Should the Father bet it all on me?

Homily

4th Sunday of Lent C2

Laetare Sunday

27 March 2022

St. Lawrence Catholic Campus Center at the University of Kansas

AMDG

Should the Father bet it all on me?

First a quick confession; yes, another one!  I bet on sports.  It's not legal in Kansas, not yet, but when I travel I place bets on games.  I'm not proud of it.  I know it's a tax on stupid people.  I know it's a waste of money, attention and affection.  It's an idol and a sin I confess.  Yet I still do it.

I'll be making at least one more confession in these last three weeks of Lent.  I invite you to the same.  We're halfway to Holy Week!  The Church bids us to rejoice today; yes, even in Lent.  Let's end our fasting, prayer and almsgiving well, mind you, yet knowing it's never ultimately about the fasting!  I fast in order to feast.  I do penance so as to not miss out on the glory of Easter!  I fast not as an end to itself, nor to my own benefit, but so that I can experience how little rejoicing I have done.  If you don't believe me tell me why the Church has us listen to a party Gospel in the throes of Lent.  

Like the younger son, I hunger to get up and go experience the affection the Father has for me in confession.  Please make plans to go as well!

So that's that, but it's not the homily. The homily is about this foolish Father.  Should the Father bet it all on me?  Of course not!  This dumb dad commits parent mistake number one!  He spoils his younger son.  He gives him whatever he wants.  He even lets his son insult him before trusting the boy with everything.

What is much worse, the dad doesn't learn from his first mistake.  Instead he makes a mess of himself at the sight of his son.  He won't let the son offer a real apology or pay him back, nor suffer indignity even for a second.  The dad suffers the indignity then repeats his first mistake, wasting the best he has on this unworthy son.

Why is this dad so dumb?  Why isn't this called the parable of the stupid dad?  The older son is quite bothered.  So am I if you can't tell.  So are you.  This Father is ridiculous.  There is no reason, no calculation, no fairness in his action.  The Father is dumb because he bets it all on one thing, that his son might experience and trust how much he is loved.  For that reason alone, He bets it all.

The parable highlights a real problem.  I am loved like this too.  So are you.  The problem is that I can't talk the Father out of it, no matter how hard I tell him not to bet it all on me.  He's gonna do it anyway.  It's who He is.  It's all He knows.  It's His way.  It's all He will ever care about.  If there is any chance in heaven I might trust His love for me, He bets it all.

I hope this question bothers you as much as it does ime.

Should the Father bet it all on me?

Do I need another chance?

Homily

3rd Sunday of Lent C2

20 March 20222

St. Lawrence Catholic Campus Center at the University of Kansas

AMDG

Do I need another chance?

You better believe I do!  By God's great mercy, I get another day!  So do you.  I have a friend who knows I'm not as careful as I should be, so she always reminds me not to die too early.  So far this advice and prayer, and the work of my guardian angel have kept me alive.  I'm grateful, for I really do need another chance.

It's agonizing when the clock runs out on the Jayhawks during March Madness.  It's crushing. Maybe it won't this year, but it usually does.  The scriptures remind us that the clock always runs out, quite unfairly actually.  Deadlines are warnings, we are told. They are also godsends, for my life wouldn't have shape or urgency without them.  I don't know how fast my clock is ticking.  My grandpa Jake is 104 and couldn't die if he tried.  I turned 48 this week.  My mom was 49 when she died.  The scriptures today only remind me of what I already know. The clock is ticking.

I hope I have enough time left to become a better Father.  To date I've been focused on other things.  Bad things, like my sins and addictions, to be sure, but also good things like being a priest.  I've wanted to be conformed to Jesus and His saving graces and mysteries.  Yet there is more I'm being gifted with.  Even though I act in persona Christi capitis, nobody calls me Jesus.  You call me Fr. Mitchel, for I have been entrusted with a patrimony.  I feel like I've whiffed to date. I need another chance.

What's it for you?

The good news is not only that the clock is ticking, but also that your story matters.  God has chosen the future of the world to run through your story.  Not your story only, but your story as much as anyone's.  That's scary for sure, and speaking for myself, very poor planning on God's part.  Yet He is who He is.  He said as much to Moses.  I am who I am.  I am God, and this is how I do it.  I delight in the future of salvation running through your story.  I draw close to choose you.

This is the great theo-drama of played out in Moses' story.  Moses is called out of his ego-drama, his private investigation of the burning bush, and told to back up and back down so He can really notice what God is revealing.  If Moses allows his small, fragile human nature to be called and elevated by the Holy Spirit, he will be fully alive, on fire but not destroyed.

That's your destiny too, especially if you're a jayhawk.  You do know what will be on your KU diploma if you earn one, right?  It's not Allen Field House nor the Campanile.  It's the burning bush, encircled with the Latin phrase Videbo visionem hanc magnam quare non comburatur rubus.  I will see the vision of this bush that doesn't burn.  Now, KU is a secular university without theology, the science of understanding God's revelation, so Mt. Oread has no definitive interpretation of what happens on Mt. Horeb.  Yet you do have an interpretation. This vision is your destiny.

The future of the world will indeed run through your theo-drama, the mystery of your call to become fully on fire with the Holy Spirit yet without getting burned.

Do you need another chance to embrace this destiny?

I'm a Jayhawk too, and I sure do.

am I afraid of losing?

Homily

Thursday of the 2nd Week of Lent

St. Patrick's Day

AMDG

Am I afraid of losing?

If so, I've already lost.  The fear of losing may be my greatest enemy, which makes the battle to be generous one of eternal consequence.  There is no getting around this.  Today's parable of the rich man and Lazarus is crystal clear.

The only things I have are those I have given away.  There will never be any getting around this.  My greatest generosity, my greatest change, and my greatest risk of faith, always lie ahead of me.  There is great hope in this!  The rich man had a chance to change everyday!  Behold I make all things new, says the Lord!

Jesus reminds me often.  Stick around, please!  Don't go home early.  The best is yet to come, I promise!  He knows this takes faith, so He prays daily for my courage.  He never gives up on me, begging me always to not be afraid!

The parable lays out the consequences to clinging to what I have. Nothing, and I mean nothing, can talk me out of it once I let the fear of losing take over.

Am I afraid of losing?

how do I win?

Homily

Wednesday of the 2nd Week of Lent

16 March 2022

AMDG

How do I win?

I love to win.  So do you.  I bet your bracket is filled out.

Much more importantly, I am praying for the victory of good over evil in Ukraine.  I want Ukraine to emerge victorious against its unjust aggressor.

These two things, brackets and war, are not equivocal, of course.  It's just what has everyone's attention.

I want KU to win this year.  I always do.  I love how much story and passion is revealed through the glory of high-level competition.  It's ok to care about it.

Yet Jesus reminds us that to be first is to be last.  That doesn't mean I have to forfeit everything.  It does mean that I can't put anything before my vocation to empty myself for what I love, desire and believe in.

My vocation is where I follow Jesus' call to have it all by giving it all.

In the light of the Gospel, how do I win?

am I suspicious?

Homily

Monday of the 2nd Week of Lent C2

14 March 2022

AMDG

Am I suspicious?

Jesus has every reason to be suspicious of me. I have a track record.  Yet He is the most forgetful person ever.  His mercy makes all things new.  He is more ready to forgive me today than He was yesterday.  He forgets how I could harm him tomorrow so He can be generous to me now.  

Experiencing this from Him, how could I possibly go into today with suspicion?

am I desperate?

Homily

Thursday of the 1st Week of Lent

10 March 2022

St. Lawrence Catholic Center at the University of Kansas

AMDG

Am I desperate?

The right answer is yes.  Yet I hate this right answer as much as any.  I admit it with the greatest resignation. Everything in me wants to be hard, not soft.  I rail against needing anything.  I hate asking for help.  I am driven to be the first human not to need anything at all.

You might say my one prayer is not to be desperate!

Jesus addresses my fear of being in need.  He simply tells his disciples to ask.  Ask early and often.  Ask boldly.  Ask for the impossible. Ask for whatever you want.

The paradox laid bare by Him is that desire disguises itself as desperation.  To live the lie of self-sufficiency I have to kill a lot of desire.  That's why I can only be secure through desperation, for it is only in desperation that I know what I want.

Am I desperate?

am I hungry?

Homily

1st Sunday of Lent C2

6 March 2022

St. Lawrence Catholic Campus Center at the University of Kansas

AMDG

Am I hungry?

Uh, no.  I'm more fat than hungry.  The hungriest I have ever been was when as a wrestler I fasted 4 days at a time to make weight.  I thought I was gonna die as a teenager I was so hungry.  But with all due respect to people who are food insecure, the vast majority of us here are just the opposite.  We have too much bad food.  None of us gets hungry like Jesus did.

Maybe you're signed up for a Lenten program promising you the best Lent ever.  If that is advertised, run away!  You are not going to have the best Lent ever.  Jesus did, and his record is unbreakable.  We're just limping in the Master's shadow.  However, His desert experience is the pattern of our Lenten observance.  

First of all, He enters Lent not on a self-improvement ego trip, but instead is driven by the Holy Spirit to face what He needs to on our behalf.  So too my Lent.  My Lent must be Spirit not ego driven.  The Spirit will drive me to the things I need to face.  I need to ask Him about that.  

I love the prayers at Mass asking for deliverance from evil and safety from distress.  I am a wimp, so I need those prayers or I am doomed.  Still, I need no less to do battle with the things I have been avoiding.

Am I hungry?  Again, not like Jesus.  He is hungry for God alone and above all.  The things He is tempted with - pleasure, power and honor - made quick work of Adam and Eve who saw the fruit as juicy, something more and a way to rival God instead of loving Him - but Jesus makes quick work of these temptations.  

Notice the three temptations progress in three locations, starting low with the temptation to lust, then proceeding higher through greed then ending with the queen of vices, pride!  Notice that Satan is an expert theologian, quoting Scripture in the last temptation, and that He reigns in everything that is less than the highest good, love of God alone.

Jesus makes quick work of the temptations, yet at the end of 40 days.  We get the temptation Gospel at the beginning, so we can use throughout all 40 days the weapon of fasting to combat lust, the weapon of almsgiving to defeat greed, and the weapon of prayers to conquer pride.

So let's be about it!  I'm not hungry enough.  I'm certainly chock full of lust, greed and pride, consumed with the pursuit of pleasure, control and honor.  Yet these fall so short of my desire to love God alone by being a better father, one that wastes time enjoying his children, seeing them as a gift rather than a burden.

So let's be about.  I have plenty of things to face this Lent, and I bet I'm not the only one.  Let's start by asking a pivotal question.

Am I hungry?

Do I like surprises?

Homily

Saturday after Ash Wednesday

5 March 2022

St. Lawrence Catholic Campus Center at the University of Kansas

AMDG

Do I like surprises?

I think a real Christian has to.  Jesus intentionally causes maximum scandal in today's Gospel, first by calling the worst of scoundrels, Matthew, then making it worse by drinking with him.  Jesus is full of tricks, always surprising.  New wine must go in new wineskins!  Behold I make all things new!

Jesus destroys and surpasses what anyone thought the Messiah could be.  It was a problem then.  It's my problem now.

I'd rather control how Jesus gets to call me.  No surprises, please.  I'd rather calculate quite precisely, and I have, how I can change and how I won't.  I don't have a problem telling Jesus what's on the table, and what's non-negotiable.

It might be Jesus' favorite prayer, when I tell Him He can't surprise me.  He loves the dare.

Today's pivotal question is a critical one for faith.  Do I like surprises?

Why fast?

Homily

Friday after Ash Wednesday

4 March 2022

St. Lawrence Catholic Campus Center at the University of Kansas

AMDG

Why fast?

Actually, Jesus was asked the opposite.  Jesus was asked why He partied!  It's not that Jesus didn't fast.  We know that privately He fasted more than anyone, in the desert for 40 days.  Yet in public He was accused of being a glutton and a drunkard, and for breaking the Sabbath.  Guilty as charged I would say.  After all, this is the guy whose first miracle was making 180 gallons of 100 pt wine.

Jesus partied in public, fasted in private.  He instructed his disciples to pray and give alms in private as well.  That's because fasting is never to be seen as an end unto itself.  Jesus is clear in today's Gospel.  Fasting is so much more than a strengthening of the will against temptation.  We fast in order to be ready for the ultimate party.   We fast so as to prefer nothing to the richest of feasts, the showering of God's mercy upon his bride.  

Why am I here?

Homily

Ash Wednesday

2 March 2022

St. Lawrence Catholic Campus Center at the University of Kansas

AMDG

Why am I here?

This sounds like an existential question.  I could dive deep with it I guess.  Yet I'm not going to.

I'm going practical today!  Ash Wednesday is not a day for abstraction.  It's literally a day to get dirty.  It's a day to get real, one of brutal honesty.  

So when asking why am I here, I'm asking about my story.  How is it possible that my story passing through this little chapel on the KU campus.  How are these my people?  Why do I allow a stranger to throw dirty on my forehead, and call me a fake, and remind me I'm gonna die?

That's what I mean by the question - why am I here?

Ash Wednesday is a trip.  It's the strangest of days.  It's the best marketing strategy the Church has ever come up with.  Nothing else works at KU except inviting people to be insulted and allow a stranger to rub dirt on them.  Yet I love every second of it.  So do you.

Why am I here?  Actually I'm gonna retract the question.  I don't really care why.  I could make a billion dollars if I could read the soul of each one of you who comes to Ash Wednesday, but I don't want the money. 

What I care about is that I am here.  What I care about is that you are here.  That's all that matters, and it is enough.  Being for each other and sharing this moment, considering our faith stories together, that's all I care about.  What I love about today is that I don't have to have life figured out to belong.  Today I don't have to pretend to be better than I am.  Today all the price tags and labels I put on others don't matter.

Today we're just together.  My story matters.  These are my people.  I want to live differently, but I don't know if I can or will.  Yet I haven't quit.  Of all the places I could be, I am here.   

That is enough.