what do you have to lose?

Homily

13th Week in Ordinary Time

St. Lawrence Catholic Campus Center at the University of Kansas

28 June 2020

AMDG +JMJ +m

What do I have to lose?

One of my pet peeves is when my teams play scared, when they're afraid of losing.  Nothing turns me off faster.  Especially when they have a lead and choke because they stop playing.  I'd much rather lose playing to win than to win by playing not to lose.

What do I have to lose?  That's our pivotal question for today.

For real disciples of Jesus, the answer is simple.  I have nothing to lose.  Nothing.  Nothing.  Nothing that I am not already willing to give because I love God and live only for Jesus.

St. Paul reminds me that as I disciple I'm dead.  Dead to sin.  Dead to myself.  And so alive for God in  Christ Jesus.  And this is for every disciple.  Everyone who is baptized.  Christianity does not admit of exceptions.

Which is why Jesus speaks without exception in the Gospel.  The absolute speaks absolutely.  The only way to save lives is first to lose mine.  The paradox is at the heart of what it means to be baptized, to be a disciple, to be Christian, and to be alive.

We all know the situation we face.  We are all supposed to be saving lives without asking what it means to live.  We are to preserve existence through distance, or by canceling or erasing persons and the past.  

This isn't the way.  Jesus is the way, the truth and the life.  If I want to save lives I first have to offer mine!  Nothing else will work.  Nothing.  Only absolute generosity, courage and detachment will work, and they are the non-negotiables of discipleship.

I'll tell you what it looks like.  Vic Johnson is on oxygen and he is here in the front pew during the coronavirus, because he knows what it means to live.  Life is Christ.  Vic knows he has nothing - no capacity to love his family - if he does first receive the source of all that he is - the source of all life and relationship - Jesus Himself.  Life is Jesus.  Life is the Eucharist.  Vic on oxygen is the last person who should be at Mass right now.  But he knows that whoever seeks to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses it for Christ's sake will find it.

I have never argued against being safe or careful in the times that we are in.  And I won't now.  But let's all admit please that these can only go so far.  Being safe and careful are great for preserving life; but only courage and generosity beget life!  That's the meaning of today's Scriptures.

There is nothing God could ask of Vic that he hasn't already given.  He has nothing to lose.  He is living only the life that lies on the other side of the cross, the eternal life of the Resurrection.  Why does he do it?  Why does he life like he has nothing to lose?  

Vic loves God.  That's it.

If I truly want to save lives, especially the life of my family, I have to start by offering mine.

Jesus tells his disciples it is the only way.  

If he's right, what do I have to lose?

what does it mean to live?

Homily

11th Sunday of Ordinary Time

Solemnity of Corpus Christi

St. Lawrence Catholic Campus Center at the University of Kansas

14 June 2020

AMDG +JMJ +m

What does it mean to live?

That's the easiest pivotal question of all time!

Jesus the author of life gives us the answer.

To live is to eat my flesh and drink my blood.

No ifs, ands or buts.  That's it.

There's been a lot of talk in 2020 about saving lives that matter.

There's been too little talk about what it means to truly live.

Jesus gives us the answer.

To truly live is to eat my flesh and drink my blood.

Anything less than this is simply existence that fades into death.

The recent Pew Study says that 70% of Catholics don't believe Jesus.

I think that number is too low!

I would say almost 100% of Catholics don't believe in the Real Presence.

I think the number has always been close to 100%

Now don't freak out.

That's not my survey answer.

My survey answer is that I truly believe.

But it's my heart answer.  My gut answer.

What percentage of Catholics are truly saints?

That's your number - of how many truly believe.

St. John Vianney who adored Jesus in the Eucharist constantly, had it right.

If the Eucharist is really what Jesus says.

If it is all of God - all reality, all mystery, all story, all grace, all of life -

than anyone who actually receives what this gift is - would die.

Which is to say that he would stop simply existing,

and pass over to live only the eternal life that is the fruit of the Eucharist.

I wish that was me!

But it's not, not yet anyway.

I seem to be existing just fine,

with or without the Eucharist.

The COVID restrictions haven't killed me.

Which means only that I have yet to begin to truly live,

to fully believe.

So put me in the 70% or the 100% who struggle to receive this gift.

God help me.

Lord, help my unbelief.

Ultimately, I don't believe because I don't want the responsibility that comes with the gift.

That's how things work - we know it.

There is no gift without responsibility.

Regarding the responsibility of the Eucharist - 

it's way more than mere obligation to get your rear here every Sunday!.

No - it's a freedom, an energy, a capacity - an ability to respond to ultimate gift with ultimate thanksgiving and ultimate generosity!

Corpus Christi is the day marked for such ultimate responsibility - thanksgiving and generosity.

It's the day for me to take Jesus outside!

I've gone to enough World Youth Days to know how this works.

Jesus belongs ultimately not merely inside, but also outside!

I've gathered outside with millions - the largest, most peaceful, most diverse and unifying crowds in human history - gathered around the Eucharist.

But still I'm the worst at taking him outside, at sharing Him with others.

Instead, I'm tempted to use the Eucharist as a weapon for Catholic insiders - as part of the cancel culture judging who counts and who doesn't.  As a litmus test for identity politics - who's a real Catholic and who's a pretender.  To reduce the full sign of the Eucharist to mere virtue signaling of who's holy and who's not.

But shame on me if I abuse the Eucharist in this way!

The Eucharist, especially today, is meant more for outsiders than insiders.

The Eucharist was never given to be the magic pill or secret sauce of gnostic Catholics.  The gift is wasted if it is only a private possession hoarded from the inside, instead of fulfilling its destiny to be the universal sacrament of salvation for all people, and the only true hope of the world!

How dare I claim the Eucharist to be the source and summit of the Catholic faith if I do not also know it to be the engine of the Church's mission of evangelization to outsiders!

This is what it means to embrace the ultimate responsibility that comes with ultimate gift.

Why do black lives not matter?  Why is there still so much death?  So much doubt, discord, disagreement and distance, when the source of meaning, life, faith, communion, peace, reconciliation and intimacy is staring us right in the face?

The answer is too simple, but nonetheless true.  It's because I have barely started to unwrap and share the sublime gift of the Eucharist with outsiders.

Moses says to remember where we came from.

The Eucharist is a sacred remembering - yes!

Yet we remember not in order to go back,

but to activate the launching pad for going forward.

For all her rich history of Eucharistic tradition, theology and piety,

to mark Corpus Christi today, 

is never to wish we could go back,

but is a confession that I need to go forward in realizing this gift

and sharing it with outsiders.

What does it mean to live?

To live is to eat my flesh and drink my blood.

Lord, help me not to hoard this perfect gift!

To know that will never work!

May my one desire going forward,

be to unwrap this sweetest of gifts, and to share this most wonderful sacrament with outsiders!

is it a sin to be white?

Homily

10th Sunday in Ordinary Time AII

Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity

7 June 2020

St. Lawrence Catholic Campus Center at the University of Kansas

AMDG +JMJ +m

Is it a sin to be white?

No.  But it is a sin to stay white.

As a white American male I enjoy more power, privilege and protection (the three P's) than 99.999% of all persons in history.  It's a fact that is not hard to know, see and feel.  I remember how scared I was in 2010 in South Africa when I ventured into neighborhoods where white priests had been robbed and shot, places where I didn't have the three P's.  I know I'm a coward.  Even today I rarely spend time, money and energy in zip codes where I don't have the three P's.  I don't let myself experience the danger that is normal for most persons.

No, it's not a sin to be white.  But it is a sin to stay white.

Today is not a day for excuses.  Who cares if I've personally worked hard and that I'm not personally racist.  Compared to the white and black soldiers who on D-Day June 6, 1946, threw themselves into the heart of danger to fight the the evil assault on human dignity that was Nazi Germany, I have done nothing.  Nothing.  I want to honor those soldiers of all colors not with excuses, but with action. With my admission that our country needs new heroes, and that America is not great unless she gets a whole helluva lot better.

I'll be honest.  George Floyd is not my chosen rallying point.  I am concerned that the Black Lives Matter movement will be co-opted by politics, ideology, violence and hate and do more harm than good.  And I'm most angry about the violence done to innocent, unborn minority girls who are discarded and dismembered here and around the world because fathers will not fight for their right to breathe.  I would start by saying unless and until unborn lives matter, no lives matter.  But insofar as I am doing nothing either for the unborn or for George Floyd, I am a big part of the problem.

Right now, the Holy Spirit is breathing clarity and conviction into our nation through the image of a white officer, Derek Chauvin, kneeling on the neck of a black man, George Floyd.  Like it or not, his life is a new starting point.  Until George Floyd's life matters, no lives matter.  Unless black lives matter, no lives matter.  

Black lives matter.  It's not that hard to say.  And yes, I am sorry if as a white pastor or a mostly white Church, I'm afraid to say it, or am the last to say it instead of the first.  I do not care where you get your news.  Saying black lives matter is not political.  It's just not.

It's no more political that saying that one is three and three is one.  That's the mystery and the message of Trinity Sunday.  That the most real and the only lasting unity is born through a full diversity of persons.  One is three and three is one.  That's only true if there is no privilege or segregation or inequality in God. There is instead intimacy, closeness, communion, dignity, equality.  That's what we celebrate - the heart of all reality and any personhood is the Trinity.  Today's mystery is that before sin, violence, rivalry and politics entered the world, there are three persons who matter to each other.  Saying black lives matter is not political. It's written into the very heart of God.  That is why racism, as Archbishop Naumann says, is ultimately an insult to God, who Trinitarian image is written on people of every color.

To ignore today's mystery is to allow God to be perceived wrongly, to be experienced as a rich, privileged white guy who controls his slaves from far away.  Insofar as my Church rests in white privilege, and stays white, and my leadership is perceived in this way, I am not proclaiming the truth about God!

But this not the truth of who God is.  His Trinitarian mystery is revealed in the paschal one whose fullness we just celebrated at Pentecost.  God is a heartbroken Father who through His Spirit sends His Son into the heart of danger to be a victim who saves.  At the heart of God is not the privilege to separate and dominate, but a burning desire to suffer evil and transform it with mercy.

I am not proclaiming the truth about God, and I'm no disciple of Jesus unless I take a knee and give up my breath so that others may breathe.  

The breath of the Holy Spirit is speaking clearly.  Ready or not, there is a new starting point.  I must be able to see God and myself in my black brothers and sisters.  At the heart of reality there are persons who matter to each other.  Unless and until black lives matter, no lives matter.

No, it's not a sin to be white.

But it is a sin to do nothing, and to stay white.

am I guilty for George Floyd's death?

Homily

Solemnity of Pentecost A

St. Lawrence Catholic Campus Center at the University of Kansas

31 May 2020

AMDG +JMJ +m

Am I guilty for George Floyd's death?

The quick answer is no.  It's not my fault.

The right answer is yes.

There's a piece of the evil that fell on George Floyd's neck,

that could have fallen on mine instead.

Beyond all the takes, angles, politics and emotions surrounding another horrible part of 2020,

there's a piece of the evil that fell on George Floyd's neck,

that is meant to be suffered by me instead.

Let's get right into it, then.

There's an portion of the evil that is in the world,

that is destined to fall on me.

An evil that sometimes I don't choose, 

but other times I do.

an evil that is just part of the way things are.

An evil that I cannot ultimately avoid.

Many evils I can avoid, and should. - by being careful, safe and prudent -

Jesus escaped a few times himself, living to fight another day.

Other times he spoke up and called evil out!

There were times he confronted demons and healed natural evils,

fighting back with force.

But the greatest evils? The moral ones?

It was those that he suffered.

The greatest evils are defeated by victims,

those who take in and absorb evil willingly,

who transform it by mercy,

by drawing closer to enemies,

by forgiving those who persecute,

by enduring wrongs with love and perseverance.

The greatest evils are defeated in just this way.

Jesus shows me how, then trusts me to do likewise.

This is Jesus' paschal mystery,

defeating evil with mercy,

brought to fulfillment in His Church at Pentecost,

It's Jesus mission, and His way,

sealed and strengthened in His mystical body the Church,

by the outpouring of the Holy Spirit

Does anybody out there think that 2020 needs a fresh outpouring of God's Holy Spirit?  I sure do!

Come Holy Spirit, come!

In your 7-fold gift descend!

This Pentecost more powerfully than ever!

For 2020 has me not knowing what to do or how to live!  This year is crazy. It's awful.

I need wisdom, understanding, knowledge and counsel to see, feel, think and decide as God does.  I need to receive and celebrate life and relationship with God through piety and wonder.

But most of all I need a new, big refreshing mammoth dose of courage to live dangerously.

Because Jesus' Spirit kicks me out of the locked room of my fear

and dares me to go into the heart of evil and transform hate with love.

Come, Holy Spirit of courage, come!

This Pentecost refresh my frightened heart!

There's nothing wrong with being careful, safe and prudent instead of reckless.

Yet it does not replace the necessity for living courageously!

If there's anything we've learned in 2020,

it's that distance and isolation may preserve existence,

but in the end they define death.

For separation is unequal, and avoiding each other is what ultimately kills.

The Holy Spirit beckons us to draw closer,

for only reconciliation, togetherness and relationship beget life!

There's an evil inherent to life that we cannot avoid.

There's a danger inherent to life that we reject to our own peril.

So Jesus calls his disciples beyond being careful and safe.

And sends His Holy Spirit in the hope that we,

his mystical body, would be the most courageous heroes the world has ever seen.

the willing victims of an evil,

that can only be defeated and transformed

by Divine Mercy.

Is there a piece of the evil that fell on George Floyd's neck,

that only I can suffer, swallow up and transform by love?

The easy answer is no.

The right answer is yes.

Come Holy Spirit, give me the courage to seal and strengthen this witness that Jesus has entrusted to me!

Come Holy Spirit, Come!

am I scared of heights?

Homily

Solemnity of the Ascension

24 May 2020

St. Lawrence Catholic Center at the University of Kansas

AMDG +JMJ +m

Am I scared of heights?

You bet I am.  It's my #1 fear.  Most of my nightmares end with me falling!  Thank God I sleep alone, so no one hears my screaming!  Airplanes are fine.  Hiking 14ers ok - unless there's are ledges and high winds.  But cliffs - hate 'em.  Bungee jumping.  negative!  Skydiving?  No thanks. Rock Climbing - hell no.  I watched Free Solo last night in preparation for this homily - Alex Honnold - free soloing El Capitan in Yosemite?  Are you kidding me?  That guy is insane!  I'm too chicken to even like trampolines.  This white man neither jumps nor dunks.

Am I afraid of heights?  It's our pivotal question for the Ascension.

Heck yes I am!  Aren't you?

They worshiped on the mountain, but they doubted!  Sounds like me.  I trust the rule of gravity completely.  Everything that goes up, must come down.  I worship, raising my heart and soul to God, but then I come down - I doubt!  Yet the rule of the Ascension is just the opposite.  Whatever goes down, must go up!

Jesus has completed the greatest free fall of all time!  From the heights of heaven, falling to his own death, descending even lower to the gates of hell, his ridiculous condescension of mercy to save us in unbelievable.  The guy knows how to take a dive for someone He loves.

Today He shows that He's even better at going up - at climbing!  Jesus takes everything encompassed in his free fall - every second of salvation history and every ounce of his saving mysteries - he takes it all UP in his glorified and redeemed human body to where He started, to the heights of heaven.  

Man did you and I make out good on this deal!  At the Ascension, my humanity which at first was only an outer glimpse of the glory of God, now has a new home and destiny in the inner heart of God, in the middle of the relationship between the Father, Son and Holy Spirit.  Jesus knows how to make a climb for someone He loves.

Jesus now works from home - but not only his home, but also from my dream home!  He dares me to follow, to climb, and to come to my true home.  He who once was happy to descend to where I am, now dares me to climb where He is.

Don't stare at the sky though, the angel says.  Jesus is still with you, closer than ever actually, for his Ascension paves the way for an even more daring free fall that is the descent of the Holy Spirit.  Every second of salvation history and every ounce of Jesus' saving mysteries taken up in the Ascension will in 9 days descends even more radically from Heaven once again into the mystical time of the liturgy and the mystical body of the Church and Her sacraments.

Jesus works from home, but home is not in a galaxy far, far away.  Home is right here, at this liturgy, where earth is taken up into heaven in a greater ascent than our first fall from Eden.

And this is how love and life works.  For death, what goes up must come down.  For love and life, what goes down, must go up.  Love is not a one-way street, where the lover simply lowers Himself in death, compassion and mercy, but even moreso love heals, fills up, inspires, enlivens, ennobles and elevates the beloved!  The law of the Resurrection and Ascension is what prevails - life is stronger than death - that what goes down, must be lifted up!

So, am I afraid of heights?  I've had the worst Easter if the answer is yes.  For today's liturgy is nothing if it is not my willingness to embark beyond my fears on the most dangerous climb of my life - to use the descent of the Holy Spirit to give me clear vision of my highest destiny.  Our veterans who went to die for our country didn't die so that we could sit scared at home.  No, we honor them by living like Bl. Pier Giorgio Frassati taught us -by going verso l'alto - to the heights!  If Mass doesn't make me nervous, if it's not the biggest risk of my life to ascend, then I'm missing the point.

The climb in front of us is into the very heart of God, into the fullness of relationship.  For Eden from whence we fell is less of a place and more of a relationship.  So too heaven, to where now we are invited to go up, is less of a destination and more of a person.  This climb, surely the scariest one that defines my life, is to dare to become like Him, more capable of relationship with Him as his child, more courageous in pursuing my highest destiny.  

This fearless climb marks the life of  a real hero, and a real disciple of Jesus.  To live less by fear and doubt, that what goes up must come down, and more by faith, hope and love, by the rules of the Resurrection and Ascension, that what goes down, must go up!

The pivotal question thus stares me in the face, and cuts me to the heart, at this pivotal moment of Easter.  Am I afraid of heights?  The only answer for a disciple is no.

how will you dare to stand out?

Homily

6th Sunday of Easter

Graduation Sunday

St. Lawrence Catholic Campus Center at the University of Kansas

17 May 2020

AMDG +JMJ +m

Congratulations Catholic Jayhawks! On your virtual/pseudo graduation.  I am so glad that at least some of us can be here in person!

Class of 2020, how will you dare to stand out?

KU Catholics aren't like everyone else.

At least I hope we aren't.  That would be so boring!

With all bias confessed, I think KU Catholics are the best.

My dream is that Catholic Jayhawks are the most courageous people the world has ever seen.

COVID 19 Class of 2020, how will you dare to stand out?

And I don't mean by infamously having your graduation canceled during a pandemic.

I don't mean missing your chance to walk down the hill.

I mean that I dare you to take more risks that I have.

Not reckless or selfish ones, but the risks inherent to your faith!

Yes, I dare you to go farther in faith than me.

To go beyond that impressive legacy of KU Catholics who have already borne great fruit.

I like to think of St. Lawrence as the Napa Valley of campus ministry.

I want you to be the best vintage in history

You got next.  Starting today.

And I dare you to fly higher, Catholic Jayhawks.

The best gift St. Lawrence can give you,

is our faith that you can, and you will.

COVID Class of 2020.

Your last semester was a raw deal.

The world your are entering is being torn apart.

I am sorry. It's not supposed to be this way.

Yet what makes you different,

is that absurd hope beyond hope that is in you precisely when life is going to shreds.

St. Peter says that when everyone else is predicting the worst and playing politics,

real Christians dare to stand out.

They show mercy to anyone who doesn't understand them.

And they give reasons for the hope that is in them.

Real Christians know the story and history of salvation,

that God never abandons His creation or his covenants,

but draws near and does his best work in the face of adversity.

My dear KU graduates, if you have made it to this holy Mass,

it's because you have already grown in learning the power of your faith,

and a love that conquers all things,

at a time when you were most at risk of discarding it.

All the moreso now, a world that is hurting, needs your class

to give reasons for the hope that is in you.

What hope do I mean?

I mean the hope of the family you belong to and the worldview you hold.

Your hope that as a disciple of Jesus your best story will be passionate like His, through suffering that comes from conflict and adversity.

Your hope that the crimson of KU reaches its deepest hue in the blood flowing from His sacred Heart, flooding your soul and all creation with mercy.

Your hope that you will only wave the wheat at the end of your life insofar as make a gift of your life, as that grain that falls to the ground and dies.

Your hope that the vision engraved on your KU diploma, of a bush that burns but is not consumed, is sealed even more by the fire of the Holy Spirit dwelling in you.

Your hope that under the mantle of our Blessed Mother, the ultimate alma mater, your life will always tower toward the blue of heaven.

I mean that hope that is within you.

Class of 2020, fueled by that absurd hope against hope,

how will you dare to stand out?

I don't mean to get too sappy today, but I want to see your Rock Chalk Chant rising far above the phog of witnesses like me who have gone before you.

Thank you for trusting St. Lawrence to guide your story.

Your family the Church loves you and believes in you.

May the wonderful work God has begun in you be brought to fulfillment.

I hope at St. Lawrence we have given you more than a Catholic identity.

I pray that we guided you to a new capacity for writing a great story with your life.

I trust that the commandments of Jesus which you embrace,

are the launching pad of heroic journey.

So it's time to dare you, to take more risks than I have.

I dare you Catholic Jayhawks, to fly higher.

Our best gift is not the champagne and donuts waiting for you after Mass,

but it's our faith that you can, and you will.

COVID-19 Class of 2020,

our dear KU Catholics,

show us now - how will you dare to stand out?

how would you describe God?

He looks at me.

It's my favorite line from Mary's great hymn - her Magnificat.

He looks at me.

It's what St. John Vianney, the greatest priest says about prayer.

He looks at me.

It's my favorite way to describe God,

which is our pivotal question for this week.

How would you describe God?

He looks at me.

I got this from my mom - Mary.

Do you think it strange that Mary never goes looking for her Risen Son?

In the Gospels, we haven't heard from her since Good Friday - since the cross.

Five weeks of Easter now, and no mention of Mary in the Easter story.  How strange.

She has to be the key disciple of Easter.

She's always the best disciple.

Where in the heck is she?

Doesn't she have FOMO regarding the Resurrection?

Mary was the first eyewitness of so much.  The Anunication, Visitation, Nativity, Presentation, Finding. 

Jesus' first and last signs - Cana and the Calvary.  She saw it all.

But the Resurrection and Ascension - where the heck are you mom?

Did you go into hiding?

Hardly - Mary is the worst at hiding.

If she's not searching, it's because She knows God is searching for her.

He looks for me. He looks at me.  .

She always lets God find her.  She always lets God look at her.

That's who She is.

It's the work that makes her the greatest of all time.

So our mother waits to be found by the Resurrection of Her son.

She is not an eyewitness.

Instead she is one better - she is the one Jesus means when He says Blessed are those who have not see but have believed.

Mary did her seeking early on - getting in her question long before the Resurrection - at the Annunication.

How can this be?

The Holy Spirit will find you.  He will look at you, and through that look you will become the dwelling place of God.

Deal.  You can look at me. I will let you find me.  Let it be done to me.

Mary doesn't need to see to believe - she walks by faith.

He sees me.  That is enough for me.

Mary teaches that to be seen is the key to seeing.

Being known is the key to knowing.

He looks at me.

Mary is the key disciple of Easter, even though she is not an eyewitness.

For she receives the Risen Christ just like you and I do.

By faith more than by sight.

By letting God look at her, then make His dwelling in her,

just like we do in the Eucharist that is our Easter duty.

What is more, Mary receives the Risen Christ better than any eyewitness disciple.

She outwardly missed the resurrection and ascension,

but is the first to receive these mysteries in faith.

For the same Holy Spirit that first conceived Jesus in her,

at Pentecost delivers the Risen Christ to his best disciple.

Strangely, the one who does not see,

is the first to rise bodily with Him through Her glorious assumptoin,

and receives her crown in the place prepared by Him for his mom

in His Father's house.

I can't blame Thomas and Philip for straining their eyes to see.

Prove it Jesus.  Show us Jesus.

But Mary has chosen the better part.

For the key to seeing is to let yourself be seen.

He looks at me.

Nobody will have a better Easter than Jesus' best disciple.

Or a better Mother Day for that matter.

By letting God gaze on her lowliness,

Mary accomplishes the greater work of which Jesus speaks today.

She does something Her son never will.

She becomes a mother.

He looks at me,

and through that look exalts Her to be the Mother of God. 

In Easter, and on Mother's Day, Jesus certainly says.

Look at my mom.

We know how she in turn describes God.

He looks at me.

Mary, my mother, pray for me.

That your way will always be my favorite way to describe God.

He looks at me.