Homily
4th Sunday of Easter - Good Shepherd Sunday AII
World Day of Prayer for Vocations
3 May 2020
St. Lawrence Catholic Campus Center at the University of Kansas
AMDG +JMJ +m
Who is the loudest voice in your life?
Let's see. How about a morning trip around my phone? I always start with gmail and calendar. Then my weather app. Then onto social media - twitter, instagram, facebook, youtube and tiktok - yes, sorry, tik tok. Then sports apps - ESPN, the Athletic, Jayhawks, Royals, Chiefs and Sporting. Then the news apps - Topeka Capitol-Journal, Lawrence Journal-World, Kansas City Star, CNN. It takes two hours and a pot of coffee to scroll through it all.
Even in my holy hour that comes next I use my phone for my daily prayers and devotions. Thankfully I put the phone down for adoration, the rosary and Mass.
Only to pick it up again for another lap around the social media apps at lunch.
I'm on gmail and calendar all day.
Finally before bed a final lap around the social media apps, then if time some entertainment - YouTube TV, Amazon Prime, Netflix (but no Tiger King), Kindle - and on a good night, the phone mercifully gives way to a hard copy of a book.
Who is the loudest voice in my life? That's the pivotal question on this Good Shepherd Sunday.
The largest voice in my life is surely my phone.
The loudest voice is FOMO. Why else would I give in to this dopamine drip of distraction that is my life, unless I was ultimately afraid of not knowing something.
That's a lot already about voices. What about this gate that Jesus speaks of? We know Jesus to be the most unique voice in history, and Himself the Good Shepherd who becomes like the sheep and lays down His life for them.
Yet in today's passage from John He calls Himself none of those things - not the voice, not the lamb - not the shepherd.
I am the gate. I am the gate. I am the gate. He says it three times!
Jesus presents Himself today as a mechanism for discernment. The gate is the instrument that reject the noise of fake news that robs and destroys, and admits voices that cut to the heart and give life in abundance.
I am the gate. Time with Jesus in prayer is thus a gate that can filter what voices I admit or reject. What if I applied this filter of prayer to my phone?
More specifically, the Eucharist which is Jesus Himself, is the gate of discernment for the moves of my life, when to enter in and when to leave.
As vocation director, I always told seminarians to only make big decisions on where to go next in the three minutes after they receive Jesus fully in the Eucharist. Why? Because He wants to be the gate through which we move safely into life in abundance!
At this gate of course I hear the voice of the Good Shepherd - this is my body broken for you, my blood poured out for you. But even moreso today, I am invited to fall in love with the standards enforced at this gate!
Of all the loud voices in my life, only the voice that knows me, desires life in abundance for me, cuts me to the heart, and will lay down its life for me is admitted. All other voices are filtered out at this gate that is Jesus Himself in the Eucharist.
So if the loudest voice in my life is FOMO, I'm invited precisely at this gate to trade the dopamine drip of distraction that is making me deaf and killing me, to listen only for a voice that tells me what I really don't know - the way that leads to abundant life.
It is at the Eucharist that I want to answer the question anew.
Who is the loudest voice in my life?
4th Sunday of Easter - Good Shepherd Sunday AII
World Day of Prayer for Vocations
3 May 2020
St. Lawrence Catholic Campus Center at the University of Kansas
AMDG +JMJ +m
Who is the loudest voice in your life?
Let's see. How about a morning trip around my phone? I always start with gmail and calendar. Then my weather app. Then onto social media - twitter, instagram, facebook, youtube and tiktok - yes, sorry, tik tok. Then sports apps - ESPN, the Athletic, Jayhawks, Royals, Chiefs and Sporting. Then the news apps - Topeka Capitol-Journal, Lawrence Journal-World, Kansas City Star, CNN. It takes two hours and a pot of coffee to scroll through it all.
Even in my holy hour that comes next I use my phone for my daily prayers and devotions. Thankfully I put the phone down for adoration, the rosary and Mass.
Only to pick it up again for another lap around the social media apps at lunch.
I'm on gmail and calendar all day.
Finally before bed a final lap around the social media apps, then if time some entertainment - YouTube TV, Amazon Prime, Netflix (but no Tiger King), Kindle - and on a good night, the phone mercifully gives way to a hard copy of a book.
Who is the loudest voice in my life? That's the pivotal question on this Good Shepherd Sunday.
The largest voice in my life is surely my phone.
The loudest voice is FOMO. Why else would I give in to this dopamine drip of distraction that is my life, unless I was ultimately afraid of not knowing something.
That's a lot already about voices. What about this gate that Jesus speaks of? We know Jesus to be the most unique voice in history, and Himself the Good Shepherd who becomes like the sheep and lays down His life for them.
Yet in today's passage from John He calls Himself none of those things - not the voice, not the lamb - not the shepherd.
I am the gate. I am the gate. I am the gate. He says it three times!
Jesus presents Himself today as a mechanism for discernment. The gate is the instrument that reject the noise of fake news that robs and destroys, and admits voices that cut to the heart and give life in abundance.
I am the gate. Time with Jesus in prayer is thus a gate that can filter what voices I admit or reject. What if I applied this filter of prayer to my phone?
More specifically, the Eucharist which is Jesus Himself, is the gate of discernment for the moves of my life, when to enter in and when to leave.
As vocation director, I always told seminarians to only make big decisions on where to go next in the three minutes after they receive Jesus fully in the Eucharist. Why? Because He wants to be the gate through which we move safely into life in abundance!
At this gate of course I hear the voice of the Good Shepherd - this is my body broken for you, my blood poured out for you. But even moreso today, I am invited to fall in love with the standards enforced at this gate!
Of all the loud voices in my life, only the voice that knows me, desires life in abundance for me, cuts me to the heart, and will lay down its life for me is admitted. All other voices are filtered out at this gate that is Jesus Himself in the Eucharist.
So if the loudest voice in my life is FOMO, I'm invited precisely at this gate to trade the dopamine drip of distraction that is making me deaf and killing me, to listen only for a voice that tells me what I really don't know - the way that leads to abundant life.
It is at the Eucharist that I want to answer the question anew.
Who is the loudest voice in my life?
1 comment:
Great blog, I enjoyed reading it
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