius. The helpless, hopeless crowd ridicules Jesus, and the scoffing disciples question how he could ever know who touched him in that pushing, shoving crowd. But he dismisses their silly question, and he puts the crowd out of the house. These emotions of doubt and fear have no place or power where He is present. They must go. And when they are gone, the girl rises restored to life and her family. And also rising up, standing before Jesus, the woman is restored to life, raised up from her slowly consuming death and twelve years of isolation. And Jesus calls her “daughter” – affirming that she is a child of God. Jarius gets his daughter, God gets his daughter all because of a faith that has overcome fear.

On a hot summer Sunday in the mist of a holiday weekend, we take nourishment and hope from this place. We find in the First Reading from a Book written just before the time of Jesus, the way to interpret and integrate this Gospel message into our lives. Listen to it again in light of these details from Mark 5.

“God did not make death, nor does he rejoice in the destruction of the living.

For he fashioned all things that they might have being; and the creatures of the world are wholesome,

and there is not a destructive drug among them nor any domain of the netherworld on earth, for justice is undying. For God formed man to be imperishable; the image of his own nature he made him. But by the envy of the devil, death entered the world, and they who belong to his company experience it.”

As our nation celebrates its hope for and foundation on the ideals of liberty, we have reason to celebrate even more profoundly the freedom we have found in Jesus Christ. No Declaration of Independence can cause freedom. It can only express the ideal. But God can, does, and wills that we be free:  free of fear, free of doubt, free of death. Because of this, we may declare what we hope for and record in writing for other generations the Enlightment’s version of Rights of Humankind.

The idea that we are created equal is lived in the ministry of Jesus and experienced by an influential synagogue official and an outcast, unclean, penniless woman. Jesus doesn’t know the difference between them because he sees with the eye of God. We might well pray this weekend in thanksgiving for the faith that we do have and for even greater faith that might cast out our fears and our doubts. In a nation that holds our lofty ideals, there is still too much power and influence, deciding who is really free and who is not, who lives and who dies, who is in and who is out. Fear these days still shapes our decisions and our visions. It becomes a tool for the savvy to manipulate opinion. Yet Christ still comes to cast it out, to silence those who scoff at thoughts of peace, and dismiss those who ridicule the idea that life is more precious in God’s sight than any death.

The woman of this Gospel models the faith Mark would teach us. She points to the power of faith in Jesus. She is anonymous and therefore stands for us all. She is an ordinary person who speaks her faith and builds up the community in her generation. She first put her trust in the professionals; the “doctors” Mark calls them. It was the wrong place to put her trust and her faith. Until she turned to Jesus, she was doomed. Shall it be so for us? Who is going to bring us peace, stop violence and killing, cast out fear and distrust? The Pentagon? The Congress? The Courts? The Presidency? These are the “doctors” of our time.

We are spending all that we have, and almost nothing is left. Only Jesus Christ. Only hearing and believing what the Book of WISDOM says will restore us and preserve us. “In the image of God’s own nature we have been made and all creatures are wholesome.” This is the Word of the Lord.

June 25, 2006 At Saint Mark Church in Norman, OK

Job 38:1,8-11 + 2 Corinthians 5:14-17 + Mark 4:35-41

There are a couple of details that slip by in these Gospel verses unless like me you have sat with this text for hours recently and preached on it for more than thirty years! The first is that the disciples call Jesus “Teacher.” Notice that their faith in him is just beginning, and they have made no connection between Jesus and God.

The second detail is that this interaction between the disciples and Jesus happens on water in a boat.  There is a lot of that in Mark’s Gospel: a lot of time in a boat crossing back and forth from one shore to the next. On one shore are the Jews, on the other shore at the Gentiles. Jesus is going back and forth in Mark; talking to both, bridging the gap, drawing them closer, almost, as it were, introducing them to one another. The third detail comes from the verb Mark uses to describe what Jesus does when awakened: REBUKE This is the verb Mark uses when Jesus confront an evil spirit. He rebukes The final detail I want to simply plant in your thinking is that Jesus accomplishes this wonder by his own power. He does not say: “By the power of God, be still! Hush! Calm down!” 1He simply gives the order by his own command and his own power. We must notice that just as the disciples in the boat must have noticed that to start their wondering about who in the world was in that boat with them.

The miracles in Mark’s gospel fall into two categories: healings and exorcisms. From the very beginning Mark shows almost a fascination with exorcisms. I’m just guessing, but I would think he probably has more exorcism stories than the other three Gospel writers. These conflicts with evil that he describes are always violent struggles, described in frightening detail. The Jesus of Mark’s Gospel is always the vigilant victor in a power struggle with evil.

These ancient peoples who lived along the rim of the Great Sea carried in their culture wild mythical stories of evil depicted as a monster rising from a boiling sea. We suspect that images of Creation have their roots in these stories. And so, in Genesis, God draws from the wild waters of chaos, order, calm, peaceful, dry land on which He establishes paradise. It is the beginning of primitive man’s understanding of and belief in God.

Mark draws upon the memories of those ancient stores and primitive beliefs to reveal the divine Jesus Christ who like or because he is God can defeat and control the awesome and frightening powers of the deep and like the Creator/God, draw from chaos and disorder, the new paradise: The Kingdom of God. This time however, the chaos and disorder is not really the sea and what is out there. It is the chaos and disorder of a split and polarized world of Gentiles and Jews – the two symbolic sides of that Lake, and the chaos and fear of these otherwise brave, competent fishermen.

I am beginning to imagine with some amusement a slightly different version of this event. Imagine with me the storm on the lake, the sleeping Jesus who has been taken on this boat ride to get him out of the crowd which has been chasing him around and wearing him out. His friends are worried that he’s over worked and needs some rest, so out they go for an afternoon on the lake. The storm comes up, but Jesus, so tired sleeps through it to the point that he might be lost if the boat the swamps. The rudely wake him up with their shouting and frightened scream because this storm is greater than they had ever experienced. This Jesus who has early that day shown them that he is afraid of nothing, having just won a contest of will and power over an evil spirit, is awakened from a wonderful and restful nap by this racket from his friends. What if?  Perhaps? at least in my version, he turns to the disciples rather than to the wind and sea and says the same thing: BE QUIET! CALM DOWN! (Under his breath he says: “Can’t you see I’m trying to sleep here?” Sometimes I think it would be easier to calm the wind and the sea than to calm a terrified people, but that is what he is about among us.

It is, in the end, what his mission is about: crossing the lake of our polarized lives,

calling us together, calming us down, rebuking in us the demons of fear, doubt, confusion, violence, distrust, racism, — whatever, and drawing from the stormy depths of our lives the new creation, the new paradise which he liked to call, the Kingdom of God.

June 21, 2026, at Saint William Parish in Naples, FL

Jeremiah 20: 10-13 + Psalm 69 + Romans 5: 12-15 + Matthew 10: 26-33

There is a breathtaking intimacy expressed in these verses of today’s Gospel. To those of us who are too often timid, if not downright afraid, to respond to the challenges of today’s culture and political climate, Jesus reveals a God of sparrows. This is a God who is to be trusted. A God who has not withdrawn from the world but filled it with his gentle and loving spirit to give us courage and hope. Yet, we are so like Saint Peter, who in Pilate’s courtyard cowardly avoided any association with Jesus Christ when it meant some risk. Then the Spirit awakened in him, and there was no way to silence his voice when it came to speaking of Christ and what he had learned from his Savior.

This culture and political climate may not be as physically dangerous as in other times, but there is a persecution still. It is subtle, often expressed in apathy or a roll of eyes that minimizes our faith and what we have learned from our Savior about how to live together in peace, generously, respectfully, and honorably. Religion becomes a private matter banned from discussion as though we had nothing to say that mattered.

Our values matter, and they need to critique the public sphere and shape public policy not in a patrician political way, but in such a way that our values raise questions about what is right and what is wrong. We do not check our values rooted in the Gospel when we leave this church. The compassion of Jesus Christ for the poor, the sick, those in prison, and the vulnerable matters as much today as it did in his own historical time. These vulnerable ones cannot be demonized.

I know people who place conditions on God’s unconditional and extravagant love. They resist a Gospel of Grace and often embrace a Gospel of punishment and retribution calling it “Justice.” I also know people who simply avoid any mention of Jesus Christ and resist what he taught us about the Father. With no more judgement about them than I would judge Peter in Pilate’s courtyard, I wait and pray that the Spirit will awaken them to experience that God of Sparrows who protects, inspires, and waits for us to bear witness to his presence, his Son, Jesus Christ, and all that he taught us. Everyone who acknowledges me before others, I will acknowledge before my Father in heaven. Who wouldn’t want that?

June 18, 2006 At Saint Mark Church in Norman, OK

Exodus 24:3-8 + Hebrews 9:11-15 + Mark 14:12-16, 22-26

As a child, I loved Peanut Butter cookies: those cookies with the grid on the top from the fork mom used to press down the dough. In our house they were kept under lock and key. I could not control myself. If I came home from school and smelled them, I would not rest until I had found them which meant EAT THEM. ALL OF THEM! Mom would say: “If you keep that up, you’re going to turn into a Peanut Butter Cookie”. My mother was wise from life, but not a great theologian. Yet, as I earned a degree in theology, I began to realize how profoundly theological she was. In terms of cause and effect with a few other details added, she had it right. It is what we are doing here with our Communion. Consume the Word of God, Consume the Body of Christ in the context of the assembly’s celebration of the Eucharist, and you will likely become the Body of Christ, holy, precious in God’s sight, and be raised up on the last day.

Deep in the human heart embedded in the human psyche is a fear all of us know. It is the fear of being alone: the fear of abandonment. Sometimes I think this is one of the little clues of our divine origins since God’s own nature seems to abhor the same thing. So then comes creation and those words recorded in Genesis: “It is not good for man to be alone.” It isn’t good for God to be alone either.

The first spoken words in the New Testament are: “Fear Not.” Spoken over and over again by angelic messengers, the divine name at the Incarnation is “Immanuel” (God with us). The name Immanuel says it all. Final words at the Gospel’s conclusion last week: “I will be with you always until the end of the ages” open us to the wonder of the Eucharistic presence. This relationship we spoke of last week is not inaccessible.

Our greatest fear is set aside by this divine promise which we by faith recognize in the presence of Christ’s Body and Blood. While the wonder of the Eucharist ought not be reduced simply to a physical object, it does begin there with bread and wine. Relieved of that awful fear, we are free to become Eucharistic people who are capable, willing, and anxious to share in and fulfill the mission of Jesus Christ.

It’s as though we, paralyzed by fear, have been cured, restored, freed to get up and walk this world with the message and life of the gospel.

It starts however with the experience and the truth of God’s presence in these sacred and holy gifts. So simple, so accessible, so common, we run the constant risk of taking it for granted. Like bread on the table at home, we forget easily how essential it is. And so this feast comes each year to say to us: Look.  Remember…….Take Care………Approach with fear and reverence. Bow your head………..  Be grateful…………..  Bend your knee.

You are in the presence of the Lord your God.

There are on many occasions moments in life when words are totally inadequate.

I have experienced that in preparing this homily. What is there to say? How can we ever express what we believe here? I experience the inadequacy of words when I see people get up and go to the restroom during the Eucharistic prayer; when they stand ten feet from the tabernacle and chat as though they were in a coffee shop. When people stroll in here as casually as at a ball game, and grab communion on the run like the drive through at Sonic. The Body and Blood of Christ is what happens when God as nothing more to say and words are inadequate. The Body and Blood of Christ is what happens when there is nothing more to say, and Presence is all that matters. This gift, this symbol, this message is like that moment when as a child we fell down, skinned our knee, bumped our head, or fell off the bike, and Mom or Dad said nothing, but swept us up, gathered us close in a loving embrace and simply held us close to their heart.

June 11, 2006 At Saint Mark Church in Norman, OK

Deuteronomy 4:32-34, 39-40 + Romans 8:14-17 + Matthew 28:16-20

This week and next we are led by the church’s readings to ponder the wonder of relationship and presence with themes of the Trinity and the Body and Blood of Christ. The easy way is to simply dismiss the wonder of this relationship by declaring it a “mystery” and thereafter never give it another serious thought. I suspect because of our leanings in that direction the church simply keeps bringing it up year after year following Pentecost. In my own progression of thought and understanding I know this to be so. But little by little, year after year, like water dripping on stone, that easy dismissal is not so easy nor satisfying. In my own progression I went from mystery to dogma, which was satisfying enough at the time, but never got the point. Any student of Church History knows well the progression and development of thought and language, the trials and schisms, violence at times and fracture of the family of faith. This is all very well and good,

but it leaves the truth of this revelation in one’s head which is not very well and good. The Holy Trinity is not an idea to be studied. It is a relationship to be enjoyed. The mission of Jesus Christ was about living, not about thinking. If right thinking leads to right living, then let that progression stand, but the progression must go all the way to that point of conversion.

We have not done too well as a church about this progression. In the eyes of far too many, our church is a church of dogmas and rules. There is no point in disputing what others see, and we are responsible for what we have shown them.

Jesus had a lot of trouble with a Judaism of laws that did not prompt and encourage right living. In years that are gratefully well behind us, a person became a Catholic as soon as they memorized the rules. Their preparation was an intellectual endeavor we called: “Instructions.” Now we are beginning to the heart of the matter, the Trinity. Realizing that it is about living in relationships, the preparation now takes a long time because real relationships do not just happen in a month, so the focus now is moving into a sacramental life, a way of behaving that comes from the heart more than knowing the rules in your head.

Even the words used to reveal this truth are about relationship. Father, Son, Spirit.

It isn’t just about God anymore. If I call God or experience God as “Father” it changes the relationship between you and me and so it’s not just about God. If I know, believe, and accept the Incarnation: Jesus Christ born in the flesh, it changes the relationship and so it is no longer about God off somewhere else all powerful and all knowing. It is also now about suffering, death, weakness, betrayal, healing, touching, embracing, forgiving. If I say I believe in the Holy Spirit, then it’s all about life animated, purposeful, and holy.  If I say I believe in the One Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church, it means I have transcended the mystery of the Trinity and begun to live and lead a life that unified, holy, inclusive of others, and inspired by a vision of the Kingdom of God, our future, proposed and revealed by Jesus Christ.

So, if the Trinity is the heart of our faith, our lives will be the textbook from which others may learn and be drawn to God. We will live in “communion” in “covenant” and it will not be a rule that brings us to Mass at least once a week, but a thrilling, life-giving relationship. While dogmas will develop as they always have historically from the lives of faithful people, it will be their lives, their joy, their courage, their service, their kindness, their peacefulness, and their love that draws others to God.

I think that is what Matthew is proposing when he has Jesus disperse the Apostles and says: “Make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit and teaching them to observe all I have commanded you. Know that I am with you always to the end of the age.”

May 28, 2006 At Saint Mark Church in Norman, OK

Acts 1: 1-11 + Ephesians 4:1-13 + Mark 16: 15-20

Today when we celebrate the Ascension of the Lord, we are face to face with the truth of Divine Revelation. Nothing that Christ did or said was meant for him alone. Christ did not speak to himself. What is reveled in Christ is not for the sake of Christ. It is for our sake. In revealing to us what he is, Christ also reveals what we are. The ascension is a description of our own future, of what lies in store for us. The ascension is also a commentary on our present condition, in light of the prayer Jesus has offered for us.

The focus of the New Testament Gospel insists that Jesus is not “gone” in the sense of being over or finished, because he is still in relation to those of us who are sort of — “on the ground.” He has prayed that even though he will soon be gone, the Father will continue to offer the same protection from the world and evil that the Father provided for His Son; because they belong to him, because He now lives in them. and because they have faith him Him, His disciples are no longer “of the world.” They are just stuck in it – so to speak. On the ground, yes; but oriented toward the things that are above.

So, the revelation of this Gospel is both about us and about Christ: about Christ in as much as his redemptive, sanctifying work leads him back to the Father; about us in as much as we now know where we belong, and how best we might relate to this world and the things that are above. We have, like the risen ascended Lord, been taken out of this world, yet we too often fail to live like it, and certainly do not often look like it. Christ no longer needs to be with us, because now he is within us. It is a quality of presence, this being within. It is a presence that when recognized, acknowledged, and embraced becomes evident in “Spirit” as we shall soon be reminded next Sunday. But until that Spirit has filled us, overwhelmed us, and taken possession of us, we shall be stuck in this world, standing around all day.

Our prayer today is the prayer of the church longing and groaning in hope and expectation that we shall be born again, that we shall be re-created, that we shall be lifted up from the petty, simplistic, materialistic things of this world, and fix our eyes, our hearts, and our hopes on what is to come. For we who are Baptized into Christ and Confirmed in His Spirit are no longer of this world.  We live in joy with a firm expectation of what is to come, and we pray:

COME HOLY SPIRIT FILL THE HEARTS OF YOUR FAITHFUL

AND INKINDLE IN US THE FIRE OF YOUR DIVINE LOVE.

May 21, 2006 At Saint Mark Church in Norman, OK

Acts 10 25,26,34,35,44-48 + 1 John 4:7-10 + John 15:9-17

There is in our understanding of this Gospel, a powerful description of discipleship. The disciples of Jesus are his friends. They have been chosen by him. The usual Jewish custom was for disciples to seek and choose their teachers. Not so in the relationship with this teacher, Jesus. He does the seeking and calls. He sets the tone and the style of the relationship, and he does it as much by deed as by word when he crawls on the floor and washes their feet.

The commandment he gives, the mission he proposes for his disciples in not simply to love one another. There is a second part to that verse: “As I love you.” With those words we are far removed from the emotions of affection and the sentiments of greeting card verses, Hollywood, and the torrid affairs of celebrities paraded before us day and night on the magazine covers at the checkout stand. That caricature of love has nothing to do with the divine, and it reveals nothing to us about what has happened to us by redemption.

Again, for the third week, our language fails to give clarity about what is being said here. “Remain in my love” is far too week for the sense of the original language. It means STAY HERE IN PLACE – STICK TO THIS – NEVER WAVER! Remember, this text is a commentary on last week’s verses about branches being attached to the vine. “Remain” is too passive. The disciple is not just standing around in one spot. The disciple is fixed in place, fixed in this relationship, and the strength of that relationship produces fruit.

The wonder here is this relationship called “friendship.” There is mutuality in this suggestion. It means more than being “friendly.” True friends are equal sharing something intimate and unique. Consequently, this suggestion that we be “friends” with Jesus and furthermore be “friends” with God should leave us stunned with wonder and almost recoil at the thought. “Wait a minute.” we might say. Is he suggesting that the old slave and master thing is gone? That is what it says, isn’t it?

Sheep of this flock, branches of this vine, people loved by God and people who live as Jesus loved are lifted out of broken humanity and born again in Divine Life. It is not enough to “imitate” Jesus Christ. That would be role playing – acting like, not at all the real thing.

This Easter Season has proposed again and again; that the risen one is within us,

that the risen one is seen within, heard within, and known within a people who have gathered in his name and consumed his flesh and blood. From then on, it’s not an imitation. It is the real thing.  It is the risen Lord. We are the Body of Christ who do what he does, and He does what we do. Reason enough then to make certain that what we do reveals what we have become. Reason enough to make certain that what we say reveals who we are.

This love is not something we give or take, receive or deserve. It is God – a God who embraces all without condition or reservation. It is God – a God who invites us in: into life, into love, into friendship, into service, compassion, care, and into eternity. This is the commandment: Live every waking moment with the knowledge that God is within you, and see that presence in every other human life, and stay that way!

May 14, 2006

Acts 9:26-31 + 1 John 3:1-21 + John 15:1-8

We must be careful about how we understand the descriptive adjective “true.” Like last week, this is another translation issue that can easily distract and diminish what is revealed to us in today’s Gospel. If missing the literal meaning of a “Good” shepherd last week cost us the beauty of what is revealed; it is no less so this week with the word: “True.” As we use it in English, “ture” suggests that this vine is the real one rather than a false one. To be satisfied with that understanding is shallow, simple, and a long way from what the Jesus of John’s Gospel is saying about himself. “True” as it is used in the original context and in the sense of this revelation is not the opposite of false. It means far more than that. “True” in this Gospel means something more like faithful or dependable, somewhat like the way we would describe a friend who is “true.” It isn’t that some people are “false” people. It is more properly said that some are “true”, meaning that you can count on them to be there when you need them, that when times are tough, they come through.

When Jesus announces that I am “The True Vine”, he speaks to us of relationship

not of falsehood, error, right or wrong. He comes not to divide into true or false,

but to be friend, to be loyal, and be worthy of trust. Vines in themselves are not good or bad. The language of the bible about vines and even the language of horticulture speaks of the “choicest” vine and “choicest “wine. Just as the Shepherd may have other sheep, there may be other vines, but for those who branch off the fruitful vine, there is only one that is most chosen; and for those who have known the suffering and the sacrifice of pruning, and remain connected to the vine, there will be a harvest of sweet and choice wine: the everlasting sign of the bounty of God’s Kingdom.

Since Easter’s first day, we have marveled at the resurrection and the presence of the risen one. Last week, this week, and the week to come, we shall continue to ponder our relationship with this risen one and the relationship to which we have been called in Him. Leading us soon to make real the Baptism we have received not in Water, but in the Spirit on Pentecost. It is a Birth that makes us good or beautiful, in the image of last week, a birth that makes us true or authentic extensions of Christ in the world thriving on Christ’s resurrected life, surging through all his members. As branches of this vine, as members of his body, as anointed people in this church, we live in Christ as Christ lives in us.

May 7, 2006 At Saint Mark Church in Norman, OK THERE IS NO AUDIO AVAILABLE THIS SUNDAY

Acts 4:8-12 + 1 John 3:1-2 + John 10: 11-18

I honestly believe that there is nothing more terrifying to a human being than even the suspicion let along the conviction, that he or she is alone, set adrift in a pointless world. So, the revelation of Christ as Shepherd is welcome and comforting. Somehow that image above all others makes the promise “I will be with you always” imaginable and possible. We are in the hands of a God who knows us better than we know ourselves, who cares for us more graciously than we could ever care for ourselves.

This is the insight that sparked the enthusiasm of the apostles in their earliest preaching. The kind of enthusiasm we hear from Peter in the first reading. John had just finished healing a cripple; an act that got them arrested and demanded an explanation. Peter’s response is that there should be no surprise at that healing, because healing, wholeness are a natural consequence of faithful awareness of the presence of God. What looks like healing is more than a mere cure. The cure is an outward sign of a much deeper inner reality. It is a sign of God’s mercy that endures forever.

This saving power, this mercy, is nothing less than steadfast covenant love. It is the kind of love that broke open the world in the death and resurrection of Jesus and overflows as healing grace; it is the kind of love that compels the shepherd to put himself at risk for the sake of the sheep. It is a love that recreates us as children of God. This love has already taken hold of us. Through baptism we are God’s children now. Easter celebrates this reality. What we will eventually become has not yet reached fulfillment. But we have had a hint of it this weekend in this church. In the long and steady procession of family and friends and children coming to this altar for First Communion, more than once, I had to pause, swallow slowly and look down after tears of joy and love in the eyes of mothers and fathers brought tears to my own eyes. Love is all around us, and the love of which this Gospel speaks is manifest again and again in the love of every parent for their children for whom they would and do sometimes lay down their lives.

When salvation is brought to its fulfillment, there will be a great illumination, and we will recognize the marvelous dignity that is ours. We will see that we have been made like God, and we can now act like God acts. We can bring the saving grace of God to a world in desperate need of healing. We can do this in our families, in this parish, at work and countless other situations of our lives.

Our limited and sometimes impoverished language, English does not always carry nor allow the richest sense of words translated from other tongues.

It is unfortunate that at some time in the past someone chose to translate this Gospel using the word: “Good” for a word in Hebrew that more accurately means, “Beautiful.” In our tongue, “Good” means too many other things like, competent, tasty, or morally correct. Not so in John‘s Gospel. What he describes as the image of God’s care for us made manifest in Jesus is nothing short of noble and beautiful. That is the real, literal meaning of the original text.

God’s love for us is not “good” – it is nothing less than beautiful and as noble as the loving gaze of parents on their children at their finest moment. It is a beautiful God, a beautiful shepherd with all the sense of intimacy that word will allow that comes before us this week of Easter Joy. If it does not transform us all into beautiful people who are the earthly reflection of that Beautiful Shepherd, then faith has failed us and we are fools to be here.

After communion……………

Throughout the world this day, communities assembled in worship like our own unite in prayer for Vocations. You most graciously celebrated my ordination anniversary two weeks ago, and continue to share the joy of my life day in and day out. I’ve always believed that a pastor’s most joyful day is First Holy Communion, and my own tears and thrill today is evidence again and reminder that I my life and vocation is nothing less than a wonder, a miracle of love, and a gift beyond price. I teach our children at very opportunity to look into the future with their gifts and ask always what God wants them to become, who God wants them to be, and how to use the gifts most completely. You who wish happiness for your children must know that “Happiness” comes first of all on and always from being who you were made and called to be and nothing else. Pray for your children this way. Teach them to consider always in every decision what God asks of them. “What do you want to be when you grow up?” is the question we Catholic Disciples of Jesus ask, not “What do you want to do?” A life in consecration to God, to the Gospel, to leadership in the community of faith, and to prophetic service is being asked of some in this parish family. That call is a sign that God is very near and God’s blessings are abundant. Parents, pray for it in your homes.

I believe that one of the signs of God’s nearness and presence in the church is the calling of great men and women to heroic lives of witness and service. We in Oklahoma have been touched by the hand of God in man from Okarche who was a beautiful and noble shepherd who did not run like a hired hand from his sheep.

On this day of prayer for Vocations, I want to call you to prayer about another Vocation, the calling to sanctity, holiness, and “sainthood.” The process for acknowledging the courage, faith, and holiness of our own Father Stanley Rother has begun in earnest. The ushers are passing among you now cards in his memory with a prayer we can and ought to use until that day when all the church will proclaim what we believe: that he is among the saints living in God’s presence.

When I say this prayer, I ask Stan to stir the hearts of our children to follow his example and step forward with their gifts to say to God : “Here I am, send me.”

Never forget what goes unsaid in the Gospel of this day. It was a shepherd who came forward to reveal God’s love and mercy, not a prince or a king. It is a shepherd God still chooses to continue God’s work, not a CEO, a President, or some powerful celebrity with a short and shallow life drowning in fame and fortune. It is shepherds we still need: simple, faithful, good, beautiful, and willing.

Are they not among us?

From the back of card you have received, let us pray together:

Heaving Father, source of all holiness, in every generation; you raise up men and women heroic in love and service. You have blessed your Church with the life of Stanley Rother, priest, missionary, and martyr. Through his prayer his preaching, his presence and his pastoral love, you revealed your love and your presence with us as Shepherd. If it be your will, may he be proclaimed by the universal church as martyr and saint, living now in your presence and interceding for us all we ask this through Christ our Lord. Amen.

April 23 2006 At Saint Mark Church, Norman, OK No Audio is available for this Sunday

Acts 4:32-25 + 1 John 5:1-6 + John 20:19-31

This Gospel has been proclaimed on the Sunday after Easter for my whole life and beyond. All of us have heard it over and over again. It was the Gospel proclaimed at my first Mass in 1968. Consequently, each time I hear it, I am filled with memories and gratitude. Each time I have preached and reflected on this text, I am drawn deeper and deeper into John’s Gospel, and part of that is because each time I preach it, more and more people have departed from my life through death leaving me less interested in Thomas and the other Apostles, and more interested in the transformation of their relationship with Christ. That is really what this is all about: a transformation of relationship from being with someone to being in someone.

What is this manifestation of Jesus and how does he get in that room? A shallow reading of these texts would leave us with the impression that there is some kind of resuscitated corpse popping up now and then like something in a movie with all kinds of technical special effects.

John never intended to suggest that their eyes saw something. This experience is not a “sighting”! What is happening here is that they were able to read the signs of his wounded and open body. This was their recognition that through those wounds there is now access to the divine life which is being poured out for us. They understood as we must that the opening of the side of Jesus recalled the birth of Eve from the side of Adam. These wounds are channels that make life with God available. Here is the truth of this death that leads to Joy. God loves us enough to die for us.

For those faithful disciples who came together and stayed together, the coming of Christ was a regular event, but Thomas was not there, and so he missed it and remained stuck at a physical level of faith wanting to probe wounds of the flesh. His invitation is not to touch, but to go beyond the physical level and open himself up to a communion with divine life. John never tells that he touched something. What we understand is that his relationship to Jesus was transformed. As part of the community, he finally experiences the risen Lord. This does not happen when he is absent. There in communion with the others, he is invited into the wounds. The breakthrough of this moment, the shift Thomas makes from the Jesus of his past to the Resurrected Christ whose presence is now within him is nothing short of being born again – being born in the Spirit. The world which sees with physical eyes only what is physical can no longer see Jesus after his death. But those whom he loves will see him because they have spiritual eyes but that cannot happen until He dies.

What all this eventually can awaken in us is the truth and realization that we are spiritual in nature, not just a physical presence on this earth which passes away. There is something about us that does and will last forever. The first stirrings of that truth call into question all of our pre occupation with our looks, with our earthly possessions, the values of our lives, what we do day in and day out, and why we do it. Then, it calls to question our mission, our purpose, and relationships. As physical beings, we know what it means to be with someone. As spiritual beings, we know what it means to be in someone as Jesus said more than once in John’s Gospel (Jn 14:10; 15:4 & 17:21). “I am in the Father, you in me, and I in you.”

Appreciating, living in, nurturing our spiritual selves and the spiritual communion we have with God and all creation is the breakthrough of faith which gives us our unique understanding of death This Easter Sunday is our day to celebrate the re-creation of life, but this time not the life and resurrection of Jesus Christ, but our own. There is a new form of presence. It is not waiting for us beyond the locked doors of death it is already in our midst.