13th Sunday in ordinary time, June 27, 2010
Fr. Anthony Brankin
(Sorry, no audio) Gospel: Luke 9:51-62
Full text of homily. We believe in the Holy Trinity. As Catholics we proclaim and profess that there is only One God, and that in this One God, there are Three Persons, the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.
This homily is brought to you by Questions For God Books, which offers a children’s book series and DVD that will help children three years old and older learn about God’s plan for salvation and everlasting life.
We tell the world—every time we make the sign of the cross—that we live under the sky of this One God—that He is over us and in us and around us. In Him we live and move and have our being. We tell anyone who asks us that this One God in Three Persons created the Universe—the Angels, the stars, the planets, the Galaxies and Adam and Eve.
And that when we sinned and wandered far from Him, He eventually sent His Son to be born of the Virgin Mary to save us. And that finally He sent the Holy Spirit among us to make us Holy and strong and give us all the grace we need to get to heaven.
This is what Catholics have believed since the very beginning—and the Church has never wavered in the strength of that belief—that our God is the only God. And that there are no other gods. And there is no “no God”—the universe of the atheists. And we need to live our lives and structure our world in the reflection of the reality of that God.
The problem is that we live in modern times, and modern times are practically atheist. We moderns have been taught to make all of our decisions in our lives—from how we run our schools, to how we run our government, to how we run our day to day lives, as if God did not exist.
Our television and movies, our newspapers and internet, our politics and programs, our schools and sports all exist in this godless vacuum. God might as well not exist as far as our daily lives are concerned.
It is one thing when the government does this—spending all its energies and our money with never a thought about God; but the danger is that such an attitude can seep into our personal and family lives, and we will begin to live and make our personal decisions as if there were no God.
We begin to ignore God, and His will and His revelation. We regard our Catholic religion—not as something important for us and everyone else, but as something apart from us—alien to us—foreign to us.
Americans do this all the time. We call it “separation of Church and State”—but what it really means is “ignore the Church and make the government our God.”
Well, our lives are impoverished when we live our lives and make our decisions as if there were no God. I don’t care what anyone says, but this modern world, its fashions, its attitudes, its buildings, its entertainment, its people its politics—are ugly. Our lives are becoming ugly—precisely because we are no longer living those lives in the beauty of the good God—if God had something to do with our lives, those lives would be much more beautiful than they are.
We don’t need to read a laundry list of modern ugliness, but the world of our grandparents—a world of beauty and politeness and decency and generosity died a long time ago. Is it too much to conclude that back in the days when we lived as if there were a God and so many more people communicated with this God in prayer, that we communicated much more effectively and deeply with each other.
We have a thousand and one communication devices, but we have nothing to say. We twitter and facebook and think it is an amazing achievement that we are now in contact with people who haven’t talked to us in thirty years. But is that really communication? Or is it just more superficial noise and distraction?
Is it possible that modernity with all its media noise and hype and hoopla and meaningless chatter and noise and static is intending to create a wall of noise and distraction precisely so that we do not hear God, knowing that if we do not hear Him, we will ignore Him and live our lives as if He does not exist.
Some night go into your backyards and listen—very carefully—very deeply. There is no silence anymore. Way out there—way off in the distance—there is a hum—a whir—a sound. It is the ever-present background noise of modern life. It never leaves—it is always there—always present. Maybe it’s the low hum of a billion electric lines—criss-crossing the city—or maybe it is the blurry buzz of a million car tires turning on tar. I don’t know what it is, but it is there and you can hear it, and it never ends. And it means nothing, And that’s not good, because how can we hear God, with so many noises and distractions in our lives.
When our people all lived in the country—on farms and in villages—they lived and worked all day close to nature They woke to the sounds of birds chirping in the dawn and went to bed with crickets announcing dusk. They worked with horses and animals and crops and seasons. And they had no doubt as to who put it all together for their benefit. They lived their lives conscious of the God who created it all.
The rhythms of life were driven by the rhythms of prayer. The silence of the world was broken only by the voice of God in nature—or our voices lifted up in prayer to that God. God was real and our lives were structured in that reality.
No, we don’t live in the country anymore—even the farmers have been kicked off their land and sent to town to get a job. But in the meantime, maybe we could still try to live our lives as if God were making a difference in our lives. But we have to hear him first. But we will not hear him if everything else is blasting in our ears and souls.
Maybe that means turning off the television—stop watching shows about celebrity vampires and washed up dirty-dancers. Who’s hot and who’s not on the internet. Those are terrible distractions that keep us from noticing or hearing God in our lives. How can God make an impact on our decisions about how to live life when sex and sleaze on a screen is how we spend our time?
Also, we need to pray more—and as family. We can recite the Rosary or parts of the rosary after supper. We can also sit down and open up a Bible and read one Psalm slowly every day.
God, the Trinity, our Catholic religion needs to become more than a definition, more than a statement—more than a notion—more than something in a book—our faith must become part of the fabric of our daily lives. If what we believe about God and supernatural things is true and real, then we must live our lives and make our decisions in the light of that reality. And when we do that—our lives and our world can become sane again—and maybe a little happier—and a bit more beautiful.