The Friar Factor

The Following is my homily from the 4th Sunday in Ordinary Time, 2007:

You may have heard in past homilies about “Little Johnny”, but we have not heard too much about his little brother Mikey. One day Johnny and Mikey were sitting at the breakfast table enjoying their favorite breakfast, French Toast, after gorging themselves they looked up at the plate in the center of the table with wide eyes, looked at each other, and immediately started to fight about who should get the last piece. Johnny and Mikey’s mother stopped their fight and said, “now boys, if Jesus was here, he would say to the other, you take the last piece.” Johnny and Mikey looked at each other, waiting, finally Mikey spoke up, and smiling lovingly at his brother he said “Johnny, you be Jesus.”
Our readings today at Mass are full of little helps, encouragements and admonitions about our life as Christians, our life as followers of Jesus.
The first reading in today’s Mass tells us, that God is our strength, he is our fortress in our times of distress. In the face of upset and in times that we seem to lose hope, the book of Jeremiah reminds us GOD IS THERE WITH US. He tells us this in no uncertain terms, when we are standing before a discouraging situations “Be not crushed on their account, as though I would leave you crushed before them”. And when we have to make the decision between sin and rightousness, and we know that we have to make these decisions CONSTANTLY God tells us again, “They will fight against you but not prevail over you, for I am with you to deliver you.” Where else can we find such encouragement? Where else can we find such love? We find it perfectly in God, but we have to be instruments of that love as well.
St. Paul writes to the Corinthians, one of the earliest communities that St. Paul we a Spiritual leader to and tells the citizens of Corinth the message of God, which is LOVE. This love is not just some unreachable ideal that we are being told about, but a goal that we MUST strive to reach, a love that eliminates from our world prejudice, hate, violence and countless other atrocities, which we hear about every day. This love that St. Paul tells the Corinthians about is our PERSONAL invitation to be Jesus to everyone around us. We have all heard this reading several times I am sure. “Love is patient, love is kind, It is not jealous, it is not pompous, it is not inflated, it is not rude, it does not seek its own interests,it is not quick-tempered, it does not brood over injury, it does not rejoice over wrongdoing but rejoices with the truth. It bears all things, believes all things,hopes all things, endures all things.” An important question to ask ourselves when we hear any passage from the Bible is: how does this relate to me? How can I put this into practice to make myself, my family, my community, my country and my world a better place? It is easy to put this passage into practice, every time you hear the word “love” put in the pronoun “I”, and we get this: “I am Patient, I am kind, I am not jealous, I am not pompous, I am not inflated, I am not rude, I do not seek, my own interests, I am not quick-tempered, I do not brood over injury, I do not rejoice over wrongdoing but rejoice with the truth, etc.” If we can honestly say that this sounds like us, then we are on the road to perfection, the road to the heavenly banquet. Most likely, we can not say that this is us 100%, which is normal, so what do we do about that? We work harder; we try every day to become more of who we say we are.
When we try to show love to other people no matter where we go, our world is bound to become a better place. BUT when it seems to just not be taking, when despite our best efforts, we just can not see a noticeable difference in society, we MUST NOT lose hope. Our society is not used to love and affection, we can see that just by turning on the TV, so we will meet opposition in our efforts, because we are being counter-cultural. Sound familiar? It should, Jesus was also counter-cultural, and he met opposition, in the gospel we hear about that opposition: “They rose up, drove him out of the town, and led him to the brow of the hill on which their town had been built, to hurl him down headlong. But Jesus passed through the midst of them and went away.” Jesus is love to everyone he met, yet they still put him up there, on the cross, but he did not see that as defeat, but saw it as the greatest opportunity to love. When all seems like it is falling apart around us, trust in God, he is our fortress and stronghold, when all seems to be hatred and war in the world, LOVE harder than you ever have, and when someone is reaching out to us looking for a smile and a helping hand, let us respond to little Mikey’s message: “YOU BE JESUS.”