The Cedars of Lebanon: Friday of the Third Week of Lent (Hosea 14:2-10; Psalm 81:6c-8a, 8bc-9, 10-11ab, 14 and 17; Mark 12:28-34)

The Cedars of Lebanon are referenced dozens of times across Scripture.  But, we rarely ever discuss what makes the Cedars of Lebanon so special and how they relate to our spiritual life.

Throughout history, the Cedars of Lebanon have been a highly regarded tree that grows in the mountains of present day Lebanon.  Throughout this time, they have consistently symbolized strength, resilience, endurance, royalty, dignity, and even incorruptibility.

These trees were known for their high durability as well as resistance to damage from decay, insects, and water.  These characteristics made them highly sought after for the construction of mighty sea faring ships as well as majestic palaces.

Two important, foundational prototypes of the Catholic Church were constructed from the Cedars of Lebanon:  the Temple of Solomon and the fishing boat of Peter.

King Solomon obtained great amounts of the Cedars of Lebanon to be used for interior walls, beams, and ceilings of the Temple.  The Cedars of Lebanon symbolized strength, longevity, and majesty…ultimately helping the people be more mindful of the Divine presence and the permanence of the covenant.

The Catholic Church is one of the fulfilments of Solomon’s Temple in the New Covenant in so much as Jesus Christ is the new Solomon and the ultimate Temple (as he stated in the Gospel of John).  It is through the Catholic Church that the Divine presence is preserved on Earth.  

Archeological evidence around the Sea of Galilee suggests the fishing boat of Peter that we hear about in several Gospel passages was constructed out of the Cedars of Lebanon.  The strength of the Cedars of Lebanon enabled the boat to survive the crashing of 10 to 12 foot waves.  The boat provided safety in turbulent waters.

As we said in a previous homily, anytime we hear of a boat in the Scriptures, we should immediately think of what the Lord is trying to teach us about the Catholic Church.  The Catholic Church is the fulfillment of the Barque (or Boat) of Saint Peter.  She withstands the constant onslaught of violent waves of human secularism, relativism, and the like.  It is through the Catholic Church that we are provided safe passage to eternal life.

Regarding the symbols I mentioned earlier, the Cedars of Lebanon should provoke a sense of the fulfillment of these symbols in the Catholic Church.  

What was imperfectly strong in the Old Covenant, has been perfected through Christ in the New.  What was imperfectly resilient in the Old Covenant, has been perfected through Christ in the New.  What was imperfectly permanent in the Old Covenant, has been perfected by Christ in the New.

Like any other plant, the Cedars of Lebanon begin as weak seedlings.  They grow deep roots that penetrate the rocky terrain of the Lebanese mountains to establish a firm foundation and obtain the nutrition they need to grow.  

I read that for every 10 feet of height the tree obtains, there are 30 feet of roots beneath the ground.  Another way to look at that is that 25% of the tree is above ground, concerned about the things of the world around it.  Meanwhile, 75% of the tree below ground, concerned about being grounded in nutrition.

It reminds me of the Parable of the Sower in the Gospel of Matthew, “Some fell on rocky ground, where it had little soil. It sprang up at once because the soil was not deep, and when the sun rose it was scorched, and it withered for lack of roots.”

If we applied the Cedars of Lebanon to our spiritual life, less than 25% of our life would be focused on the things of the world around us, while more then 75% of our life would be focused on grounding ourselves more deeply in the Sacramental life of the Church, the Scriptures, following the commandments, and performing works of mercy.

Indeed, through us, the Lord shall strike root like the Lebanon cedar, and put forth his shoots.  We will hear Him and walk in His ways as he proclaims, “I am the Lord your God: hear my voice.”

Thanks be to God!

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To Suffer with Him: Thursday of the Third Week of Lent (Jeremiah 7:23-28; Psalm 95:1-2, 6-7, 8-9; Luke 11:14-23)

This month, Archbishop Lori says, “As fallible humans, our strength and resolve sometimes collapse into weakness. May we always seek the courage to follow Jesus faithfully, even when the going gets tough.”

We see a sense of this in our readings today.  The Lord commanded His people to listen to his voice.  But, they did not obey.  They turned their backs to the Lord, walking in the hardness of their hearts.  Faithfulness gone.

Let’s face it, our post Christian, human secularist society echoes the very situation the Prophet Jeremiah describes.  As a society we continue to stiffen our necks and each subsequent generation does worse than their fathers.

What are the consequences to a society that has turned its back to the Lord?  Are those consequences present in our society today?  Increased addictions, check.  Increased violence, check.  Increased breakdown of marriages, check.  Increased dysfunctional families, check.

If this description leaves you feeling a bit uneasy, good.  That means there is hope.

Hope means that we are going to need to suffer for Christ.  Hope means we need to step outside of our comfort zones in how we love others, in how we evangelize to others, and in how we lead others to Christ. 

Hope means we need to sacrifice for Christ.  Hope means we need to eliminate those things from our lives that are not compatible to a life with Christ and encourage others to do the same.  

Hope means we need to live with a spirit of martyrdom.  Hope means we need to consistently embody the ultimate witness to truth, charity, and faith in Christ.  And, carry that spirit out into the world around us.

Hope means we need to lean into the sacramental life of the Church even more.  Hope means we need to listen to the voice of the Lord through the Mass and the Sacraments as frequently as possible.  Hope means we need to take courageous corrective action when the Church teaches something that is different than we had previously thought.

This month Archbishop Lori says, “I challenge you to pray the Stations of the Cross each week — in your parish community, with your family or individually — with the intention of receiving the courage to suffer for Christ.”

In his challenge, he asks the following questions, “Are you a good disciple of Christ? How can being a faithful Catholic help prepare you to take up your cross and follow him? Are you willing to suffer for your faith if called upon?”

The reality is that we are all called upon to suffer for our faith.  We are all called to be missionary disciples to spread the Kingdom of the Sacred Heart into the world around us and to lead those we encounter to the Sacred Heart in the Eucharist.

To suffer with Him in this way is a heroic response to this month's challenge.

If today you hear his voice through the Eucharist, harden not your hearts.

Thanks be to God!

Idol of Relationship: Friday of the Second Week of Lent (Genesis 37:3-4, 12-13a, 17b-28a; Psalm 105:16-17, 18-19, 20-21; Matthew 21:33-43, 45-46)

Our first reading gives us several examples of codependency that can exist within the family.  The favoritism of Israel toward Joseph.  The anger and jealousy of the brothers.  The feelings of abandonment, rejection, and betrayal.  All symptomatic of a codependent family structure.

Codependency is a very relevant topic for our society today.  I have read statistics that strongly suggest nearly 90% of Americans suffer from some level of codependency.  

At its most basic level, codependency is the excessive emotional or psychological reliance on another person, place, or thing.  In this case, Israel developed an unhealthy attachment to Joseph.  Israel’s sense of self  (his very sense of identity) was based on his relationship to Joseph.  To put it in more Catholic terms, Israel made an idol of Joseph.

There isn’t enough context in the reading to know the exact nature of what the relationship was; however, we certainly see very clearly that the symptoms of a problem existed.

Codependent parents often fall into one of two categories: permissive or authoritative.  It is possible that Israel was permissive with Joseph, while at the same time,  authoritative with the other siblings.

Either way, codependency can have a profound impact on how siblings learn to interact, communicate, and relate to one another.  

Siblings in codependent family structures often exhibit routine efforts to gain attention and validation.  Siblings constantly exhibit jealousy, resentment, and insecurity (as we see in our reading today).

Growing up in a codependent family structure can lead to an adulthood marked with difficulties creating and maintaining healthy boundaries as well as difficulties creating and maintaining meaningful relationships with others and even with God.

Over time, intimacy and trust often erodes and are replaced with feelings of powerlessness and despair.  Stress, anxiety, depression, and other forms of emotional turmoil often become the norm.

Imagine how dysfunctional it really had to be in order for the brothers of Joseph to hit a bottom so low that it became desirable to either kill Joseph or sell him into slavery.

Of course, we know the end of the story for Joseph.  By the grace of God, he became a great leader for the Hebrew people.  He and his brothers were able to make amends.  Seemingly, at least, it was a happy ending for Joseph and his family.

If you find yourself, or someone you know, in a codependent situation, please know of my empathy and prayers.  There does come a point where we can “love” others too much.  A disordered love that is sourced from a point where we desperately need approval, acceptance, love, or friendship.  

From that point, it often spirals into a cycle of insanity consisting of growing guilt, shame, resentment, and depression.

Like any cycle of addiction, codependency can be broken by the promises of Christ.  Surrendering our lives and our wills, and particularly our relationships, to the care of Jesus Christ.  Learning and practicing authentic acceptance, detachment, and surrender are often the keys to conquering codependent patterns in our lives.

I’m sure we will go into more depth on these themes in future homilies.  However, here are three takeaways for today to start the journey of depending on God and embracing the freedom of Christ:

Spend time with God everyday.  Come to Mass, receive the Eucharist, spend time in Adoration, read the Bible, and make time for prayer in general.

Live for God as opposed to human validation.  Earnestly seek His will and resolve to live it out.  Come to understand what your charisms are and find ways to exercise and strengthen them.

Say “No” to unhealthy relationships.  Learn to identify the dysfunctional patterns that may exist in family structures, establish and maintain healthy boundaries, and allow God to be your guide and your strength.

Conquering codependency is most challenging, but sanity can be restored and healthy, loving relationships are possible as we remember the marvels the Lord has done.

Thanks be to God!

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Restitutio Pro Reatus Poenae: Friday of the First Week of Lent (Ezekiel 18:21-28; Psalm 130:1-2, 3-4, 5-7a, 7bc-8; Matthew 5:20-26)

Last year, during Lent, we introduced the concept of reatus poenae. If you recall, reatus poenae is the concept that the impacts and consequences of our sinfulness (often through how we have hurt ourselves or others) remain in effect even though our crimes have been forgiven and forgotten in the Sacrament of Reconciliation.

I’ll bring up again the baseball analogy that I have used a couple of times.  When my brothers and I would break a window playing baseball, we were generally forgiven right away.  However, in spite of the forgiveness, the window still had to be fixed.  Despite the forgiveness, restitution needed to be made for what we had done.

Today, I want to talk a bit more about the restitution we can offer for reatus poenae so that the broken windows in our lives can be truly fixed.

You may recall another homily from a few months ago regarding indulgences.  We said that indulgences are the remission of temporal punishment for any sins that have been forgiven through the Sacrament of Reconciliation.

The grace from the Cross is a remedy for what we owe for the temporal consequences of our sins….a remedy for the restitution we need to make for reatus poenae. When we receive that grace through prayer, fasting, and/or almsgiving, it is called an indulgence.  

When we receive a plenary indulgence, we are given a complete remission of what we owe for temporal consequences of our sin.  Restitution for our actions have been made.  Or to paraphrase what Jesus said to Saint Faustina, our debt to His justice is fully paid off.

We have a wonderful opportunity to receive plenary indulgences during Lent.  As many of you know, the deacons of the parish lead a Stations of the Cross prayer service each Friday evening during Lent at 7:00.  On Good Friday, the prayer service is at Noon.  

You may already be aware of this, but praying the Stations of the Cross (both during Lent and outside of Lent) is an opportunity to receive a plenary indulgence.

This year, the deacons will be more intentional to call out the plenary indulgence in the prayer service so that we may take advantage of this powerful grace from our Blessed Lord.

I invite all of you to come pray the Stations of the Cross with us this evening and each Friday during Lent with the intention of receiving this grace of remission for the reatus poenae in our lives.

Just a quick review of the requirements to receive a plenary indulgence:  

1. Complete the indulgenced act, which in this case is to participate in the Stations of the Cross prayers.
2. Receive the Sacrament of Reconciliation within a window of 20 days before or 20 days after receiving the indulgence.  If you confess your sins sometime around mid-Lent, your should be covered for the season.
3. Receive Holy Communion on the day you will pray the Stations of the Cross.  Since all of you are at Mass this morning and will assuming receive our Blessed Lord in the Eucharist, you should be in good disposition to receive the indulgence this evening.
4. Pray for the intentions of the Pope. This is something we do at every Mass we celebrate, but the deacons should call this out in the prayer service as well.
5. Practice detachment from all sin.   This may be the most difficult of all the requirements, but at the same time, it is ultimately the purpose of Lent.

If for some reason you do not meet all requirements and do not receive the plenary indulgence, you will still receive a partial indulgence.  Partial indulgences can greatly reduce reatus poenae.

I hope to see you at the Stations of the Cross as we participate in the offer of Jesus to Saint Faustina to “draw all the indulgences from the treasury of My Church”.   

Today we praise Jesus Christ for the treasury of His Hoy Catholic Church because, if you, O Lord, mark iniquities, who can stand?

Thanks be to God!

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Tempered through Fasting: Friday after Ash Wednesday (Isaiah 58:1-9a; Psalm 51:3-4, 5-6ab, 18-19; Matthew 9:14-15)

Last year, my homily for the Friday after Ash Wednesday set the table for the Christian discipline of Fasting.  We said:

The practice of fasting and abstinence teaches our senses to ignore the cultural programming of instant gratification by focusing instead on our need for God.

Further, the practice of fasting and abstinence gives us a spiritual defense against the seven capital sins; particularly gluttony.  In those times we are tempted to fall to a capital sin, the practice of fasting and/or abstinence can give us an alternative focus to avoid the temptation.

I thought it appropriate today to double click on the idea of tempering our temptation through fasting.

As we see in the example of Jesus in the desert, fasting can strengthen the will as one does not live on bread alone.  Through that strengthening of the will, we begin to see a dissipation of disordered passions.  By voluntarily denying ourselves of the carnal pleasures of the world, we train our mind and psyche to resist the perceived demands of instant gratification.

Let’s break that down a bit more:

Fasting tempers temptation by strengthening the will.  By training the mind to say no to the little things like that daily soda, that afternoon snack, or that hamburger on Fridays, we gain in the virtue of temperance.  It's like doing pushups of virtue in that we gain the strength necessary to say "no" to more significant temptations, like the capital sins.

Fasting tempers temptation by mortifying the passions.  In this aspect, we echo Saint Paul as we “put to death” our disordered passions.  Through the death of our disordered passions, our self-mastery over our senses is restored.  We can more consistently respond to things with love as opposed to reacting from the depths of our fear and other disordered passions.

Fasting tempers temptation by weakening the flesh.  If you recall, the Carnevale season was intended to be a season of preparation to say "farewell to the flesh".  Carnevale, after all, means "farewell to the flesh".  

Now is the time to put that preparation into action.  Our motto becomes that of Jesus in the desert in that we only rely on “every word that proceeds from the mouth of God” as opposed to the pleasures and temptations of the world around us.  

We hear the word of God through the Mass and the Sacraments, and we surrender our weakened bodies to the Paschal Mystery.  Through the Paschal Mystery, our weakened bodies are paradoxically strengthened.  Through the Eucharist, we participate in the victory of Christ in the desert.

Fasting tempers temptation by sharpening discernment.  We live in a world where we are constantly bombarded with idols.  These idols create unnecessary and excessive noise that serves to distract us from hearing the word of God and distracts us from seeing the tactics of the evil one.  

Fasting can help eliminate this noise in our life, which in turn, will enable us to hear the Holy Spirit more clearly.  With more focus on the Holy Spirit, we can better discern the will of God in our life.  And, with a strengthened will, we will have the fortitude to live it out.

We can see how fasting on a regular basis helps to temper our temptations and aids us in our spiritual lives.  As we have said in the past, the practice of fasting and abstinence is a gift Jesus has given to His disciples in order to foster a deeper relationship with God and to seek Him more earnestly with a humble and contrite heart.

A heart contrite and humbled through fasting, O God, you will not spurn.

Thanks be to God!

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The Cloak of the Prophet: Friday of the Fifth Week in Ordinary Time (1 Kings 11:29-32; 12:19; Psalm 81:10-11ab, 12-13, 14-15; Mark 7:31-37)

After my homily a couple of weeks ago comparing the relationship of David and Saul to the relationship of the Catholic Church and the Orthodox churches, someone asked me about the significance of David taking a piece of Saul’s mantle.  This tearing of the mantle represents the division in the Kingdom of God.

We see this theme again in our reading today.  The cloak of Ahijah, which represented the Kingdom of God, separated into the 12 tribes of Israel.  Jeroboam takes 10 of the tribes into rebellion against the house of David, the other 2 remaining faithful.

Again, there are a lot of parallels in our first reading to Church history.  This time the parallels are between Jeroboam and Martin Luther.

Both men recognized the abuses that were occurring and wanted to do something about it.  Some of these abuses were well intentioned such as financing the building of Solomon’s temple in the Old Testament and financing the building of Saint Peter’s Basilica in Church history.  Still, abuses existed, none-the-less.

Before they became rebels, both Jeroboam and Martin Luther were highly regarded.  King Solomon made Jeroboam responsible for the workers within the Tribe of Joseph.  Martin Luther was named provincial vicar within the Augustinian order.

Neither men initially intended to rebel, and the story of both men is far more complicated than I can do justice today…perhaps I’ll get into that in future homilies.  Ultimately, both men were pleading for fairness, but when the pleas were denied, both men crossed the line denouncing authority entirely.  Pride vs humily…how many times does that contrast come up in salvation history?

However, there are some important points we can be call out.  Both men were threatened with their lives.  King Solomon threatened to execute Jeroboam upon learning about the potential rebellion.  Similarly, Holy Roman Emperor Charles V gave permission for anyone to kill Martin Luther in the Edict of Worms.

Despite the bounties placed on their heads, both rebellions started without military response.  Unfortunately, both rebellions would lead to wars later.

Recall the 10 fragments from Ahijah’s cloak.  The 10 northern tribes rejected the house of David and followed Jeroboam into a modified religion.  The 2 southern tribes stayed faithful and continued the authentic worship prescribed by God.  Similarly, for all intents and purposes, northern Europe followed Martin Luther into a modified religion.  Southern Europe stayed faithful and continued the authentic worship prescribed by God in the Eucharist.

As part of the modified religion, Jeroboam presented two golden calves as the true gods of Israel and led many to sin as they frequented the calves.  Meanwhile, Martin Luther introduced two new religious doctrines: Sola Scriptura and Sola Fide.  Through their religious inventions, both men separated their followers from the true faith.

Both men broke from the priestly line.  Jeroboam made "priests" in his new religion, but none of them were from the tribe of Levi as prescribed in the book of Deuteronomy.  Martin Luther did not have a way to validly ordinate priests through a duly consecrated bishop.  Therefore, apostolic succession was broken and there are no holy orders in Protestantism.

Jeroboam’s new religion rejected many of the Old Testament scriptures as authoritative and often changed the wording in their books in an attempt to legitimize their religion.  Martin Luther did similar.  In his new religion, he rejected seven books of the Old Testament (and threatened to reject several New Testament books).   Further, he added the word “alone” to his translation of Romans 3:28 in an attempt to legitimize Sola Fide.

Understanding this history gives us better perspective of the place the Catholic Church has in Salvation History and how the non-Catholic ecclesial communities around us fit into it.

Let us thank God today that we have remained faithful to His household, which is of course the Catholic Church (as Saint Paul says in his letter to Saint Timothy).  Let us pray that the mantle of our High King (the cloak of our High Prophet) will become whole again in that our separated brothers and sisters will come home.  Home, where through the Eucharist, we can hear the Lord say, “I am the Lord, your God: hear my voice.”

Thanks be to God!

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