Homily
Thursday of the 5th Week of Ordinary Time I
St. Lawrence Chapel at the University of Kansas
10 February 2011
St. Scholastica, pray for us!
You get a sense from today's Gospel that Jesus needed a break, or a nap, or time to pray, but he couldn't escape notice. When approached by the Greek woman, he says what hits our ears as the rudest thing we have ever heard our Lord say. He tells the woman that she is cutting the line, that Greeks should be behind Jewish people in receiving His teaching and healing. The Greek woman's faith is more than up to this unique challenge by our Lord, and by her faith her daughter is healed of the demon.
Those called to the priesthood and religious life cut the line as well, skipping over a step that is natural and good for man, the call to marriage, so that they might participate as fully as they can already now in the eternal marriage of Christ to His Church. Taking nothing away from marriage, which remains as we see clearly in the reading for Genesis God's usual way of calling men and women to a good and holy life, those called to the priesthood in the western Church, and to religious life universally don't really skip over marriage, but sacrifice this natural good to attend to a supernatural call to spiritual marriage to the Church or to Christ Himself, respectively.
Just as a man and wife complement each other perfectly in a marriage, so in the Church, laity and religious complement each other perfectly. Families are the domestic Church, where vocations can be born and first heard and answered, and religious serve families by making present the eternal marriage of Christ to His Church in a way that enables sacramental marriage to remain a real possibility. The family provides the first setting where a person knows himself to be loved. Religious in turn give a witness to families that our deepest desire to be loved can only finally be answered in God alone.
It is marriage to God, perfectly celebrated and achieved in the wedding banquet of the Eucharist, that enables every vocation to be heard and answered in the Church. Today we celebrate St. Scholastica, the twin sister of St. Benedict, and champion her virginity for the sake of the kingdom of heaven. As the well-known legend about her testifies, even though her twin brother was famous for setting up a rule that allowed religious to pray and work in harmony, a rule that has always served the Church and civilization so well, still the greater of the twins could easily have been Scholastica, whose love for God even exceeded her brother's. Just as Mary's virtue exceeded that of all the other apostles, so also we celebrate the gift of women religious in the Church, who like St. Scholastica, show the true heart of the Church, and who show us how to allow God to love us into our true vocation to holiness, which is always a gift received from the Holy Spirit. If there is a vocation in the Church that we need the most, it is surely vocations to the religious life for women. Let us pray more for vocations to the religious life, especially for women, confident that their consecration will renew the Church in the most beautiful way possible.
Let us pray for the Church, especially for our Benedictine brothers and sisters, that as they celebrate today they will find strength to continue to serve the Church with fervent joy, we pray . . .
Let us pray for the world, that the monastic example set by the Benedictines will inspire people to allow their work to be inspired by prayer, we pray . . .
Let us pray that the Benedictines would be true to their charism to pray regularly for us and for the needs of the world, and celebrate the divine liturgy with great skill and devotion, we pray . .
Let us pray for the mission of the St. Lawrence Catholic Campus Center to open the minds of all students at KU to the source of true and lasting Wisdom, we pray . . .
Let us pray in thanksgiving for the impending installation of KU alum Bishop Paul Coakley as the new archbishop of Oklahoma City tomorrow, we pray . . .
Let us pray for a greater openness to vocations to the priesthood and religious life, we pray to the Lord . . .
Let us pray for all those in need, and all those for whom we have promised to pray, especially the lonely, the sick and the doubtful, we pray to the Lord . . .
Heavenly Father, through the intercession of St. Scholastica, may we receive those things we need to serve you more joyfully in purity of heart. We ask this through Christ our Lord. Amen.
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