Homily
for December 17, 2006
Liturgical Year C - Cycle I
3rd Sunday of Advent
By Fr. John Carney Topic:
Live Joyfully
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Reading I Zep
3:14-18a Shout for joy, O daughter Zion! Sing joyfully, O Israel! Be glad and exult with
all your
heart, O daughter Jerusalem! The LORD has removed
the judgment
against you he has turned away your enemies; the King of Israel, the LORD, is in your midst,
you have no
further misfortune to fear. On that day, it shall be said to Jerusalem: Fear not, O Zion, be not discouraged! The
LORD, your
God, is in your midst, a mighty savior; he will rejoice over you with
gladness,
and renew you in his love, he will sing joyfully because of you, as one
sings
at festivals
Reading II Phil
4:4-7 Brothers and sisters: Rejoice in the Lord always. I shall
say it
again: rejoice! Your kindness should be known to all. The Lord is
near.
Have no anxiety at all, but in everything, by prayer and
petition, with
thanksgiving, make your requests known to God. Then the peace of
God that
surpasses all understanding will guard your hearts and minds in
Christ
Jesus
Gospel Lk
3:10-18
The crowds asked John the Baptist, “What should we do?” He said
to them
in reply, “Whoever has two cloaks should share with the person who has
none. And whoever has food should do likewise.” Even tax
collectors
came to be baptized and they said to him,
“Teacher, what should we do?” He answered them, “Stop collecting
more
than what is prescribed.” Soldiers also asked him, “And what is
it that
we should do?” He told them, “Do not practice extortion, do not
falsely
accuse anyone, and be satisfied with your wages.”
Now
the people were filled with expectation, and all were asking in their
hearts whether John might be the Christ. John answered them
all,
saying, “I am baptizing you with water, but one mightier than I is
coming. I am
not worthy to loosen the thongs of his sandals. He will baptize you
with the
Holy Spirit and fire. His winnowing fan is in his hand to clear
his
threshing floor and to gather the wheat into his barn, but the chaff he
will
burn with unquenchable fire.” Exhorting them in many other
ways, he
preached good news to the people.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I’ve been fighting a
cold for
the last couple of days and haven’t been feeling well.As soon as I saw you and heard the beautiful
music, I felt better.That is the truth.
This third Sunday in
Advent,
obviously, we think about joy, God’s gift of joy and peace.In the readings today, the word joy, or
synonym for joy, was used almost two dozen times.We
changed the Lenten color, violet, which is
a color of penance, to the color of rose, not pink.This is not pink.This is rose
because that is the Church’s
symbol of joy.The readings lead up to
the Gospel.In Luke, it is interesting
how the Gospel selection begins because it starts with a question.“What must we do?What
must we do?” they ask him.“What must we
do to be saved?What must we do to lead a
good and joyful
life?” John told them, “Do
whatever is
in front of you.”In effect, He said to
the tax collectors, “Don’t cheat anybody.”He said to the religious Jews, “Share your food and clothing,”
because that
was the prescription of the law.He said
to the soldiers, “Don’t bully anyone.Do
not accuse anyone falsely.Quit griping
about your pay.”In other words, there
is this great, big question, THE question, “What should I do to lead a
good
life?” that we all ask God John tells us that
the answer
is to just do your job, just live the vocation that you’ve been given,
whether that
is a soldier, a tax collector, or a good, religious Christian.Just live your life today.In other words, be faithful to the present
moment.There must be a million books
written on this, all these books concerning mental health and
happiness, but it
is one of the basic messages of the Gospel.Live in the present moment to the fullest.Don’t
let the past drag you down.Although we
know that is good advice, many
people are carrying around their past like a ton of work on their
shoulders.You could almost see some
people.
“Is there something wrong
with your back?” “No.It was my mother.Forty-three
years ago.”
It doesn’t make any
sense.We ask God’s forgiveness for our
faults.We ask God to give us hearts
that forgive others for the hurts that we have received.And that’s it.We should stand up
straight then, walk into
the future, and live the present moment fully.Don’t stifle the spirit that God gives you.Look like you have the spirit of God in
you.I know that is difficult for some
people. There was a fellow in
my last
parish.I thought the guy couldn’t stand
me.Sunday after Sunday, I would look at
him and he’d look back.There are some
of those in every church, except here.He had to move and before he left, he came to see me and said,
“I need
to talk to you.”I said, “Okay.” He said, “I want to thank
you.You have meant a lot to my family
and me.You have really helped us become
better Christians.I’m really going to
miss you.”I said to myself, “What
was the
look?What was the frown, the look of
pain?”It was wearing on me.We have to be careful with that.We
project a certain feeling and as Christians
we are to project a sense of peace and joy.” The Archbishop of
Milwaukee,
Timothy Dolin, writes of peace in a priest magazine that comes out each
month.I am sure most of you get
it.I love to read it.He is a wonderful guy.He’s witty,
he’s kind, and he’s a wonderful
bishop.He used to be the rector of the
North American Seminary in Rome.Last
month he wrote an article called “The
Heresy of Huffyism.”He
just mentioned
about all the letters he gets.You can
imagine, because the Archbishop gets letters, believe me.He just recounted some of them.What
he was trying to point out was that there
is a certain heresy in the Church of “huffyism” he called it. People are always
complaining
about very little areas of interest.He
got a letter.He had mentioned that he
had started a Vicariate in the Archdiocese of Milwaukee for Latino
Affairs.There is a tremendous number of
Hispanics, mostly from Central America and Mexico.They
weren’t
being dealt with because of the shortage of Spanish-speaking priests or
whatever, so he set up a vicariate to make sure that their needs were
being
met.He got all sorts of letters saying,
“Where’s the Irish Vicariate?Where’s
the English Vicariate?”Huffy.Huffy.In another case, a deacon wrote him a letter complaining that
the
priests had prayed for vocations to the priesthood and religious life
and had
left out the diaconate. Here is one and I
have
experienced this.He gets letters from
people complaining that in the Prayers of the Faithful, they are
praying for the
Army.Obviously, the letter writer
doesn’t like the United States Army.It
goes on with a diatribe against the President.Then he gets other letters saying that their pastor prays for
peace and
that he’s against the Army. You know, its
nonsense.This heresy of huffyism isn’t a
Catholic
thing.It is a human thing.Now, of course in Los Alamos, we don’t have much of
this, do we?I’ll tell you something.Anyone
in this town that’s served on the county council or the school board
deserves
the Congressional Medal of Honor.Now,
we all have a right to complain, but there is a right, gentle, and
loving way
to get our opinions heard, isn’t there, without going for the jugular?We have all read many of the letters in the
local paper that are so sarcastic.The
word sarcasm is Greek. It comes from sarkasmos. Sark
is “flesh” and the second part of the word means to “rip apart.” None of those letter writers are Christians. Of course, the point
I am
trying to make is live in the present moment with joy.It doesn’t mean you’re a wimp or a wuss.It
just means that you respect the dignity of
the other person, even the one you don’t agree with. Don’t be afraid of
the
future.Again, hundreds of books are
written on this topic of anxiety.People
worry about the future.The scriptures
remind us that worry will never add one day to your life and, indeed,
it will
take years from your life.Any doctor or
nurse knows that when they treat their patients, that there are many
sick
people that have nothing wrong with them but they are so full of
anxiety and
worry.That indicates a lack of trust in
God’s providence and we can’t be like that. I had some difficulty
in
preparing these thoughts today in light of the death of Patty Ann Booth.I knew Patty Ann very well.She would often come to daily mass and she
was a Eucharistic minister, usually at the 11:30 AM mass.
She
would often bring Holy Communion to her mother, Irene, who is
homebound.
One of the deacons pointed out about
preaching at difficult times about something called joy. Deacon
Ray said, he reminded me, that joy is
not a feeling. It is a grace. It’s a real thing, a sharing
in God’s free
life. Joy is equally at home with tears
and grief as it is with laughter and happiness.
Another woman who has had a difficult year said, “You know, when you’re
close to the Lord, when you are doing the best that you can, then you
can
experience joy at the most difficult of times.”
She said that joy permeates the pain and it becomes something more,
leaving
something glorious. That’s the bottom
line, that faith in Jesus Christ is the source of our peace.
Faith means that we trust in him. Blessed Julian of Norwich said,
“The greatest
honor that you can give Almighty God is to live gladly, joyfully,
because of
the knowledge of His love for you.”
Patty Ann Booth lived like that.
In fact, she spent her last day caring for the family, visiting her
mother, helping her mother, Irene. She
died like that, in peace and in joy. May
she rest in peace and may we all live like that. May we respect
each other and treat each
other with the dignity of the person that is made in God’s image.