Homily
for October 7, 2007
Liturgical Year C - Cycle I
27th Sunday in Ordinary Time
By Fr. John Carney Topic:
Old Folks Sunday
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I
guess you could say I’m in the faith business. You know, it’s
interesting that men cannot
talk to each other when they first meet for more than maybe an hour
without
asking the other man, “What do you do?”
That’s why, I think, we identify so much with what we do. That’s
why, I think, some men have trouble
when they retire because they’re not doing anything so they don’t know
who they
are. It’s interesting as a priest that
sometimes I meet up with someone on the golf course, play four or five
holes
and they say, “What do you do?” And I say, “I’m a priest.” And
they go, “Oh, no.” They have to think of what they said the last
four holes and to be honest I’m usually thinking of what I said the
last four holes. “You didn’t sound like a priest.” “Well,
I’m sorry.” You know, when you miss that two foot putt…
That’s all you need to know.
I’m around faith all the time.
That’s what we’re doing here today. We share
this faith in Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior.
Everything I do, just about, involves faith. So, if you had asked
me, “Who has the
greatest faith? Is it those who are
comfortable and well-off without any suffering in their lives?”
In one way, you could make the case they
should have the greatest faith. They
seem to be the most blessed. Or is it
the older folks, perhaps, or those who suffer a lot? Of course, I
think you know the answer to
that. It’s those who have suffered who
have the greatest faith. I don’t know if
that’s ironic or not but it’s certainly true.
As a result of that, people who inspire me the most, who increase my
faith are those who have been around awhile and who have suffered a
bit, the
older folks. I know a lot of them and
I’ve heard their stories and oftentimes their stories are quite
similar; sometimes,
it involves the loss of a spouse; sometimes the loss of children.
It always involves illness. That’s just part of being older.
Oftentimes, the heaviest cross they carry is
that their children have strayed from the faith. That’s the
greatest burden they know. I’ve been inspired by old people for
many
years. When I was in my former parish in the EastMountains, we had seven mission
churches: San Antonito, San
Antonio,
Canoncito, Carnuel, Sedillo, Escobosa and Chilili. Each of those
little towns, if you’re
familiar with any of them . . . has anyone here been to Chilili?
Have you ever been to Chilili? I call it the republic of Chilili. They have signs, “Do not enter.”
because of
the land grant issue. They’re wonderful
people there; most of them are named Gutierrez.
When I first got to Chilili, I said, “Hello Mr. Gutierrez, Hello Mrs. Gutierrez.” They
said, “You
know this new priest is very smart. He
knows everyone’s name already in the village.”
In each if these little villages there’s a little church, a capilla and
you can be sure that the best maintained building in those villages is
the
chapel even if it’s not used very often.
In ancient days, 100 years ago, they didn’t have a priest and so they
would, “catch as catch can”. When the Padre
would come by on his horse, he would baptize and bless marriages and go
to the
cemetery and do whatever. They didn’t
have a priest assigned to that parish until 1965. One time, I
told this vejete which means old
lady in Spanish, I said, “You know, you have such wonderful faith and
you
didn’t even have a priest until 1965 to bring you the sacraments on a
regular
basis.” She said without hesitation,
“Oh, Father, before the priest came we had better faith.” I never
knew what she meant by that.
The common trait of the holy ones and
that’s what they are,
they’re holy ones; the common trait they share is that they have
suffered and
they’ve suffered a lot. The years take
their toll, don’t they? I can’t look at
anybody because, “Don’t you look at me.
I’m not an old lady.” I know
women that are 90. “Don’t you call me an
old lady.” We’ll just say old folk. They’ve suffered a lot
and suffering does
something to us. If it’s accepted, as we
heard in the scripture today, if you accept a share of suffering that
the Gospel
entails; if you accept it, it strips away all the falsehoods of life.
Remember when you were a kid, the
things you thought would
make you happy, they haven’t. They strip
away the falsehood that money gives us security and peace. All those
lies that
we used to believe, are stripped away.
What is left is faith. What is
left is eternity and so they focus on what’s really true and important.
The gift of faith that we receive at
baptism is covered up
oftentimes in the earlier years by sin and neglect and distractions and
pleasures. It’s uncovered in crisis and
it’s tested in fire. We often hear this
at a funeral from the book of Wisdom, “As gold in the furnace He proved
them
and as sacrificial offerings He took them to himself. At the time
of their visitation they shall
shine. They shall judge nations and rule
over peoples and the Lord shall be their King forever.”
You know, sometimes it seems that the
prayers of the
faithful ones are not answered but they have a secret. The secret
is that they know what to pray for
and it’s not money or success or generally it’s not even health.
They pray for eternal life. The more they pray, the greater their
faith
is. The greater their faith, the more effect
they have on their loved ones. The more
effect they have on their loved ones, the more the loved ones begin to
share
the faith and lead a good life. The more
they live a good life, the more the vejetes prayers are answered.
But what is faith?
Augustine says, “Faith is believing in what we do not see and the
reward
of this faith is to see what we believe.”
But I think we can describe faith with one word and that is trust.
The faithful person trusts in God, trust in
God’s love for him or her, trust in God’s providence, divine providence
which
in my words means that somehow it’s all going to work out okay.
Regardless of how it may look, it will be
okay. It’ll work out for God’s glory if
we trust God and walk with him. God is
greatly pleased with our trust, as you are.
You know we are made in His image.
We share many qualities with God as His gift. When someone trusts
you, you appreciate that,
don’t you? You feel honored by it and
you return that trust in kind.
St Gertrude, the mystic, heard the
Lord say this to her, “Though
I look with kindness for all that is done for my glory like prayers,
fast, and
acts of piety. Yet the confidence with
which my people have recourse to me touches me more deeply.”
The great St. Catherine of Siena,
another mystic and doctor of the Church, heard the Lord say, “The more
you
abandon yourself to me and trust in me, the more I will console you
with my
grace and make you feel my presence.”
Let’s call this Old Folks Sunday and
look up to them and
realize how precious they are. I visited
a couple of our old folk this past week.
One man who’s blind, he could see a little bit. He’s got this
screen he can put a piece of
paper in and it magnifies it. The font
is about this big per letter. In
addition, he has like nine other diseases and every hour he has a clock
that
beeps and he has to take his medicines. I
went to see him and said, “How are you doing?”
He said, ‘Oh, Father, I’m fine.
It’s a beautiful day. I love this
time of year. Everything is good.” So happy, so joyful.
Then I visited Tony Porto, who will be 90 the
first of November. Tony’s been
sick. “How are you Tony?” “Oh, I’m fine. I’ll be okay
and if I’m not okay that’s
okay.” He said, “You know, I went to the
doctor and he said, ‘I couldn’t find anything wrong with you Tony.
You’re just old.’” He said, “Isn’t that a great blessing to be
old.” And he means that. You know Tony
and Bernice.
We need our old folk.
We need to look up to them. So,
this is Old Folks Sunday. If you have
one in your life, love her or love him.
If you are one, keep up your prayers, your candles, and your rosaries
because we need you. You are precious to
us and you teach us how to believe