Saints Zachary and Elizabeth, Prophet and Matriarch, (1st century)
St. Bertila, Virgin, (705)
Saints Galation and Episteme, Martyrs, (unknown)
“Today salvation has come to this house
because this man too is a descendant of Abraham.—
Depending upon who got to us first, we carry differing perceptions of God. These range from visions of God as a punishing strict arbitrar of justice, to God as the laissez-faire overseer who doesn’t get much involved in the day-to-day affairs of men, to God as an all loving pappy who doesn’t much care what we do, as long as we don’t really hurt anyone.
We live with preconceived notions, the beliefs and feelings that come out of our experiences, out of our earliest memories, the picture painted by those who taught and trained us.
Those notions, beliefs, and feelings require the occasional adult reality check.
Brothers and sisters,
Let’s take that reality check.
Our first reading, from the appropriately named Book of Wisdom tells us that God has mercy on all, because He can do all things. Wisdom also tells us that God overlook[s] people’s sins that they may repent.
The reality is that God is merciful to us. He is merciful, not so we can do as we please, but so we can become what is our destiny, the perfection of humanity.
Humanity perfected is what Christ came to call us to be. It is humanity that takes up His name, humanity that repents of its sin.
Wisdom further tells us that God love[s] all things that are, and loathe[s] nothing that [He has] made.
In other words, God made us, fashioned us, and we remain simply for this reason, because God wills it so. Wisdom asks:
how could a thing remain, unless you willed it;—¨
or be preserved, had it not been called forth by you?
Listening to that we know that we have the assurance, by our very being, that we are willed to being by God. God has called us forth and He preserves us. He spares us because we are His. And, He loves us.
The most beautiful thought is this:
O LORD and lover of souls,
…your imperishable spirit is in all things!
God is in us.
The reality is that we bear likeness to Him. Our likeness to Him is in our ability to be more and more like Him, in every decision we make for Him, and in our doing every good and holy thing He taught.
My friends,
In our likeness to God is the promise that we will be reunited to Him one day.
We draw closer and closer to Him each day, when we pray, when His grace enters us in the sacraments, when we meet our brothers and sisters and see in them the likeness of Christ.
When we stumble on the way to God we are not doomed. Rather we are called to repent, to come back and reclaim our place in His family. In that we draw ever closer to Him.
Brothers and sisters,
Our reality check continues with St. Paul as he tells the people of Thessalonica, and us:
We always pray for you,—¨
that our God may make you worthy of his calling—¨
and powerfully bring to fulfillment every good purpose
and every effort of faith,—¨
that the name of our Lord Jesus may be glorified in you,—¨
and you in him.
The apostles, the saints, the entire Church prays each day. They and we pray that God bring us to fulfillment.
Fulfillment is this, that the imperishable spirit of God that is in us continues to perfect us, continues to draw us closer and closer, transforming us to perfection in Him.
That is the joy of the Church. That in Jesus Christ we become perfect.
In Jesus Christ we are fulfilled and perfected, not by magic or hocus-pocus, but by the reality of God among us. God as he came to Zacchaeus saying:
“Today salvation has come to this house—¨
because this man too is a descendant of Abraham.—
It is no less for us. We too are descendants of Abraham, grafted onto the chosen people, adopted and born of the Spirit of God. Salvation has come to us.
That is the adult reality of faith. That is the truth of the sacraments.
By baptism we are grated onto the Church, onto the new Israel. By penance we are strengthened to avoidance of sin and to a spirit of true repentance. By the Eucharist we are transformed into the very likeness of Jesus.
These graces, and the others available to us, transform us as Zacchaeus’ encounter with Jesus transformed him.
Zacchaeus was once again able to sing along with the psalmist this song of praise and thanksgiving:
The LORD is gracious and merciful,—¨
slow to anger and of great kindness.—¨
The LORD is good to all—¨
and compassionate toward all his works.
Zacchaeus, and all of us have this reality check stated in Jesus’ own words.
—For the Son of Man has come
to seek—¨and to save what was lost.”
That is God, that is who He is.
Amen.
Saints Vitalis and Agricola, Martyrs, (unknown)
St. John of Iberia, Monk, (580)
St. Charles of Milan, Bishop, (1584)
St. Winifred, Virgin and Martyr, (650)
St. Hubert of Liege, Bishop, (727)
St. Marachy of Armagh, Bishop, (1148)
For this is the will of my Father,
that everyone who sees the Son and believes in him
may have eternal life,
and I shall raise him on the last day.—
The poet John Guzlowski wrote the following:
What My Father Believed
He didn’t know about the Rock of Ages
or bringing in the sheaves or Jacob’s ladder
or gathering at the beautiful river
that flows beneath the throne of God.
He’d never heard of the Baltimore Catechism
either, and didn’t know the purpose of life
was to love and honor and serve God.He’d been to the village church as a boy
in Poland, and knew he was Catholic
because his mother and father were buried
in a cemetery under wooden crosses.
His sister Catherine was buried there too.The day their mother died Catherine took
to the kitchen corner where the stove sat,
and cried. She wouldn’t eat or drink, just cried
until she died there, died of a broken heart.
She was three or four years old, he was five.What he knew about the nature of God
and religion came from the sermons
the priests told at mass, and this got mixed up
with his own life. He knew living was hard,
and that even children are meant to suffer.
Sometimes, when he was drinking he’d ask,
—Didn’t God send his own son here to suffer?—My father believed we are here to lift logs
that can’t be lifted, to hammer steel nails
so bent they crack when we hit them.
In the slave labor camps in Germany,
He’d seen men try the impossible and fail.He believed life is hard, and we should
help each other. If you see someone
on a cross, his weight pulling him down
and breaking his muscles, you should try
to lift him, even if only for a minute,
even though you know lifting won’t save him.
Reflect on those words.
Death is as certain as life, and suffering is equally as certain.
God Himself took on our suffering and our death so to save us, to bring us home to heaven.
How we respond, how we react, to the extent we lift others in their suffering, if even for a moment, is the testimony we give to our faith in Jesus Christ, our faith in His promise of heaven. His promise that He will raise us on the last day.
Amen.
Feast of All Souls
St. Victorinus of Pettau, Bishop and Martyr, (303)
St. Marcian, Monk, (387)
I received a very kind E-mail from John Guzlowski of the Lightning and Ashes blog. This blog has linked to John for awhile now.
John has three published editions of poetry: Lightning and Ashes, Third Winter of War: Buchenwald, and Language of Mules.
John’s poetry is primarily focused on his parents who had been slave laborers in Nazi Germany. His website notes the his poems try to remember them and their voices.
John was extremely generous and sent along a poem which he asked me to include on these pages. He said:
I want to give you a poem about my father and his beliefs. He was a “faith-filled” man, and always took Jesus and the things the priests said seriously.
This poem is particularly appropriate as we remember the faithfully departed this All Souls Day. I will certainly remember John’s parents Jan and Tekla in my prayers at Requiem Holy Mass tomorrow. Eternal rest grant onto them O Lord!
What My Father Believed
He didn’t know about the Rock of Ages
or bringing in the sheaves or Jacob’s ladder
or gathering at the beautiful river
that flows beneath the throne of God.
He’d never heard of the Baltimore Catechism
either, and didn’t know the purpose of life
was to love and honor and serve God.He’d been to the village church as a boy
in Poland, and knew he was Catholic
because his mother and father were buried
in a cemetery under wooden crosses.
His sister Catherine was buried there too.The day their mother died Catherine took
to the kitchen corner where the stove sat,
and cried. She wouldn’t eat or drink, just cried
until she died there, died of a broken heart.
She was three or four years old, he was five.What he knew about the nature of God
and religion came from the sermons
the priests told at mass, and this got mixed up
with his own life. He knew living was hard,
and that even children are meant to suffer.
Sometimes, when he was drinking he’d ask,
—Didn’t God send his own son here to suffer?—My father believed we are here to lift logs
that can’t be lifted, to hammer steel nails
so bent they crack when we hit them.
In the slave labor camps in Germany,
He’d seen men try the impossible and fail.He believed life is hard, and we should
help each other. If you see someone
on a cross, his weight pulling him down
and breaking his muscles, you should try
to lift him, even if only for a minute,
even though you know lifting won’t save him.
Solemnity of All Saints
Saints Caesarius and Julian, Martyrs, (unknown)
St. Benignus of Dijon, Martyr, (unknown)
St. Quintinus, Martyr, (unknown)
St. Foillan, Abbot, (655)
St. Wolfgang of Regensburg, Bishop, (994)
St. Serapion of Antioch, Bishop, (212)
St. Marcellus the Centaurian, Martyr, (298)
St. Asterius of Amasea, Bishop, (410)
Let us then be shepherds like the Lord. We must meditate on the Gospel, and as we see in this mirror the example of zeal and loving kindness, we should become thoroughly schooled in these virtues.
For there, obscurely, in the form of a parable, we see a shepherd who had a hundred sheep. When one of them was separated from the flock and lost its way, that shepherd did not remain with the sheep who kept together at pasture. No, he went off to look for the stray. He crossed many valleys and thickets, he climbed great and towering mountains, he spent much time and labour in wandering through solitary places until at last he found his sheep.
When he found it, he did not chastise it; he did not use rough blows to drive it back, but gently placed it on his own shoulders and carried it back to the flock. He took greater joy in this one sheep, lost and found, than in all the others.
Let us look more closely at the hidden meaning of this parable. The sheep is more than a sheep, the shepherd more than a shepherd. They are examples enshrining holy truths. They teach us that we should not look on men as lost or beyond hope; we should not abandon them when they are in danger or be slow to come to their help. When they turn away from the right path and wander, we must lead them back, and rejoice at their return, welcoming them back into the company of those who lead good and holy lives. — Saint Asterius of Amasea