Daily Virtue Scripture Readings

Francis of Assisi once said: “Preach the word of God wherever you go, even use words if necessary.”  We might want to reflect upon that, given some of the recent shifts within the churches regarding how we understand the word of God. Fr. Rolheiser tells of his journey while doing graduate studies in Europe. “I was living at a major Seminary. During my last year there, one of the secretaries at the seminary, a deeply Christian and most gracious woman, a young person who was an exemplar wife, mother, and friend of many, died of cancer. I went to her funeral on a bus full of young seminarians and student priests. At her funeral the homily was delivered by one of her uncles, an American priest, who had been flown in for the occasion. He delivered what, to my mind, was one of the best homilies I ever had the privilege of hearing. In it, he picked up this woman’s life as a word of God, related it to the mystery of Christ, and then, with that, both consoled and challenged all of us there, especially her husband and her children. On the way home, on the bus, all the talk among the seminarians was about how dreadful and liturgically inappropriate the homily at been. At one point, I turned to one of the seminarians and said: “I thought the homily was outstanding. Why do you think it was inappropriate?” His answer: “He never used the word of God, he gave a eulogy!” That answer and that indignation, typify a reaction that is growing within the Catholic community. More and more, the idea is that the word of God is perfectly synonymous with the written word of Scripture. For this concept, we are the poorer. Recently a nun shared with me how, at her mother’s funeral, the presiding priest, a young man who had just graduated from a good theology school, had conducted the entire funeral, homily and all, without ever referring to her mother, save for those times when the ritual prayers called for her name. She was, rightly, furious and felt cheated. Her mother had been an extraordinary person, a fine Christian. That day, in church, there was more than the written word to be read. Her mother was a word of God. In her, the word had become flesh and it had dwelt amongst us. That word, sadly, was left unread, uncelebrated. Sometimes I am asked by people who have the responsibility of preaching, priests and laity alike: “Where can you find good stories to use in homilies? How do you bring the word of scripture down to the people’s level?” Those are sincere questions, but not good ones. The task is never to bring the word of God down to people’s level. The task is not to search in books and homiletic aids for good stories. The words and the stories that we need to preach effectively are still being written. They need to be read out of the lives of the people we are ministering to, out of our own lives, and out of the events of the day. The word of God is not a baton, passed on in a relay race. Nor is it a deposit of faith, a treasurer chest of truths handed down from one generation to the next. The word of God something to be eaten, digested, and given flesh to. Reading it requires both eyes: With one eye we scan the bible, with the other we examine what the flesh that has been influenced by it looks like.

Grace. Fr. Ron Rolheiser writes that we understand grace only when we grasp existentially what’s inside the Father’s words to his older son in the parable of the prodigal son: My son, you are always with me, and everything I have is yours. But we had to celebrate and be glad, because this brother of yours was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found. The older brother would not be bitter if he understood that everything his father owns is already his, just as he would not be envious of the pleasures his wayward brother tasted if he understood that, in real life, his brother had been dead. But it takes a deeper grasp of what grace is to intuit that, namely, to grasp that life inside God’s house dwarfs all other pleasures.  The same is true for the convert who has given up his wayward life but still secretly rejoices in the experience and sophistication it brought him and nurses a condescending pity for the less-experienced.  He too has not yet really understood grace. In his book, The Idea of the Holy, Rudolf Otto submits that in the presence of the holy we will always have a double reaction: fear and attraction. Like Peter at the Transfiguration, we will want to build a tent and stay there forever; but, like him too before the miraculous catch of fish, we will also want to say: “Depart from me for I am a sinful man.” In the presence of the holy, we want to burst forth in praise even as we want to confess our sins. Only when we understand what the father of the prodigal son means when he says to the older brother: Everything I have is yours”, will we offer both a confession of praise and a confession of sin. The mark of genuine contrition is not a sense of guilt, but a sense of sorrow, of regret for having taken a wrong turn; just as the mark of living in grace is not a sense of our own worth but a sense of being accepted and loved despite our unworthiness. We are spiritually healthy when our lives are marked by honest confession and honest praise.

Bishop Robert Barron writes that today’s Gospel reflects on the pivotal figure of John the Baptist. It’s fair to say that you cannot really understand Jesus without understanding John, which is precisely why all four evangelists tell the story of the Baptist as a kind of overture to the story of Jesus. John sums up Israel, and without the Israelite background, the story of Jesus becomes opaque. The story of John’s birth brings his parents, Zechariah and Elizabeth, into focus. Both are strongly priestly personages. Elizabeth is a descendant of the family of Aaron, the first priest of Israel, and Zechariah was a practicing temple priest. What’s important for our purposes is that John was of very priestly stock. So why, when we first hear of him in his adult life, is he out in the desert and not in the temple? Well, there was a long prophetic tradition that criticized the temple for its corruption. In John’s time, the temple was mired in very messy, vile, and violent politics. So, what is he doing in the desert? He is offering what the temple should be offering but wasn’t due to its corruption, namely, the forgiveness of sins.

Fr. Martin Pable, reflects on our gospel verse, “My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord; my spirit rejoices in God my savior” and notes that, Mary, pregnant through the mysterious power of the Holy Spirit, must have felt quite alone. Needing to talk to another woman, she seeks out her aging cousin Elizabeth, who had recently become pregnant. At their meeting, something wondrous occurs: When Elizabeth hears Mary’s greeting, the child in her womb “leaped for joy.” John, the Messenger, salutes Jesus the Message. What went on in that home for the next three months? No doubt Mary helped Elizabeth with household tasks. But I picture long evenings in which Mary, Elizabeth and Zechariah ask each other: “What is the meaning of all this? What is God doing at this moment in our people’s history?” I can imagine Zechariah with a writing tablet saying: “Remember what Isaiah wrote about the Messiah to come? He will save our people from their sins, bring comfort and healing to them, teach us again how God wants us to live.” This is the wonderful mystery, the Visitation, that we recall every Advent.   

This poem celebrates, in the open countryside, a rebirth of nature and love. Just as the fruitfulness of spring overcomes the infertility of winter, love triumphs over the selfishness that imprisons us within ourselves. An allegorical reading of this poem as a celebration of the spousal covenant between God and Israel during the restoration is relatively easy to make. Israel is depicted in many prophetical texts as a vineyard. Also, that literature used the images of devastation and of the Garden of Eden to describe Israel’s unfaithfulness and fidelity. St. John of the Cross writes that “The soul desires that nothing should diminish the delights of love it feels within, a love which is the flower of the soul’s vineyard—not the envious and evil demons, nor the body’s wild desires, nor the vagaries of the imagination, nor the attractions of created things; it calls upon the angels, asking them to root out all these things or prevent their growth, so that they cannot hinder the flowering of interior love; for the sweet taste and delight of that love is the joyful sharing of the virtues and graces that pass between the soul and the Son of God.” Richard Reece also notes that the depths within today’s readings speak to us differently. “Have we been ecstatically in love, waiting excitedly for the arrival of all we have hoped for? Have we been with a child or awaited the birth of a child, surprised or worried, or just bursting with the news and needing to share it with an understanding friend? Today’s Scriptures are not just about us. Elizabeth knows, her unborn child knows, and Mary knows now that the world has been fundamentally, supernaturally changed. After millennia of longing, ‘the winter is past, the rains are over and gone; the flowers appear on the earth,’ and ‘what was spoken by the Lord is fulfilled.’ God is with us.”

How would we respond to a request from God? Last week, a reading from Genesis provoked thoughts on human impatience in the face of God, who works in incomprehensibly long time frames. Today’s gospel directs our attention in the opposite direction, toward God’s impatience. We cannot be sure why Mary asks her question about her part in bearing the child announced by the angel, but one possibility is that she senses the urgency in the angel’s words. “You will conceive, bear, and name him Jesus.” Mary could be saying, “How can I do all of that right now when I’m not even married yet?” God isn’t really being impatient with Mary. The angel answers her question and waits for her yes. Yet there is a note of urgency in his announcement. The moment of God’s decisive action toward humanity has arrived: now is the time to respond! How do we respond to urgent inspirations in thoughts like “This is the moment to ask for forgiveness…to speak in faith…to offer to help…to give a back rub…to pray”?      

At this point in the season of Advent, the spirit of anticipation is palpable in the Church’s liturgy. In today’s beautiful balance of our readings, we see the birth of two key figures in the Judeo-Christian story, Samson and John the Baptist. Sr. Ephrem Hollermann asks us to ponder the similarities between Samson of the Hebrew Scriptures and John the Baptist of the New Testament. In the time of Judges, an angel appeared to the wife of Manoah and said, “you will conceive and bear a son . . . who will begin the deliverance of Israel.” Six or seven centuries later, an angel told Zechariah, “your wife Elizabeth will bear a son…to prepare a people fit for the Lord.” The spirit stirred both Samson and John to begin their work. In Judges, we read of Samson, “And the Spirit of the Lord began to stir him.” Of John, we read in Luke, “the word of the Lord came to John.” God inspired both Samson and John the Baptist to begin their work, yet both died in seeming defeat. Samson never lived to see Israel delivered, and John was beheaded during his imprisonment. Samson oversaw the weakening of Israel’s oppressors, preparing the way for David, from whom the Messiah would come. John the Baptist would announce the Messianic mission, fulfilled by Jesus in his life, death, and resurrection. Although Samson and John were men that God used in remarkable ways, their unique roles were to prepare for David and David’s heir, the Messiah. This was their true calling. Despite their differences, they were preludes to what would follow.

The prophet Jeremiah prophesizes the coming birth of a new king. We celebrate this birth in the promise of Christmas. Jesus’ birth means God comes to be with us in the flesh. But Fr. Rolheiser writes that God doesn’t send a superhero to rid the earth of evil by forcefully destroying all that’s bad. God sends a helpless baby lying in the straw, needing to be picked up, nursed, and nurtured. That’s God’s wisdom, the power of a baby. Babies don’t shoot bad guys, like Sylvester Stallone or James Bond, at the end of the movie; they change hearts by offering a gentler presence. So, Christmas doesn’t rid the world of evil. For the Christian, just as for everyone else, there will still be sickness, senseless hurt, broken dreams, and cold, lonely seasons when love is far away. Christmas doesn’t promise heaven on earth. Instead, it promises us, here on earth, something else: God’s presence in our lives. And it’s that presence, not the power of a superhero to blow away all that’s bad, that redeems us. When we sense that God is with us, we can give up selfishness, bitterness, and jealousy because we are no longer alone in them. Everything can be born if it can be shared. We no longer walk alone in our pain. When we are not alone, then pain and happiness are not mutually exclusive, and the agonies and hurts of life do not exclude deep meaning and deep joy. Avery Dulles once said, “The incarnation does not provide us with a ladder by which to escape the ambiguities of life and scale the heights of heaven. Rather, it enables us to burrow deep into the heart of planet earth and find it shimmering with divinity.”

I can denounce a king, but I cannot enthrone one.
I can strip an idol of its power, but I cannot reveal the true God.
I can wash the soul in sand, but I cannot dress it in white.
I can devour the word of the Lord like wild honey, but I cannot lace his sandal.
I can condemn sin, but I cannot bear it away.
Behold the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world.
– John Shea.

John the Baptist was aware of both his strength and his impotency. He can point out what’s wrong and what should be done, but after that, he’s helpless, with nothing to offer regarding the strength needed to correct the wrong. Fr. Rolheiser writes that at one point in the gospels, Jesus tells his disciples that it is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich person to enter the kingdom of heaven. The disciples are stunned, and Peter responds: If that is the case, then it is impossible! Jesus appreciates that response and adds: It is impossible for humans, but not for God. The gospels speak of this as a baptism, and they speak of two kinds of baptisms: the baptism of John and the baptism of Jesus, adding that John’s baptism is only a preparation for Jesus’ baptism. What’s John’s baptism? It’s a baptism of repentance, a realization of what we are doing wrong, and a clear resolution to correct our bad behavior. What’s Jesus’ baptism? It’s an entry into grace and community in such a way that it empowers us internally to do what is impossible for us to do by our willpower alone. But how does this work? Is grace a kind of magic? No. It’s not magic. All psychic, emotional, and spiritual energy is, by definition, beyond a simple phenomenological understanding. Simply put, that means that we can’t lay out its inner plumbing. There’s a mystery to all energy. But we can empirically lay out its effect: spiritual energy works. Grace works. This has been proven in the experience of thousands of people (many of them atheists) who have been able to find energy inside them that clearly does not come from them and yet empowers them beyond their willpower alone. Sadly, many of us who are solid believers still haven’t grasped the lesson. We’re still trying to live out our lives by John’s baptism alone, that is, by our own willpower. That makes us superb critics but leaves us mostly powerless to actually change our own lives. What we are looking for and desperately need is a deeper immersion into the baptism of Jesus, that is, into community and grace.

Today’s Gospel passage identifies the appearance of John the Baptist with the expected return of the prophet Elijah. John, the herald of Christ, appears in the desert. Here, he stands for all of us in the desert of sin, the lifeless place. It is as though John purposely went there to remind us of our need for grace. Fr. Rolheiser asks us to pray for the grace to know Jesus more deeply so that we may abundantly love and follow him. No one born of woman is greater than John the Baptist, and yet the least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he. This doesn’t quite seem congruous. Why so great in one regard and seemingly so unimportant in another? John himself answers that question when they ask him if he is the Messiah. He replies unequivocally that he is not the Messiah and isn’t even worthy to fasten the Messiah’s sandal strap. How does he see the difference between himself and the Messiah? The Messiah comes baptizing with fire, whereas John comes baptizing with water. What’s the difference? Water can only cleanse something that is encrusted in dirt. You can power-wash an old lamp that you find in the sand, but water will only make it clean; it can’t really change the lamp. Fire can melt down. Fire can change a shape. Fire can transform something into something else. Water is a symbol of repentance; fire is a symbol of grace. John the Baptist can tell us what’s wrong with us; he can name our sins. But naming alone, valuable as it is, does not give us the grace, the strength to change our behavior, to free ourselves of our addictions. We need fire, grace, and Jesus, not just water, repentance, and John. John deconstructs us; Jesus puts us back together. John is a prophet; Jesus is a Savior.