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Homily for the Twenty-Ninth Sunday in Ordinary Time
(Oct 22, 2006)
Image:
It was with some trepidation that I went to serve as Pastor at St. Mary
Defiance where I had been an Assistant. I had heard several stories of
priests who as Assistants seemed to be friendly and helpful enough, but
when they came back as Pastor, the people found them to be
much more domineering and authoritarian.
You’ll have to ask the people in Defiance how much I changed.
·
I) Authority: Most of our notions of authority are
rooted in the supposition that those who have authority, Lord it over
others. They take first place and if we get in their way, they will put
us in our place. And we suppose that those who don’t have authority
hunger for the day they will, so they can run things their own way.
·
The problem of James and John wanting to be at the
top, has continued to be a problem throughout
the history of the church. Some men have desired to become a bishop or
pope or pastor, as a way to climb up the career ladder. Those
have not been the best of our bishops or popes or pastors.
·
Jesus called James and John to become servant leaders,
who would be willing to lay down their lives for God and for the members
of the church. They were called to drink from Christ’s Cup
of Sacrifice and be baptized into
death with Jesus.
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II) While we tend to construe the human
journey in terms of
rising up toward success, Jesus aspired to climb down and be
emptied out. |
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A)
As James puts it we have great High Priest who
passed through the Heavens to come down to earth as one who would
sacrifice his own life for us. The very Son of God took on our
human to the point he is able to sympathize with our weakness and
even to be tempted in every way that we are. |
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B)
The mighty God above goes down, even below us, and
calls us to follow:
Anyone among you who aspires to success in my Kingdom must serve
the rest
The Son of Man did not come to be served but to serve. |
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C)
Is it appropriate in our church for someone to seek
a title like: Reverend, a Very Reverend, a Right
Reverend, a Most Reverend, Your Eminence, Your Excellency
or Your Holiness, while Jesus says “Whoever wishes to be first
among you must become the slave of all.” ? |
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I
prefer another of the pope’s titles: Servus Servorum Dei – Servant
of the servants of God. |
Story: A bishop who
impressed me was Ken Untner, former bishop of
Saginaw
. Impressed by his
brilliance in speaking writing – He would memorize and powerfully
proclaim the gospel without a book.
Yet those things tended to lift him up.
I was more impressed by the fact that he did not have a large
Bishop’s Mansion. I don’t know if he even had his own house, because
he spent most of his time travelling around the diocese and staying with
the priests in their rectories.
Story: You may have
heard of St. Peter Claver. He took Jesus’ call seriously – he spent
his 33 years of his life helping in
Colombia
, helping the newly arrived slaves from
Africa
. He said that he was “the slave of the Negroes forever.”
The slave trade inflicted atrocious sufferings on its innocent
African victims. Father
Claver was at their beck and call from the minutes a slave ship docked
at
Cartagena
. His mission was to relieve them of their physical sufferings and to
redeem them in Jesus name. He
baptized countless souls. He
went on to the ships to carry out dead bodies and to help the sick and
injured. He went into rooms that smelled so bad he almost could not
stand the odor coming from the sick and dying. He spent a lot of time at
the hospital and he visited those imprisoned from the Inquisition, no
matter what their religion might be. Always he remained the slave of the
Negroes forever.
Concl: Most of us know that we will never have the heroic virtue
and courage of a Peter Claver, but we pray that we will be able to drink
the cup which Jesus hands to each of us. May I become more of a servant
and less seeking to be a success in the eyes of the world. May I become
a little bit more like Jesus who poured out his life for us.
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