Author: Deacon Peter

Welcome to Trinity Sunday!  Although we are taught that God is triune, that is, three in one, the reality is that we each tend to pray to one of the persons of God more or less exclusively.  Who is it for you?  Father, Son, or Spirit?  Does the person of God that we pray to tell us something about our own journey of faith?  I think that it might, especially if we consider that our understanding of God through the Trinity has unfolded over time.  Trinity Sunday is a celebration of the journey into the mystery of God.

Over the many thousands of years of human existence, across a multitude of cultures and continents, whether isolated or not, a common absolute exists.  All people have an innate sense that something transcendent exists, something beyond themselves, something spiritual and bigger than they.  All cultures inevitably develop a theology, a definition of the divine.  Most primitive cultures, in reaction to the seemingly chaotic nature of the universe, come to believe that there are multiple gods, one for each of the powers that seem to take turns either assisting or tormenting the people.  Sun gods, moon gods, volcano gods, gods of agriculture, gods within animals, gods that seem to battle each other for domination.  These gods are to be respected, feared, and appeased in order to maintain a fragile status quo.

Some seven thousand years ago, a new understanding of God arose, a revelation that was centered in a small tribal community in the fertile crescent, the land known today as the Middle East.  This tribal community, the Hebrew people, proclaimed a very powerful God, a God that inspired the people with amazing deeds and great military triumphs, a God, shockingly, that apparently chose them.  Our first reading today captures an encounter between the Lord God and the first true prophet of Israel, Moses.  Moses does something incredibly gutsy – he asks if he can see God’s face.  God says no, it would kill Moses, but he does allow Moses to see God’s back, an interesting compromise.  More importantly, God declares His nature – merciful, gracious, slow to anger, rich in kindness and fidelity.  Try to beat that, alien gods!

Logically, armed with this revelation from the witness of Moses, the Hebrews claimed Yahweh to be better than any other god, that he was the best god.  Most of the battles they fought with other tribes simply affirmed that their god Yahweh can beat up your god whoever.  But over time, another more daring understanding slowly arose.  Yahweh is not only the best god, he is the only God.  Thus is born the notion of monotheistic religion, worship of the one and only God.

This understanding of God, however, did not immediately catch hold in other tribes.  Monotheism was definitely a minority opinion, and the predominant polytheistic religions persisted.  Much of the history of the Hebrew people as told in the Old Testament depicts the struggle of living their unique perspective of God among other tribes and cultures that rejected this notion completely.  It is no wonder that so many special rules and regulations arose among the Hebrew people – these laws were designed to emphasize and maintain their uniqueness, their chosenness.  But this defensive, closed-in posture had a price as well.  When your whole life is about maintaining boundaries, about defining where I am and you are, with drawing lines in the sand, and building walls, there is little room for something called love.  Despite many indications in the Hebrew scriptures that God was looking for a loving relationship, the people could not hear that message, could not accept a God that loves.  They wanted a warrior God, a God to make them the kings of the universe.

So, two thousand years ago, God took the next step in Revelation as so beautifully expressed in John’s gospel today.  God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him might not perish but might have eternal life.  Jesus entered our existence as a human being to show us how to relate to God’s self.  The historical Jesus preached, taught, healed, inspired, and challenged the Hebrew people to get beyond the choking strictures of the Law and see the loving hand hidden within.  Jesus showed us that it is not about life and death, but about life and life and love and love.  Jesus showed us God’s face, not his backside, and that face. as St. Paul tells us, is simply love and peace.

His mission complete as he rises to the Father, Jesus sends us the last revelation of God, the Holy Spirit.  The Holy Spirit is the catalyst of our spiritual existence, the connection between the weak spirit within us and the creative, loving spirit that is God.  The Holy Spirit works with us, leading us, continually reminding us that we are loved, that we are special, that we are God’s children.  From this knowledge, from this relationship, people can do great things, even if they seem small at first.  A nun takes three friends and starts a religious community to care for the poor of Calcutta.  A young man in Poland decides to become a priest and later becomes known as John Paul the Great.  People in our own parish volunteer to help the poor in this time of trial through donations of time, talent and treasure.  This is the call of the Holy Spirit leading our weak human spirits.

The doctrine of the Trinity can be analyzed to the nth degree.  I offer you a simple explanation.  The Trinity is an unfolding of the revelation of God over time – a journey into the mystery of God.  Every human being is invited to navigate this exact same journey.  As children, we naturally gravitate to an understanding of God as parent, to our betterment or worse depending on the parents we have.  As we mature physically and emotionally, we begin to appreciate the revelation that Jesus brings, that God is a God of relationship, a God of outstretched arms, a God that wants to know us and walk with us.  If we enter the relationship, we find ourselves being encouraged by the Holy Spirit, some would say driven, to a deeper, more intimate connection with God.  We feel at our gut level the knowledge, the certainty of our chosenness, a challenge and a wellspring of peace at the same time.

Where are you on this journey into the mystery of God?  Some signposts to consider:

• What dimension of the Trinity are you most comfortable with today?  God as Father, God as Son, or God as Holy Spirit?  This can indicate how your journey is progressing, how it may be stalled, how it may need some examination.
• Who do you pray to?  Many of the men I meet in our prisons pray to Father God, because they themselves never experienced the loving hands of a father and desperately seek to fill this hole in their lives. 
• Notice that the Holy Spirit is the most difficult person of God to understand, to grasp.  As the last person of the Trinity to be revealed, what does this say about God?  Perhaps the Spirit better describes God than our comfortable labels of Father and Son?

Wherever you are on your journey into the mystery of God, please don’t grade yourself harshly.  My purpose today is to show you how the Trinity can be used as a framework for understanding the dimensions, the completeness of God.  Don’t get bogged down with one dimension, one person, and think you have it all understood.  God’s immensity is not for understanding, it’s for falling into, like a vast sea, and in that bath of love, we find eternal happiness and peace.  So keep journeying!  Seek God’s face…

Third Sunday, Ordinary Time

About once a year, I search out my favorite musical Les Miserables and bask in the beauty of the music, the longing lyrics, and the tragic stories of love sought, love lost, and ultimately love found.  I did this recently and as usual, several of the songs brought a tear to my eye.  Two of these moments occur at the end of the musical, one after the other.  The first occurs at the death scene of Jean Valjean, the hero of the story.  As he passes over into heaven, the choir sings a verse that gets me every time: “To love another person is to see the face of God.”  And as that final note floats up and away, the music segues to the final song, aptly titled “Do you hear the people sing?”  That final song is an anthem to hope, an invitation to get involved in the messy reality of our time.  The song asks a simple, profound question, “Is there a world you long to see?”

Would you like to become fishers of men?

Today’s gospel features the story of Jesus calling his first disciples, the two sets of brothers, Peter and Andrew first, then James and John second.  This depiction matches Mark’s gospel virtually word for word, so clearly Matthew had no problem with Mark’s account and simply repeats it.  Luke takes a much more dramatic approach, tying Peter’s decision as a response to Jesus telling him to lower his nets and shockingly pull in an enormous number of fish. 

Our immediate reaction to Matthew’s account is one of surprise – the story implies that Jesus just happens to see these two guys fishing, stops a moment, asks them to follow him, and they agree “at once,” leaving their nets behind.  Shortly thereafter, he does the same thing with James and John, and they too leave their boat (and poor Dad) behind to follow Jesus.  Does this make sense?  No, of course not, but the story is indeed meant to startle us.  How to explain this odd behavior?

Matthew is making a point, tying Jesus’ actions to a prophecy, a prophecy declared by Isaiah in our first reading:

First the Lord degraded the land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali; but in the end he has glorified the seaward road, the land west of the Jordan, the district of the Gentiles.  

Where is this land?  Zebulun and Naphtali are two of the northern tribes of Israel, and their lands roughly correspond to Galilee.  So here comes Jesus, walking the seaward road, “glorifying” the seaward road, if you will.  Isaiah goes on in his beautifully poetic style, stating:

Anguish has taken wing, dispelled is darkness: for there is no gloom where but now there was distress.  The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light; upon those who dwelt in the land of gloom a light has shown.

So, here is Jesus, walking the seaward road, spotting these random men, inviting them with a mysterious challenge, and the glory of God emanates from Him with such irresistible power that of course they drop everything and follow him.  Andrew, Peter, James, and John are literally seeing a great light, and they are drawn to Jesus like moths to a flame.  You can imagine the early Jewish readers of Matthew’s account smiling as they recognize the reference – it would be obvious.  And likewise, you can understand why Luke, who was writing to a non-Jewish audience, would go in an entirely different direction.

Matthew loves to tell Jesus stories that fulfill prophecies.  He does this over and over again in his gospel.  Remember that the gospel is not so much an historical account as an invitation to get to know and understand Jesus.  Of course, we think we know and understand Jesus, but do we really?  The physical person Jesus must have been a compelling figure.  Given his reported style of preaching and teaching, there’s no doubt that he had a booming voice, a commanding presence, a face that drew you in.  I know that when I reach heaven, I hope to have a chance to be sent back in time to witness Jesus walking the earth, to see for myself what he looked like, how he spoke, and how he changed lives.  Wouldn’t that be cool?

In the end, however, people are people, and it remains for us the same question that has to be answered.  Would you give up everything for the opportunity to follow Jesus?  If Jesus walked up to you with that same bizarre challenge, “Come after me, and I will make you fishers of men,” what would you do?  If you’re like me, my answer would be, “huh?”  Followed by, “I need a minute to think about what that means to my life…”  So here’s the challenge for you this coming week.  Answer the question.  Really think about it.  I’ll make it a bit easier on you – what is the one step you need to take to start saying yes to that question?  What would you change in your life right now?  It doesn’t matter how old you are, or how rich you are, or how messy your life is. 

So play it out.  Use your imagination.  Go for a walk on the beach.  Go fishing.  Stare out at the waves.  Smell the salt water.  A stranger approaches you.  You know that it is Jesus.  He looks at you with tremendous love in his eyes and says: come and follow me.  You reply, “[fill in the blank]”  Do you hear the people sing?  Is there a world you long to see?

The Sixth Sunday of Easter

If I didn’t know any better, I’d swear by today’s readings that this is actually Trinity Sunday.  Look at the very interesting first reading from the Acts of the Apostles.  Ironically, this reading comes chronologically after the Gospel, after Pentecost, when the apostles fully understand the importance of the Holy Spirit.  Did you notice that strange statement in the first reading that the Samaritan Christians “…had only been baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus.”  There was some remedial action to be taken, apparently.  What was that about? 

The second reading, attributed to Peter but likely written by a disciple, has another fascinating Trinitarian claim.  Listen again: “For Christ also suffered for sins once, the righteous for the sake of the unrighteous, that he might lead you to God (the Father).  Put to death in the flesh, he was brought to life in the Spirit.”  So note – God sends the Son who wishes to lead us to the Father; the Son dies for our sins, and is brought to life by the Spirit.  Note the distinct actions of each of the persons in God, intermingled and mediated one by the other.  Theologians have called this the Cosmic Dance, which I think is an excellent image.

Now for the Gospel.  We heard the first half of John, Chapter 14 last week when Jesus tells the confused disciples that he is going to the Father, and more to the point, that Jesus and the Father are one.  This week we hear the continuation of this speech with Jesus introducing the Advocate, the Spirit of truth, who is also to be sent by the Father.  On that day, Jesus proclaims, “…you will realize that I am in my Father and you are in me and I in you.”  What a remarkable statement!  This leads to a very concise description of the Trinitarian God:

• God the Father is God above us
• God the Son is God beside us
• God the Holy Spirit is God within us

Note the progressive intimacy of these descriptions of God as revealed over the ages.  God the Father showing his power to Moses and the Chosen People, Jesus walking with his disciples, healing individuals from their desperate physical ailments, usually by touching them, even touching lepers.  And now the Spirit, a necessary next step in the God/human love equation, who invades our very souls and lights a fire.  Intimacy always seeks more intimacy.  God above us, beside us, within us. 

So what’s “wrong” with the baptism of the Samaritans in the first reading?  Nothing really – it was simply incomplete.  They had been baptized in the name of the Father and of the Son and…that’s it.  Peter and John went down to Samaria to complete the Revelation, to show them the open door to the divine dance, to introduce them to the Holy Spirit.  It also shows the budding realization of the importance of the apostolic witnesses, of how the laying on of hands by the apostles was a critically important gesture.  Ordination uses the same gesture thereby tying every clergy person today back to an original apostle.

The spiritual journey is about seeing what the world cannot see.  There is a vibrant spiritual existence intertwined with our human existence at all times, moving in and out of our reality with consummate ease.  Have you ever seen it?  Sensed it?  Touched it?  Most people get a taste of the spiritual when they are witnessing the death of a loved one.  It’s as if the doorway to the spiritual is made of mist.  The dying person often sees right through it, speaking to deceased family members, marveling at the scenery, anxious to be a part of it all.  They want to share it with you.  It is an immense privilege to accompany the dying through this final gate, because it is best experienced when love is present in abundance.

So if the interplay among the three persons of the Trinity is a cosmic dance, let’s introduce one more concept.  Love is the dance floor.  When Jesus speaks to the disciples he is attempting to describe a reality that He is fully immersed in and can belong to them as well.  Jesus, being fully human and fully divine, represents our doorway on to this spiritual dance floor.  How to enter?  Obey Jesus, open yourself to Jesus.  Note that you don’t have to die to experience this reality – Jesus opened the door!  You can share in this mutual dance of the Trinity while you’re a human being walking the earth!  Many Christian mystics such as Teresa of Avila, St. John of the Cross, and St. Catherine of Siena have written extensively of this experience. 

If you’ve gotten a taste of the joy and happiness of the divine dance and want more, what to do?  Get closer to Jesus.  I can’t emphasize that enough.  To obey the commands of Jesus is to be open to the dialogue, to listen and read and ponder and pray on what Jesus is nudging you to do.  The dialogue is different for each of us.  The common thread is love, that’s a given.  Jesus is always encouraging us to love our fellow human beings more, to forgive them, to laugh at silly misunderstandings, to bolster the weak-kneed, to reach out to those who have fallen in the ditch.  Yes, even to put up with nutty politicians and say nice things to grocery clerks and police and neighbors and to our spouses.  You can do it – just a little love, even if with gritted teeth, still counts.

Does all of this theologizing make your head hurt?  I get that – I find it challenging too.  Here we are, trying to explain the nature of God with human language and concepts – the best we can do is through analogies.  God is like this, or God is like that.  Our words are always insufficient to the task.  Only one word comes close and you know what that word is, don’t you?  Yeah, the word is love.  Love is the best clue – get out on the dance floor!

For the last couple of weeks, we’ve been reading from John’s gospel accounts of the resurrection and its aftermath.  Today we focus on the gospel of Luke, who presents us with a story of revelation that is one of the most beloved in the gospel.  The road to Emmaus is especially relevant because it is a journey we all take, and not just once, in our walk of faith.  Let’s take a closer look.

Our two main characters are named Cleopas and… hmm, no name at all.  Who is this second disciple?  We don’t even know if it’s a man or a woman.  So, just as we did at Easter with the beloved disciple, put yourself in this person’s sandals and be in the story.  Let the other disciple be you.  You two are leaving Jerusalem, heading for a place called Emmaus.  To this day, no one knows where Emmaus is or was – it’s simply a place seven miles from Jerusalem.  What is important is that Emmaus is not Jerusalem, it is a different place.  Symbolically and actually, you two are leaving town, getting out, washing your hands of this whole affair, heading back to the farm.  You are discouraged, disappointed, had-it-up-to-here. 

Then Jesus shows up and joins you.  Luke says that “their eyes were prevented from recognizing him.”  What a strange statement!  Does this makes sense?  Why wouldn’t you recognize Jesus?  There are some very good reasons why you wouldn’t.  First of all, you definitely don’t expect him to be there.  He’s dead, remember?  But more importantly, you’re wrapped up in yourself, in your sorrow, you’re completely self-absorbed at this moment.  I know that when I’m like this, I wouldn’t recognize my best friend. 

Worse than this, this stranger seems clueless as to what has happened recently.  He asks the seemingly innocent question, “what sort of things have happened?”  So you and Cleopas lay it all out – how Jesus was your great hope, the one to redeem Israel, how the chief priests and scribes handed him over to be crucified.  And even more amazing, how the rumor is rampant that Jesus is actually alive, although no one has seen him.  It’s all just a bit too much, isn’t it? 

Then the stranger speaks.  He seems a little exasperated, calls you foolish, and begins to explain how it really is.  How the Scripture should be interpreted, how the Christ had to suffer and die, how it was all foretold.  As you walk with him, you begin to understand more and more, and your spirit begins to lift.  You look at him more closely and a part of you deep inside is breaking open, beginning to see something new.  Time flies and suddenly, you’ve reached the outskirts of Emmaus.  You stop outside the inn where you intend to stay.  He gives the impression that he has farther to travel, but you insist that he join you for dinner – “stay with us, for it is nearly evening and the day is almost over.”  A part of you that has nothing to do with physical hunger wants more.

So the stranger joins you for dinner.  What comes next is no surprise in Luke’s gospel – Jesus is always having dinner with people, and sure enough, when he blesses the bread and breaks it, and passes it to you and Cleopas, the surge of joy that has been building up in you erupts and you suddenly see Jesus in this stranger.  As soon as you do, Jesus vanishes.  Not in a scary spooky way, but in a simple gentle way – he has moved on.  You and Cleopas are so excited, you can barely sit still.  You simply must rejoin the community and tell them what has happened, so off you go in the dark, retracing those seven miles back to Jerusalem.  Quite a story!

A number of years ago, I attended a religious education conference and had a taste of that experience.  My wife and I attended a talk given by Fr. Richard Rohr, a Franciscan priest.  I was at a time in my life when I was searching for ways to better know and understand God’s will in my life.  Fr. Rohr’s topic was men’s spirituality, and for an hour and a half, I was mesmerized.  I felt that God was speaking directly to me amidst the 400 people in the room.  It’s not that Fr. Rohr was God – he simply has a gift of teaching that clarifies and focuses the gospel.  At the end of the presentation, we drove home and Katie and I talked the entire way.  My heart was burning within me, and thoughts were flying through my head.  It’s amazing we weren’t in a car accident, but the Lord watched over us.  Over the years since then, I’ve had other similar experiences when God’s spirit has taken hold of my soul.  Has that ever happened to you?

The road to Emmaus story tells us how it can happen to you.  Some key points to note:

• Whenever you feel lost and confused, Jesus is likely to show up.
• Unfortunately, he may be hard to recognize.  That’s not His fault!
• He’ll come to you as a stranger, or as an invitation, or as an odd encounter, an interruption.  In my case, the only reason that I went to Rohr’s talk that day is because a friend of a friend told me that I might enjoy listening to him.  I went because the room he was speaking at was close to the parking lot.
• During the encounter, something deep inside you will recognize that this is important, but you won’t be able to say why.
• The aftermath is characterized by incredible energy, a need to talk it out, and a compelling need to share the story with others.
• You’ll want to take it to the next step.  You’ll want to replicate the experience, to seek out more depth.  This is understandable and just what God has in mind.

The road to Emmaus is actually a love story, isn’t it?  Jesus cares so much for you that he will seek you out, even as you are walking away.  He will address your deepest longing, your deepest fear, and shed light on your darkest places.  When you ask him to stay with you because you are thirsty and hungering for more, he will stay with you.  He’s present in the breaking of the bread, which to us Catholics is very obviously a reference to the Eucharist.  Once you recognize Jesus, you never need to be alone again.  He’s right here.

Are you on the road to Emmaus right now?  Don’t be afraid.  Jesus is about to join you.

Every Easter we ponder the mystery of the Christ, the astonishing news of a dead man apparently resurrected, and must face the question every Christian faces at some point in their lives.  What do we believe?  What do you believe? 

It’s somewhat fashionable among elite and scholarly circles these days to claim a certain type of atheism, an intellectually derived claim that God is unimportant, indeed irrelevant to our human existence.  In fact, with breathless bravado, we are told that God is not simply irrelevant, he is non-existent.  What do you believe?  Our own spiritual belief system has to start here, for without a belief in God, why bother with a belief in anything else?

Now this is when most theologians will launch into various intellectual arguments for the existence of God, and to a certain degree, these discussions are interesting and fruitful.  At another level, however, they are less than optimal, for it is far too easy to fall into the trap of trying to use scientific methods and logical syllogisms to prove that God exists.  The stark truth of the matter is that you will never get to a convincing proof of the existence of God by using your head.  You need faith.

Now before you tune out because of that vague word, faith, allow me to define this term in a perhaps unusual way.  First, what faith is not.  Faith is not the same thing as belief, or adhering to some dogma, or obeying some command from the pulpit.  Faith has nothing to do with the Pope or even for that matter the Catholic Church.  Belief, dogma, the Pope, and the Church are all responses to faith – they are dependent on faith.  They follow faith.  So what is faith?  Faith, brothers and sisters, is simply accepting what you already know to be true.

So, what do you know to be true?  Let me suggest four very unscientific concepts that I bet you know very intimately and from deep within.  The first is beauty.  Beauty is hard to define, but we can try.  It’s the combination of qualities that make something pleasing and impressive to look at, listen to, touch, smell, or taste.  Beauty is soothing to the soul and a delight to experience.  Each of us knows beauty when we see it, don’t we?  You know beauty.

The second concept is goodness.  Goodness embodies virtue and kindness, high qualities that attract us and impress us.  Someone who is good is always in high demand, for goodness is like a light shining in the darkness.  It’s hard to measure goodness scientifically, isn’t it?  But just like beauty, we know it when we see it, know it when we encounter it.

The third concept is truth.  As human beings, we all seem to have a very well-tuned sense of truth, an almost intuitive appreciation for the reality of things.  Some think it is hard-wired into our psyches, this innate sense of right and wrong, of honesty and falsehood.  A good measure of the truth of something is how our gut reacts when we hear a claim.  Falsehood can confuse us momentarily, either due to the skill of the liar, or the clever way it misleads us.  But in the end, our gut will tell us whether it is true or not.

So let’s pause a moment.  I said that faith is simply accepting what you already know to be true.  You know beauty.  You know goodness.  You know truth itself.  Well guess what?  If you know beauty, goodness, and truth, you know God.  Because beauty, goodness, and truth define who God is.  How do I know this?  Because beauty, goodness, and truth are the lures, the bait, that God tosses out to lead us all to him.  God gives us a beautiful creation, with sunsets and roses and the smell of baking bread.  We’re attracted.  Then we explore some more and we see that the world has good and bad in it, and we are drawn to the good, to the virtuous, to the people who exhibit this quality.  You all know at least one person like that, right?  I hope so!  And when your senses are full of beauty and your heart is impressed by goodness, only then do you engage the brain and seek the ever-present truth.  The search for truth is the lifelong journey we call the spiritual path.

Now to the fourth concept (for those who were counting and wondered why I stopped).  You see the fourth concept that you know to be true is simply the combination of beauty, goodness and truth.  We have a word for it – love.  In the end, it’s simple.  If you believe in beauty, goodness, and truth, you certainly believe in love.  And if you believe in love, you believe in God.  Because St. John, in his amazingly profound insight, said it simply and perfectly.  God is love.  Love is God.

If you believe in love, then you believe in God.  You have faith.  You are simply accepting what you already know to be true.  How does that feel?  Isn’t it great to have faith?  Isn’t it great to know that you’ve had it all along? 

Today is Easter.  Today Jesus shows us the final truth, the final expression of God’s beauty, goodness, and love.  Jesus shows us that death, our greatest fear, is not the end, but somehow the beginning of something profoundly exciting and new.  It’s available to all of us who have faith.  I guess that’s all of us!  You already know it to be true.  You know that this world can’t be the end of everything; it’s just not possible.  Our gut doesn’t buy it.

One last question.  Do you ever get tired of beauty, goodness, and truth?  Do you ever think, oh gosh, if I see one more beautiful flower or hear one more moving piece of music, or learn one more truth about the world, I’ll just have to go hide?  I don’t think so.  Our whole life is a day to day search for more beauty, goodness, and truth.  Take a guess what heaven is all about.  For some strange reason, I don’t think we’ll be bored when we get there.  How could we?  Beauty, goodness, truth, love, the very essence of who God is, will permeate heaven.

So the next time someone tells you, “I don’t believe in God” ask them, “Oh?  So you don’t believe in love?  Or beauty?  Or truth? Or goodness?  What a sad and frightening world this must be for you!”  Then tell them some good news…whether or not you believe in God, God most certainly believes in you.  And he’s dangling this bait…

While they were there, the time came for her to have her child, and she gave birth to her firstborn son. She wrapped him in swaddling clothes and laid him in a manger, because there was no room for them in the inn. (Luke 2:6-7)

Why Bethlehem?  We take this beautiful story quite for granted.  But have you ever really thought, “Why Bethlehem?”

One of my little fantasies is that Luke the evangelist spent some quality time with Mary before he wrote his gospel.  It’s possible – most historians would agree that Mary was probably young, no more than 16, when Jesus was born.  If Luke wrote his gospel in the 70’s, that would make Mary an elderly lady, maybe early 80’s, but still conceivable.  There are so many wonderful details in his narrative: the trip to Bethlehem, the star, the angels, the shepherds, the manger.  I can just hear Luke asking Mary this question, “Why did you go to Bethlehem?  You’re from Nazareth – why did you go to Bethlehem?”  Mary replies, “Oh, it was some government thing – Joseph said we had to go.”  So Luke gives us this census idea, which sounds good, but there is no historical evidence that it ever happened as Luke describes it.

 But wait a minute.  Wasn’t there a prophecy?  Yes, the book of Micah, which says: “But you, Bethlehem, too small to be among the clans of Judah, from you shall come forth for me one who is to be ruler in Israel…” (Mi 5:1)  So did Mary and Joseph go to Bethlehem to fulfill the prophecy?  Hmm, seems a bit implausible.  You can hear Joseph, “Mary, I was reading Micah.  We’re in the wrong place!  We have to go to Bethlehem!”  Mary replies, “Are you nuts?”  So whether a census, or “some government thing,” let’s distill it down to a likely reality: they went to Bethlehem because they had to go.  Why else would a  woman in her eighth month of pregnancy travel?  This is totally outside of Mary’s comfort zone – and she was already facing terrible uncertainty about this child she was carrying.  She is young, most certainly frightened for her child’s safety, and uncomfortable physically.  Mary and Joseph are not in control here.

So why would God do this to them?  Ahh, it’s not God doing this, it’s life.  Life has a knack of taking us out of our comfort zone, in small ways and big ways.  Life is natural disasters.  Life is slipping on a step and breaking an arm.  Life is a lost job.  Life is a serious illness.  Life is the loss of a spouse.  Life is a whole sequence of challenges and sufferings and questions.  Life is having to go to Bethlehem when you’re ready to give birth.  Life is finding no place to stay, the 5-star Hilton filled up, the 1-star barn a welcome sight.  Life can be tough.

But now, as we look just a little bit closer at Luke’s gospel, the theology, the deeper meaning is made apparent.  In the midst of this out-of-control experience, the Bethlehem valley in Mary’s life, Christ breaks through!  Literally, fundamentally, Christ breaks through!  A healthy baby boy is born.  Is there anything more joyful than holding an infant in the first moments of life?  Christ breaks through.

 Isn’t that true for us too?  God allows life to happen because it seems that sometimes we need to wake up.  We have a hard time listening to God when things are going great.  When things get tough, when we are no longer in control, God’s invitation to us for a relationship takes on added clarity and power.  And when things are darkest on our journey – if we allow it to happen – Christ breaks through!  And resurrection happens.

We call this cycle of dying and rising made holy the Paschal Mystery.  It seems that something needs to die in order for something new to be born.  Life is an endless cycle of these moments of opportunity, these little deaths.  Jesus demonstrates through his life how to face these deaths – with humility, prayer, patience, and forgiveness.  He never seeks scapegoats or plays the victim.  He accepts the death, trusts in the Father, and is resurrected. 

 Why Bethlehem?  From the moment of birth, Jesus was engaged in the Paschal Mystery, foreshadowing his life of ministry.  From the moment of birth, Luke shows us that the cycle was true for the Holy Family just as it is true for us.  It all leads to the cross.  There is no other way.  The Good News is that Jesus will accompany us on the journey if we let him break through.  With his help, we can deal with anything, because we know it ends in resurrection.

So don’t fear Bethlehem.  When our ultimate Bethlehem occurs on our death bed, and we let Jesus break through, you can bet angels will sing Hosanna for us too.