Tuesday, May 20, 2014

Onward and upward

Ten days ago nine of our seminarians graduated from Marian University and received their bachelors' degrees and will now move on to major seminary. Another seminarian who has been in an intensive English language study at IUPUI will also move forward to major seminary. The day was a poignant moment for me because I began my seminary career with most of them. So it was time for me to move on as well.

We provided formation for 46 seminarians from 10 different Midwestern dioceses this past year. Of the 10 graduates, two have decided not to continue with major seminary. Another six underclass seminarians decided to discontinue their formation. So we will have 30 returning seminarians and we won't know how many new ones will appear on our doorstep on August 14, which is move-in day.

For myself and the rest of the seminary formation staff, the break is welcome. We move on - not away from the seminary - but on to a new class and new thinking. This time is akin to recharging the battery of one's computer decices. I spent all last week vegetating. I found myself really tired and I indulged in the luxury of sleeping in late. I have been piddling around updating family history, watching back episodes of Midsomer Murders and Rumpole of the Bailey, visiting friends, getting the summer organized, disposing of clutter in my apartment and reacquainting myself with my Jesuit community who see little of me and who don't seem worse off for it. I have been avoiding people as much as possible and trying to pray but without much success.

This week there are things to do. What I cannot come to terms with is the gratitude I have been receiving from a number of seminarians thanking me for all the help I have given them. I try to convince them that whatever has changed in their lives has been their cooperation with God but somehow they still think I am a part of that. I suppose I just have to accept the pleasure of witnessing their growth.

The seminary is quiet these days save for two underclassmen who are doing manual labor for a couple of weeks. Their devotion is extraordinary and their commitment is real. We await the results of the archdiocesan restructuring of the Indianapolis deaneries. Meanwhile life goes on and the Church survives. The rector had an operation on both his knees, not knee replacements, and that has allowed him also to vegetate for a while as well. The vice rector continues to provide doughnuts on Sunday morning either from Long's bakery or Krispy Kreme.

I am grateful for another joyous year despite its turbulence and perhaps its being the hardest of the four I've spent here. It has been emotionally charged. In some way I feel like a parent watching his children struggle and move on. The faces keep changing but their lives just roll on. Life never stops surprising us. In the long run the totally self-assured freshmen seminarians are no longer so self-assured for they have come smack up against the ambiguities of growing up. It is an amazing process to witness and I cannot be thankful enough to be a part of that.


Monday, May 19, 2014

Fifth Sunday of Easter

What do we make of Scripture this Fifth Sunday of Easter? The first letter of St. Peter (2: 5) invites us to “let yourselves be built into a spiritual house to be a holy priesthood to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.”? What is Scripture asking of us when we are invited to become a spiritual house?

The reading from the Acts of the Apostles (6: 1) describes the growth of the numbers of the first Christians. The growth is so incredible that the twelve Apostles come together to tackle a practical problem. Some of the needy members of their community were being neglected because they were being missed in the daily distribution of food. The work of the Apostles was to preach the word and yet they were unable sometimes to do so. They were also the practical hands of the early Church as well. This is not unlike the expectations we can put on the pastors of our own communities today. Sometimes we expect them to do everything for us, to unlock doors and sweep floors, to meet our every need, and our every demand. We complain when our pastor does not pay enough attention to us, as if we are totally helpless in caring for our own spiritual and human needs.

The first Christians are obviously concerned about the needs of those in their community who cannot provide for themselves. At the bottom of the food chain in this first century after Christ were widows and orphans. They had no rights in this society. They had the least ability in society to take care of themselves. They had only the good will of others to keep them alive.

The work of the Apostles was twofold - prayer and the ministry of the word. The solution was to choose a number of disciples to engage in the task of caring for the daily needs of the community. When Pope Francis calls us to be a missionary church, he is calling us - among other things - to also take responsibility for the human and spiritual needs of members of our communities. We cannot simply tend to our own needs. We must care about the needs of others.

We see here the image of the two parts of the Church therefore. One is to care for the daily needs of the community, particularly those in most need of help. The other is to continue preaching the message of God’s love and forgiveness. Preaching that word may sound an easy task to some but most people are quite reluctant to believe they are good in God’s eyes. Pastors spend innumerable hours encouraging their own parishioners.

To some extent these tasks - preaching the Gospel and taking care of the community’s needs - intermingle but it was a practical problem in the early believers that required a solution that had not yet been discovered.

Is it any wonder that the disciples in the Gospel (John 14: 1-12) worry when Jesus tells them he is leaving them? What will we do? How can we survive? Jesus tries to reassure them that he has everything worked out. But he is also trying to tell them that it is time for them to step up and take responsibility, to take ownership for their own faith life, their own spiritual life. He has prepared them to live without him. He has prepared them to continue doing the works he had already begun.

The holy temple in Jerusalem, the central religious symbol and place for first century Jews, is the symbol represented in all three readings on this Sunday. The temple was the place where Jews met God. Jesus is the new temple. Things sought previously in the temple were now sought in Jesus. Jesus is the place where we meet God. Christ is the new temple. And Christ has prepared his disciples to become the Church which in the absence of Jesus is now the fulfillment of the temple. Church becomes a priestly people. What Jesus has done for us is to invite us to do his work. Father Robert Barron describes this process when he says, “The integrity of our lives are a sign of hope and a place of refuge for all around us.” Which is why our faith is not just about my own spiritual benefit. It also has a missionary benefit. My life is a sign to others of the work of God in creation.


I grow in life of Christ in order to become a place of growth for others. Jesus is the cornerstone of this temple. Jesus is rejected by the Jewish people but he is approved by God. He is the foundation for this new temple. As the letter of St. Peter recognizes, we are a holy people, a holy priesthood. We are all chosen.

Saturday, May 3, 2014

Return to Jerusalem

The week after Easter Sunday rejoices as each day repeats the Resurrection in increasingly surprising ways. The Church begins its cycle of readings from the Acts of the Apostles with Peter at Pentecost proclaiming to the Jewish citizenry of Jerusalem that God raised Jesus from the dead and has begun an entirely new relationship with human beings. Fear begins to set in. The chief priests concoct stories to prevent blame or outrage from settling on themselves.

Many of the Jews are intimidated by Peter's preaching and wonder what to do. We hear the compassionate episode in which Mary Magdalen encounters Jesus thinking him to be the gardener. Peter and John heal a crippled man in the temple who leaps up, walks, jumps and praises God inside the temple. Astoundingly, two disciples encounter Jesus on the road to Emmaus. Peter has to convince many people that the crippled man's healing is not the result of the apostle's magic but is the work of Jesus who died and rose. Then Jesus appears to the disciples and begins setting a plan of action for them.

The disciples are arrested and interrogated by the chief priests. Jesus makes another appearance, this time to the disciples, as they go fishing and they are overwhelmed by his appearance. Finally, the chief priests are convinced to let well enough alone lest the people turn on them. A recapitulaion of Jesus' three appearances after the Resurrection ends the week.

What does it all mean? Those of us living in northern states can appreciate the appearance of spring after this long, harsh winter we've experienced. I can watch fresh pine cones growing on the tree outside my window. Everything seems alive and new. Students are bursting with energy and ready to finish the restraining semester's work.

The disciples on the road to Emmaus may express the change most of all. They are going away from Jerusalem. They are leaving the place at which something remarkable and different has occurred. They fear the challenge laid out before them. They are confused and disappointed for their expectations were not met. How do we make sense of these events?

Someone had to explain it to them. Someone had to show them how to see in a new way. They were thinking in old categories. Jesus himself shows up to answer them. But they don't know it is Jesus. They only know that things have changed and they are uncomfortable with the change even though they had pinned their hopes on Jesus for another kind of change. They are getting something more. When they listened to Jesus explaining the meaning of the events, their hearts burn. In fact, their hearts are on fire. When Jesus displays his hospitality to them and shares bread with them, their hearts burn. All becomes new and Jesus now occupies rheir hearts and disappears from their presence. Scripture says their eyes were opened, they recognized Jesus, and he vanishes from their sight. They return to Jerusalem and they announce to the disciples what has happened to them.

This week of readings is crucial to anyone preaching God's word. Unless we ourselves are filled with the excitement of these events, we cannot possibly understand or relate anything else that happens to Jesus in the Scripture. We cannot understand what happens to any other human being in their time spent on earth. We cannot be good pastors or preachers if we have not shared in the joy of the Resurrection. We cannot go forward into the heavenly future. We may be tempted to remain in our upper rooms and hold tight with the Jesus we've possessed since childhood. But Jesus is inviting us out of our childish prison and offering us the reward of an uncertain human future on his terms.