Homily
Good Friday 2018
St. Lawrence Catholic Center at the University of Kansas
30 March 2018
AMDG +JMJ +m
Daily Readings
March Madness. KU is in the Final Four. Simply incredible. What a fun time to be a Jayhawk! KU fans are out of their minds. Even the most devout Catholics are tempted to skip the Triduum to focus instead on the big story that is the Jayhawks run to the national championship. Admittedly, what comes next is my fault for being addicted to sports, and making no apology for it, but I've been asked countless times this week - Father, are you going to the Final Four? Give Easter to somebody else - we need you to beat Sr. Jean! I actually think a lot of my friends expect me to skip Good Friday and the Vigil to get to San Antonio in time to root on KU. Shame on me that they could even think that - that my love of KU basketball is greater than my love of the cross.
Even you might be thinking - there he goes again! We are here to honor the excruciating suffering and death of Jesus Christ on the cross, and to confess that our sins crucified him - and there goes Fr. Mitchel - all he can think about is the Final Four . . how pathetic. Even on Good Friday he preaches about basketball. But bear with me, I beg you.
When was KU last in the Final Four? I bet many of your don't care, and many others have forgotten, and among those who know, the glorious victories of 2012 have faded. 2012 was just like 2018 - hardly anyone could think straight, the excitement surrounding KU was so great . . but even now, those incredible accomplishments that inspired so many back then, are slowly but surely fading away into the trivia of history.
In 2012 KU eventually lost in the national championship game - but that same year, a victory was won that was much greater than any of the victories won by that impressive Final Four team. It is that victory, that is still mysteriously gaining strength 6 years later, that I want to focus on tonight. I watched every KU basketball game in 2012 - I'm sure of it - but this other victory, was one I almost missed.
Does anyone remember facebook? Yea, it was a social media craze back in 2012 . . before Snapchat. All the cool kids were using facebook . . before it became old. Well, I reposted a story on facebook back in 2012 that I thought would inspire people. The headline was about an incredible 4 star basketball recruit from St. James Academy in Lenexa that was on his way to an accomplishment that millions of players can only dream of . .a scholarship offer to KU. Yet the headline I posted was this . . Connor McCullough loses battle with cancer. That's right. Connor is dead. He never played for KU.
I posted the story on facebook with the comment - rip Connor - wanting people to read about this kid but having no idea that my repost would be so offensive. Many of Connor's friends and family hated the headline - Connor loses battle to cancer. One particularly 'offended' friend of Connor's made this poignant comment on my post - more like Connor OWNS his battle with cancer. Last time I checked, cancer didn't make it to heaven.
Shame on me again for not recognizing that cancer was the cross given to Connor by Jesus so that he could give his entire life - and give all of himself - even at age 17. Me, a priest, promised to conform his life more closely each day to the mystery of the Lord's cross, had to be taught by Connor's 18 year old friend, that the cross on which all of us are called to die and give all of ourselves, is never a place of defeat, but only a place of victory. It's never a shame for us to kiss the cross of Jesus, even as it appears on the outside to be the place of horrific torture, the triumph of evil and injustice, and the death of God. For the cross is paradoxically always just the opposite. Maybe you need to be taught too tonight, that the cross is never where our life ends, but is where our life truly begins. That's why we venerate the cross with the only liturgical kiss of the year.
This year at least, many more people locally will be focused on the epic battle on the court between KU and Villanova, a Catholic school, than on the battle between good and evil fought on the axis of the cross. People will pour heart and soul into every play, give into every superstition imaginable, and ask the team to lay it all on the court, for a victory that indeed can and should inspire many. Yet despite what we say, you can't actually give it all on the court, and nobody dies in pursuit of a national championship. After every game, there is still life to live, and more to give. So just like in 2012, the glory of 2018 will fade. Because the court is not a cross.
The glory of the cross, however, can only increase - it cannot fade.. For it is precisely at Calvary that the one who once created everything out of nothing by once sharing a piece of Himself, decided to make all things new and create everything out of nothing by giving all of Himself. It is at the cross that Jesus gave his power to create and rule into the hands of evil men. At the cross Jesus Himself becomes the new nothing from which everything will be created. From the nothing of sin comes the new beginning of goodness. From the nothing of defeat comes a victory that endures. From the nothing of pain and suffering is created a joy that cannot be touched. From the nothing of darkness springs a light that cannot fade. From the nothing of the death of God, resurrects a life that can only be eternal.
Woe to us then, is we love anything more than the nothing of Christ crucified, if we do not beg him to share his cross with us so that we can quit tinkering with giving pieces of ourselves. For the cross is the only place where we too can give all of ourselves, and out of love for God and His mercy give to Him the only things we have that He doesn't have - the only things He wants and needs - our sinfulness, our weakness, and our nothingness.
Woe to us if we miss this chance tonight - woe to us if we do not kiss the cross of Jesus with the most passionate kiss of the year, the most honest kiss of our lives. For only from the nothing of the cross can come something that is eventually everything. In 2012, Connor and his friends knew this truth of the cross that I too easily forget. The cross is never - I repeat NEVER - the place where our lives end. It is only, and always, and truly, where our life begins.
Good Friday 2018
St. Lawrence Catholic Center at the University of Kansas
30 March 2018
AMDG +JMJ +m
Daily Readings
March Madness. KU is in the Final Four. Simply incredible. What a fun time to be a Jayhawk! KU fans are out of their minds. Even the most devout Catholics are tempted to skip the Triduum to focus instead on the big story that is the Jayhawks run to the national championship. Admittedly, what comes next is my fault for being addicted to sports, and making no apology for it, but I've been asked countless times this week - Father, are you going to the Final Four? Give Easter to somebody else - we need you to beat Sr. Jean! I actually think a lot of my friends expect me to skip Good Friday and the Vigil to get to San Antonio in time to root on KU. Shame on me that they could even think that - that my love of KU basketball is greater than my love of the cross.
Even you might be thinking - there he goes again! We are here to honor the excruciating suffering and death of Jesus Christ on the cross, and to confess that our sins crucified him - and there goes Fr. Mitchel - all he can think about is the Final Four . . how pathetic. Even on Good Friday he preaches about basketball. But bear with me, I beg you.
When was KU last in the Final Four? I bet many of your don't care, and many others have forgotten, and among those who know, the glorious victories of 2012 have faded. 2012 was just like 2018 - hardly anyone could think straight, the excitement surrounding KU was so great . . but even now, those incredible accomplishments that inspired so many back then, are slowly but surely fading away into the trivia of history.
In 2012 KU eventually lost in the national championship game - but that same year, a victory was won that was much greater than any of the victories won by that impressive Final Four team. It is that victory, that is still mysteriously gaining strength 6 years later, that I want to focus on tonight. I watched every KU basketball game in 2012 - I'm sure of it - but this other victory, was one I almost missed.
Does anyone remember facebook? Yea, it was a social media craze back in 2012 . . before Snapchat. All the cool kids were using facebook . . before it became old. Well, I reposted a story on facebook back in 2012 that I thought would inspire people. The headline was about an incredible 4 star basketball recruit from St. James Academy in Lenexa that was on his way to an accomplishment that millions of players can only dream of . .a scholarship offer to KU. Yet the headline I posted was this . . Connor McCullough loses battle with cancer. That's right. Connor is dead. He never played for KU.
I posted the story on facebook with the comment - rip Connor - wanting people to read about this kid but having no idea that my repost would be so offensive. Many of Connor's friends and family hated the headline - Connor loses battle to cancer. One particularly 'offended' friend of Connor's made this poignant comment on my post - more like Connor OWNS his battle with cancer. Last time I checked, cancer didn't make it to heaven.
Shame on me again for not recognizing that cancer was the cross given to Connor by Jesus so that he could give his entire life - and give all of himself - even at age 17. Me, a priest, promised to conform his life more closely each day to the mystery of the Lord's cross, had to be taught by Connor's 18 year old friend, that the cross on which all of us are called to die and give all of ourselves, is never a place of defeat, but only a place of victory. It's never a shame for us to kiss the cross of Jesus, even as it appears on the outside to be the place of horrific torture, the triumph of evil and injustice, and the death of God. For the cross is paradoxically always just the opposite. Maybe you need to be taught too tonight, that the cross is never where our life ends, but is where our life truly begins. That's why we venerate the cross with the only liturgical kiss of the year.
This year at least, many more people locally will be focused on the epic battle on the court between KU and Villanova, a Catholic school, than on the battle between good and evil fought on the axis of the cross. People will pour heart and soul into every play, give into every superstition imaginable, and ask the team to lay it all on the court, for a victory that indeed can and should inspire many. Yet despite what we say, you can't actually give it all on the court, and nobody dies in pursuit of a national championship. After every game, there is still life to live, and more to give. So just like in 2012, the glory of 2018 will fade. Because the court is not a cross.
The glory of the cross, however, can only increase - it cannot fade.. For it is precisely at Calvary that the one who once created everything out of nothing by once sharing a piece of Himself, decided to make all things new and create everything out of nothing by giving all of Himself. It is at the cross that Jesus gave his power to create and rule into the hands of evil men. At the cross Jesus Himself becomes the new nothing from which everything will be created. From the nothing of sin comes the new beginning of goodness. From the nothing of defeat comes a victory that endures. From the nothing of pain and suffering is created a joy that cannot be touched. From the nothing of darkness springs a light that cannot fade. From the nothing of the death of God, resurrects a life that can only be eternal.
Woe to us then, is we love anything more than the nothing of Christ crucified, if we do not beg him to share his cross with us so that we can quit tinkering with giving pieces of ourselves. For the cross is the only place where we too can give all of ourselves, and out of love for God and His mercy give to Him the only things we have that He doesn't have - the only things He wants and needs - our sinfulness, our weakness, and our nothingness.
Woe to us if we miss this chance tonight - woe to us if we do not kiss the cross of Jesus with the most passionate kiss of the year, the most honest kiss of our lives. For only from the nothing of the cross can come something that is eventually everything. In 2012, Connor and his friends knew this truth of the cross that I too easily forget. The cross is never - I repeat NEVER - the place where our lives end. It is only, and always, and truly, where our life begins.
