A Belated Christmas Homily

Although a week has passed since Christmas, I would like to post this following homily because it bears a lot of meaning for me. It is my first Christmas homily ever. As a priest, celebrating Christmas was spectacular. Being submersed in the penitential season of Advent and then experiencing the grandness of the Christmas celebration was breathtaking to say the least. It was amazing to see the starkness of Advent give way to the joyous and exciting liturgical season of Christmas. The Gloria was sung, the whole Mass was sung! For a guy who couldn’t stand singing as a kid, I am actually enjoying it! The people at St. Peter and Paul Parish were fun to worship with and the servers did an incredible job! They were decked out in red cassocks and the Chuck Tayor’s along with lots of incense! We even incensed at the consecration! Gosh, it was fun! Thank you Jesus!

The homily centered around an article from Time Magazine entitled, “God vs. Science.” Dr. Francis Collins and a scientist by the name of Dawkins debated about whether or not science and religion are compatible. Dr. Collins came from the perspective of a believer and Dawkins argued from the standpoint of an atheist. The last few words of the article came from Dawkins. He stated, “But it does seem to me to be a worthy idea. (ie belief in God) Refutable—but nevertheless grand and big enough to be worthy of respect. I don’t see the Olympian gods or Jesus coming down and dying on the Cross as worthy of that grandeur. They strike me as parochial. If there is a God, it’s going to be a whole lot bigger and a whole lot more incomprehensible than anything that any theologian of any religion has ever proposed.”

You know something? Dawkins is absolutely right! The atheist is right in saying that it is incomprehensible. It is to hard to believe that we have a God that loves us so much that He is willing to come down from heaven in the form of a man and enter into our very human condition. It is parochial! A God who loves us so much that he is willing to be born in the outskirts of the Roman Empire in a tiny village called Bethlehem! This is unbelievable! What kind of God who is transcendent and full of infinite grandeur be willing to not only come down to this earth but then die for our sins, break the power of sin and death, and rise from the dead? A God who was willing to be born only to die? Come on! This is way to far fetched!

You know something, I haven’t always believed. It wasn’t until I was kneeling down in front of the Blessed Sacrament on a TEC Retreat the year after college that I finally believed in this incomprehensible and parochial God. As I knelt down in His Presence of the Holy Eucharist, I began to believe for the first time and it was then that I listened to the words of this Savior and spoke to Him as if He were in the very same room we were in. It was then, even after years of being Catholic that I really believed.

Do you believe this Christmas? Do you believe that God loves you so much that He was willing to do the incomprehensible? Do you believe that a transcendent God can also be imminent? Have you allowed God to enter the very space of your heart and come to the conclusion that this isn’t just a nice story, but the very Truth of the Universe?

Let this be the Christmas that we come to believe. Let this be the time that we come to the conviction that Jesus Christ, Mary, and Joseph in a manger isn’t just some quaint little story, but a believable incomprehensible love story of a God who is willing to transform our very humanity to that of divinity. Yes, Dawkins is right, but to believe in the incomprehensible love of God is the most difficult of all spiritual moves. God loves us. He loves us so much that He was willing to send the Son whom He loves so much to redeem us of our own self-hatred and relieve us of our broken humanity. Allow yourself to be loved by God this Christmas and let the God of the universe grant you the faith to believe in His one and only Son, Jesus Christ, the Anointed, the Savior, the King of Kings.

Fourth Sunday of Advent: Changing our Personal Greetings

Praise the Lord! “Press 1 for administrative options. Press 2 to change your password. Press 3 to change your personal greeting.” There I was trying to figure out how to change the personal greeting on the cell phone and it was taking forever! There may have been times we’ve all found ourselves in similar situations, trying to change our greetings on our phones. But how many times have we decided to change our own personal greetings in our very real lives?

We say season’s greetings! Greetings to you! Glad tidings and greetings! What does it mean to greet someone? How are to greet others? At what times in our lives do we offer greetings to others and in what fashion are they? How is God calling us to change our greetings this Advent?

Often a greeting goes much deeper than a, “Hi’ya!” or a, “Hello!” or a simple and terse, “What’s up?” To greet someone is to offer something on behalf of another. For instance, a courier may be bringing a message to a king from the Pope and he would say, “The Holy Father sends his greetings to you your Excellency.” …or something like that. Perhaps you’ve sent your kids to answer the door as the guests come to your home and they have been assigned to greet others as they come in on behalf of dad and mom. So greetings go much deeper than a simple, “hello.”

Mary’s greeting to Elizabeth is power-pact because she is introducing the world to the gift of her womb. She is a walking Tabernacle of the Lord ushering in the Good News not only to Elizabeth, but to us. In haste she has made her way to the hill country of Judah to share the gift she bears. At the sound of Mary’s greeting, the infant, John the Baptist, leaped in Elizabeth’s womb! Elizabeth knew that this wasn’t a courtesy call on the part of Mary to say, “Hey, what’s up?” Elizabeth recognized that Mary’s greeting contained within it the very presentation of the Christ child to the world. Filled with the Holy Spirit and joy, Elizabeth knew the greeting was from God Himself and she exclaimed, “Blessed are you among women and blessed is the fruit of your womb, Jesus!”

This apparently “simple” greeting was manifest with the very divine love of God. Mary’s greeting was not superficial, artificial, or terse, but a greeting laden with very divine life of God. Mary becomes the bearer of the Good News, the one who is ushering into the world in haste, the news of our salvation.

That is why Mary’s role in Catholic spirituality is so very meaningful. Mary is not the end all and be all of our faith, but the means to which our Savior, Jesus Christ is brought into the world. Mary does not sit at home feeling sorry for herself, but makes in haste through the hill country to brings us a greeting from God himself! What a beautiful model of evangelization. Mary is the Mother of God and sends to us the ultimate greeting into the world—JESUS CHRIST IS HERE AMONG US!

Is there a deeper meaning behind our personal greetings? Do our greetings to others bear the presence of Christ Jesus? Or are our greetings superfluous and superficial? Just this past week, someone greeted themselves and not being totally present to the fella because I was preoccupied with other trivialities, I never introduced myself. He asked inquisitively, “And your name is….?” I had failed to greet this person with the presence of Christ because of my preoccupation with what I had to do.

Have we become so distracted so as to fail to greet others with that deeper meaning of bringing Jesus Christ to the world? What is God asking us to do to change our personal greetings? Perhaps he is calling us to move from being superficially present to others. To making ourselves totally present thereby presenting the best Christmas present of them all—being present to others. God is calling us this last Sunday of Advent to convert and change our personal greetings. God is calling us to usher Christ into the world through transparency and authenticity. He is calling us to understand more fully the deepest meaning of the word, “greet.” Let us greet others as Mary greeted Elizabeth, with the presence of Christ. Like Elizabeth, let us respond to the greeting of God by acknowledging like she did, “Blessed are you who believed that what was spoken to you by the Lord would be fulfilled.” Change your personal greeting. Allow yourself to move from being a greeter of gloom to a greeter of God, moving in haste to bring the presence of Christ everywhere we go.