Third Sunday of Easter, cycle C

John 21:1 -19

My grandmother on my father's side stood out among all my relatives. She was a hugger. My mother's parents were both first generation German, and the ten children grew up on a farm. They showed affection by teasing each other, but didn't hug. My Grandfather on my Father's side didn't hug either, and none of my cousins did at least when we were kids. And my wife comes from a similar background of non-huggers. I think one of the reasons we were attracted to each other was because we didn't naturally hug. Nevertheless, we ended up with six children. We didn't think our family was unusual until one day we were at church somewhere in another town, and at the sign of peace, several people turned to each other and hugged. At that my youngest daughter, about six I think, tugged on my coat and with a worried expression on her face, remarked, “Dad, Higbys don't hug.”.

A lot of people, myself included, have problems with intimacy. Couples are often counseled to say, “I love you” to each other frequently. That's because intimacy has to be expressed. I think among some couples and in some families it takes a lifetime to develop real intimacy, and it's not helped when a child who has reached out is ignored or even rebuffed. And it happens a lot, even when a parent means well or doesn't recognize that cry for intimacy.

In our Gospel reading, we need to recall that other time when there was a charcoal fire – when Peter was warming himself in the courtyard of the high priest. And Peter three times denied that he knew Jesus, just as Jesus had predicted. Luke says that after this denial Jesus glanced at him and Peter went out and wept. Think of how Peter must have felt. He had been one of Jesus' closest friends; he'd been the first to recognize that Jesus was the Messiah. He'd been told that he was the rock on which Jesus would build his church. He'd even sworn that he would die with Jesus. And after the three-fold denial, he didn't even have an opportunity to beg Jesus for forgiveness. I don't know if any of the other apostles witnessed this; it seems when you read the gospels that only Peter got into that courtyard. But I wonder about those days after the Resurrection. When Jesus first appeared, did Peter dare look him in the eye? And the second time, when Thomas was there, was Peter off in the corner hoping he wouldn't be noticed? And then they go back to Galilee and wait. And finally Peter, fed up with standing around waiting, tells the others he is going fishing. And off they go.

When we are ashamed of something we've done, we often retreat into the familiar. That was a common response among my children. We'd have an argument, and it often ended with the child going to her room and closing the door, sometimes forcefully. Peter was no different. He was a fisherman, and this was an honorable profession. He probably enjoyed his work and his place in the community. Filled with shame, he hoped that going out on the water and doing what he did best would help. But it didn't. The whole night they caught nothing. You could say that without Jesus, their efforts were wasted and I think that's something the gospel writer wants us to think about, especially when the stranger on the shore tells them to throw the net on the other side of the boat – and they make a huge catch. And then they recognize that it is the Lord.

Peter has lived with his shame and by now wants desperately to apologize; he throws himself into the water and is the first one by the charcoal fire. It says the apostles knew it was the Lord but none dared say anything. Perhaps they all were feeling a little shame, having deserted him when he needed them the most.

Peter is a nickname. The Lord gave it to Simon. It means “Rocky” or something like that. I suspect Jesus was referring to Peter's future role – that he would be the rock on which Jesus' church would be built -- but maybe there was irony here as well. Rocky had crumpled at the first sign of pressure, there on that awful night. Notice that the Lord does not use the nickname here. He calls Peter by his given name, Simon, son of John. That's formal; Jesus is being very serious. I am sure seared into Peter's memory is that threefold denial by a charcoal fire. And Jesus invites Peter to revisit that moment of betrayal. He doesn't point out that Peter betrayed him. He doesn't make excuses for Peter, or gloss over what happened. Jesus says, “Do you love me more than these?” Many authorities think “these” refers to Peter's trade, his family, his home, his boat – the comfortable life he left to follow Jesus. The gospel writer has Jesus using the word for sacrificial love, agape. Peter responds that he loves Jesus using the word meaning love between brothers, philo. Jesus asks a second time, using the word for sacrificial love, and again Peter in reply uses the word for brotherly love. Finally, Jesus in his third question, uses the word for brotherly love, to which Peter, now hurt by the repeated questioning, replies that Jesus knows everything, he knows Peter loves him – like a brother. We don't pick up this exchange because we only use one word for love. But I think we miss something that was probably understood by the people who read this gospel in the original – Peter has learned from his own experience that he can't trust himself to love in that sacrificial way, and when he admits that, twice, Jesus lets him off the hook by using the word for brotherly love himself.

It might have sounded something like this: Jesus: Simon Johnson, is your love for me stronger than your love for anything else? Peter: Yes, Lord, you are like a brother to me. Jesus: Simon Johnson, is your love for me strong enough to die for me? Peter: Yes Lord, you are like my own flesh and blood. Jesus: Simon Johnson, do you love me like a brother, at least? Peter: Lord, you know all things, you know I love you like a brother!. Now when Jesus goes on to predict how Peter will die, it makes a little more sense. Jesus is essentially saying that you may not love me enough to die for me now, but someday you will.

This gospel tells us that true knowledge of God requires intimacy – with the person of Jesus, who is God's word. And intimacy must be expressed. We are seeing more and more people label themselves as spiritual but not religious. A lot of bad things have happened because of religious people, its true. But real love, intimate love, needs to be expressed. That's what worship is all about, the kneeling and standing, the singing of hymns, the recitation of the Lord's prayer together, the very act of coming to church rather than finding something more exciting or interesting to do. And Peter is on his way to learning that.

And I think huggers have an advantage over non-huggers, because they are comfortable expressing their affection physically. And religious people who are spiritual have an advantage over those who are merely spiritual for the same reason – they have a venue where they can express their love of God among their fellow lovers, and that at least has the potential to make love grow.

Second Sunday of Easter, 2019

John 20:19 - 31

One of the many joys of being a grandfather is that you can get away with telling your young grandchildren fantastic stories and they believe you! We all go through that stage where we do not doubt. I have a memory of when I was about three or four, when I was teased by my grandfather and one of his friends. They insisted that I had a tail, and all I had to do was turn around and I could see it. But of course the more I turned, the region in which the tail was supposed to be also turned. I did not doubt, though.

Probably every Christian has a little sympathy for Thomas, who because of this short gospel story, has been known as the Doubter for two thousand years. Thomas who said to the other disciples, “Let us go down to Jerusalem with him to die with him”. Thomas who probably traveled as far as Paul did, founding churches up and down the gulf of Arabia and into India. Thomas who died a martyr. And I think we misinterpret Christ's words to him: “Thomas, you have believed because you have seen; blessed are those who have not seen, but believe.” It is not a rebuke of Thomas, I think, but rather, a recognition of the fact that believers are that way because of a special grace from God. John makes it clear in his gospel that belief is a gift, not something that comes about because you've reasoned to it. Belief, even that of Thomas, is always a gift. But I'd like to look at something else today.

Why do the gospel writers record the resurrection appearances that they do? According to John and Paul Jesus appeared many other times; and if we believe Sister Faustina, He continues to appear to some of his followers even today. So why these appearances? It isn't just to impress us, or convince us that Jesus rose from the dead. One purpose is to show us where we can find Jesus.

The first point made by all the writers is that if you look into the tomb, you will not find Jesus. The angel emphasizes this: Why are you looking for the living one among the dead? The tomb is empty and it is a promise to us that our tombs will be empty some day. Perhaps it reminds us not to regard Jesus as someone “up there” who no longer moves among his people.

The second point is that for many of the appearances Jesus is at first not recognized. In Luke, when Jesus appears to the twelve,“They thought He was a ghost.” Jesus has to convince them that he really has risen from the dead by showing them his wounds and eating something. And you remember the other appearances. Mary Magdalene doesn't recognize Jesus until he calls her by name. The two disciples on the way to Emmaus don't recognize him until he breaks bread with them. When the seven apostles describe in John go fishing in Galilee, eventually the Beloved disciple, the one who previously believed because of his great love, recognizes Jesus first, and this triggers recognition in the others. What does all this mean? I think it means that the Risen Jesus is with us; we don't see Him most of the time. If we did, we would not have a need for faith; we would not be able to make a choice; and Jesus wants us to choose to love him, not force it on us.

But he is with us nonetheless. When we read the gospel story today, we should note that John has Jesus appearing among his disciples on the first day of the week, and again on the eighth day. That is deliberate. John wants us to note that Jesus can be found in the assembly of believers; among those who come together to worship. Jesus himself told us that when two or three are gathered in his name, there he was.

When we remember the two disciples on the way to Emmaus, we should note that as they rushed back to tell the apostles of the fact that they had met the Risen Lord, they spoke about how their hearts were burning within them as he interpreted the scriptures for them. Jesus is present in the scriptures, specifically, when they are being interpreted, when they are being read prayerfully and with the help of the Holy Spirit. It is so unfortunate when Christians don't read the scriptures, or read them superficially, or read them as some kind of text book. Truly, they should read them together, perhaps in small groups, because the meaning is not in the mere words but is in the interpretation of those words. Someone once said that the bible is not inspired until it is read by someone with the help of the Holy Spirit.

In the time after the Resurrection Jesus is recognized by the Emmaus disciples and by the seven disciples on the shore in the breaking of the bread. We Catholics hold that in the Mass the bread and the wine become the body and blood of Christ, as do many other Christian bodies. And there are Christian bodies who do not believe that. Some believe that the bread and wine remain, but Jesus becomes present; some believe that the action is only a symbol; and there are some, like the Mormons, who don't even believe you need bread and wine, because the acting out of a sacred meal is all that matters. But every Christian body has a ritual in which they try to carry out Jesus' command, to do this in memory of him; and that is the third place we can find Jesus; in the breaking of the bread in his memory.

Every Christian can seek the presence of Jesus in the assembly of fellow Christians, in the scriptures prayerfully read and studied; and in the breaking of the bread. And there are two more situations where Jesus can be discovered. One is when he is sought with deep love. We see this in Mary Magdalene, who weeps at the tomb, who cries out, “where have you taken my Lord?” And Jesus answers by speaking her name – the shepherd calls his sheep by name. The Beloved Disciple on seeing the empty tomb, believes because of his great love, in circumstances when Peter only wonders.

And the other, I think, is when a committed Christian struggles with doubt. To read the whole story of Thomas shows that he is as much a true disciple of Jesus as the rest of them; both before and after the Resurrection. But Thomas has honest doubts, and the Lord knows that doubt is part of being human. Mother Theresa reported to her confessor that most of her life she struggled with doubt; and yet she is a saint. Doubt is normal, and when we face our doubt, when we realize that a condition for faith is doubt, (because when we are certain of something it's no longer faith), it is then the Jesus shows us his hands and feet, and invites us to touch him and doubt no longer.

Jesus has risen from the dead. He is already here among us. He has shown us where to find him. And sadly, some of us will not bother to look for him.

Palm Sunday cycle C

Luke 19:28 – 40

Its time for the Passover feast. The population of Jerusalem will go from about 50,000 to more than 200,000, as Jews from all over the world come to celebrate their liberation from slavery in Egypt. It's a time of great joy, but the Jewish authorities worry about too much celebration or even rebellion. The Jews may have gotten away from Egypt, but the Pilate's soldiers would think nothing of putting down a rebellion against Roman rule. As the eight day feast begins, Pilate will march into the city on a majestic horse followed by charioteers and foot soldiers. It will be a reminder to the Jews about who really rules; a reminder that even while they celebrate their deliverance from Egypt they are slaves to Rome.

Jesus deliberately acts out a prophecy. Zechariah said, “Rejoice greatly, Daughter Zion! Shout, Daughter Jerusalem! See, your king comes to you, righteous and victorious, lowly and riding on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey”. Jesus' followers place him on the animal and welcome him into the city. They recognize what is happening and call him king and throw down their garments for him to ride over, because that's how you treat a king. At last it seems that Jesus is going to establish the kingdom his followers have expected; at last this messenger of God will drive out the Romans and Israel will regain its independence. The Messiah of God and some ragged followers will take on Pilate and his trained army – and they will win.

The gospel we read at the beginning of the liturgy describes that moment of expectation, of triumph. The people were shouting “Hosanna!” the other gospel writers tell us. This is not a cry of triumph or praise; it means “Save us, Lord”.

Have you ever cried out “save us Lord” or something like that? I think we all have. Take away my cancer! Bring my child back to the Church! Keep me from losing my job!. Because you are, after all, the savior, Jesus!

My kind of savior comes in triumph, makes things right, lifts up the lowly, pulls down the high and mighty. In fact, my kind of savior is exactly like the one the Blessed Mother expected when she sang her Magnificat; it was the kind of savior for which all Israel waited. I know the kind of savior I need, one who repairs things, who intervenes with power, who I always know is present, the one who is my sword and my shield.

But that's not the kind of savior Jesus is. God rides on a donkey; Jesus dies in order to live; he is a suffering king. He comes into his kingdom with nothing but love, humility and sacrifice. We live in a world of pain, suffering and contradiction. We can accept the world as it is in the humility that we don't understand God's plans for the world or for us; Jesus The kingdom Jesus brings is a kingdom of peace; a kingdom of slow, self-emptying love; a kingdom of patience, a kingdom that demands from us a degree of trust, vulnerability, and courage. It's a kingdom that Pilate and Herod and you and I can hardly imagine; but that's what our king shows us and our Blessed Mother learned at the foot of the cross.. But we are obsessed with certainty, with ease, with safety, with prosperity. It's hard for us to follow a king like Jesus.

Palm Sunday starts with triumph in the gospel we read in the back of the church when the palms were blessed. The readings end with the king we follow dying on the cross and us hiding in a locked room. And the question we should ask on Palm Sunday is what kind of king do we follow? Do we trust him to be our shepherd and stay with him even when our world seems to be crashing down? Or do we cling to safety and certainty and not rocking the boat, hoping for a king that doesn't exist?

Fifth Sunday of Lent, cycle C

Fifth Sunday in lent, cycle c

John 8:1-11

I went to a very liberal medical school. It was the middle of the Vietnam war, and those of you who are old like me probably remember how polarized the country became over this issue. At my school, one professor in particular would organize “teach ins” to which we were not forced to go, at least not in so many words. At the teach ins we would hear several speakers, often from the university of California at Berkeley, describe in vivid detail the atrocities of the war and how north Vietnam was just a poor country of farmers that wanted to be left alone. And how those in the military who fought in this war were war criminals. And on and on it went. There was no attempt to present the opposite side; the only people that were allowed to demonstrate on campus had to be invited there by a professor or student group. And as might be expected, by the time we graduated most of us had become radicalized. A few of us had close friends that were in the military, and some of us thought that our defense of south Vietnam was basically a good thing, but we were in a very silent minority. My class had been radicalized into a mob.

Ever since then I've been very wary of mobs. The story of the woman caught in adultery is a story about mobs. You have a crowd of people who are taking a woman out to execute her for breaking the mosaic law. And they are following the law; it says right there that if you catch a man and a woman in the act of adultery they are to be stoned. Of course we could always ask about where the man was in this case, but that's beside the point. There were two ways of stoning someone; one was to throw the person down on stones which almost happened to Jesus when a mob was going to throw him off a cliff. The other, assuming a cliff wasn't handy, was to pick up stones and throw them until the person was dead. That's what happened to saint Stephen. Paul was stoned once as well, but lived through it.

Another thing going on here is that execution was against roman law, unless it was approved by roman authority. That, of course, was the point of getting Pilate to allow the crucifixion of Jesus. But the way around that was to form a mob. Sometimes the Romans would execute the whole mob if they could get there in time with the troops; but usually the process was over and the mob dispersed before the Romans even heard about it. And that's what is happening here. Obviously the enemies of Jesus are using this occasion to put him on the spot, but for the mob, that was just an aside. They were fired up with zeal and could barely wait until this sinner was dead.

That's the thing about a mob. However it begins, it makes the people in the mob choose sides. And when you are caught up in the emotions of a mob, you stop thinking rationally. And you catch the emotions of those around you and reflect them back until the whole group is on fire. It's primitive; it's something from our animal ancestors.

If we are part of a mob, by definition we are being irrational. The mob planning to stone the woman caught in adultery is a classic mob; but there are other kinds as well. You don't have to be physically marching down the street. Think about die hard sports fans. Have people really broken up friendships because one was for the Yankees and the other for the Red Sox? Can you develop a mob using the press or social media? Of course. We are seeing a lot of that these days and it's concerning. The Kavenaugh hearings brought out the beast in our country with people shouting for his head. And think of the national mob that rose up over the kids from Covington. Had there not been proof that they had actually behaved in an exemplary way they might very well have been expelled from their high school and worse – that after all was what the mob was crying for.

I suspect most of us are at least touched by that mob mentality now and then. If you believe strongly in something, the tendency is to see those who believe differently as the enemy and once you make this identification even if you are on the side of angels you've become a little irrational and when you find like-minded people who can magnify your feelings by agreeing with you, you've started a mob.

Jesus bends down ad writes on the dirt. People have wondered why ever since the gospel was written. Some say Jesus was just doing what came naturally in those times – doodling on the ground while he gathered his thoughts. And of course my grandmother told me he was writing down the sins of the people who were in the mob. But maybe Jesus was doing the only thing you can do to stop a mob – distract them. They were full of passion, they knew they were doing what god had commanded and at the same time thumbing their noses at the Romans, and to top it all off, they had a chance to put Jesus on the spot. What's you answer, Jesus? Quick, what's you answer?

And they paused and waited, and while they waited, their rational selves awoke, and to those rational selves Jesus said, “let him who is without sin cast the first stone.” And one by one they left the mob and went home.

If you are not part of a mob, your tendency is to keep silent. And because of that silence, the mob has changed our world very quickly. Same sex marriage, abortion without any restrictions, five year old's being surgically and chemically changed into the opposite sex because a boy played with a doll or a girl wanted to play football; Christians being demonized because they don't want to go along with the mob – and perhaps among the saddest consequences – a rapid rise in the fraction of the population who want nothing to do with religion, which is probably the only counter to the mob. Being a Christian means that we try to see where Jesus is in our own story, and in the story we've just heard, Jesus is all about mercy … but he is against sin and against mobs.

Third Sunday of Lent, cycle C

Luke 13:1 - 9

The other day I spent some time with an elderly lady who had been hospitalized for about three weeks and was now trying to get her strength back. She was a bit depressed, and in the course of our conversation she told me that she knew why God was doing this to her – she hadn't been to church for about a decade. Then she went on to tell me that the reason she stopped going to church was because they had changed everything from when she was young. And then she told me that all the scandals going on in our Church were because God was punishing us because of those changes. She was pretty sure we got President Trump because we aren't doing anything to put an end to abortion. I didn't have the heart to ask her what God was planning to do to us because marijuana is now legal.

The people of Jesus' time believed that when bad things happened, it was all God's doing. You remember when Jesus' own disciples asked him whose sin caused a man to be born blind – his sin or his parent's sin? What did those Galileans do that God allowed Pilate to kill them? What about those people building a tower, what was their sin? We twentieth century Christians are so much more sophisticated. We don't look for a hidden sin when tragedy strikes someone. Except for maybe that elderly lady.

The first thing we should notice about this gospel is that Jesus more or less tells us that we can't blame God when bad things happen, nor should we believe that if we become ill or lose a loved one or go bankrupt, it's not because we are sinners. After all, we are all sinners, we all miss the mark. There is a whole branch of theology that tries to figure out how if God is perfect, all powerful, all good, and all loving, why do we get sick and die, why do children get cancer, why do typhoons wipe out whole villages, why was there a holocaust? And we've all heard explanations ranging from “God is punishing someone” to “God has his reasons which we will find out in the next life.” I don't believe either is the answer, but I don't have an answer. I think Jesus is saying today, that isn't the question. The real question is are you changing? Are you taking advantage of the time you still have left on your meter?

Jesus says, “repent or perish”, which sounds a lot like one of those old fire and brimstone preachers. But repent isn't a dirty word; the original word in the Greek language was metanoia, which means something like “get above your mind” or “change your direction” or maybe simply “wake up”. Because we know the natural tendency is not to change. I had a friend once who would answer the question “how are you”? With a percentage '' 80 %, 70%, whatever. He explained that the number expressed how close things were to where he wanted them to be. But the interesting thing is that most of the time he answered roughly the same fraction. He must have been content with 75%. And I think that's how a lot of us are in our spiritual lives. We aren't where we want to be, but we aren't really willing to put in the effort and time. And Jesus is saying that we risk “perishing” because the reason most of us are content with 75% is that there are a lot of little things we'd have to change to do better; Maybe we'd have to give up some television time and get involved in some ministry. Maybe we'd have to put down the book we're reading and pick up some spiritual reading or the bible. Maybe we would, heaven forbid, have to take 15 of our precious minutes to say the rosary. I'm not picking on anyone; I am speaking from experience. And the trouble is always what pulls us away from God can be boiled down to pleasure, prestige, power, or wealth. And the pursuit of these will never get us to 100% which can only be found in God. If our lives are controlled by our urges, appetites and desires we are perishing. If we are blind to the needs of others we are perishing. If we cannot control our anger and lash out whenever we are provoked, we are not living; we are perishing. If we cannot make peace with the pains of our past, but keep rehearsing them in or minds over and over again, we are not living; we are perishing. Repentance isn't a prison sentence; it's the path that liberates us from a life that just settles, a life that we could never call “abundant” – which is the life that Jesus calls us to.

The parable of the fig tree is meant to be a wake-up call. At any moment the owner of the vineyard will ask if I have fulfilled the purpose for which I was created, and whether I have or have not, there will be no more opportunity. If I'm only 60% of the way there, I hope I'll be graded on a curve. But the parable also tells us of God's mercy. He is the God of another chance, and today he is offering you and I yet another chance to change our minds, to wake up, to repent. And the best news from the parable of the fig tree is that he will give us everything we need to reach that abundant life he wants for us, that complete joy that Jesus wishes to share.

Some of you know I'm a bible geek. This parable is only in the gospel of Luke. There is another acted out parable in Matthew and Mark, where Jesus comes upon a fig tree which was full of leaves, but had no fruit. Jesus cursed the tree and it withered and died. I wonder if Luke is thinking about that episode when he described this parable. He's reminding us that we are called to bear fruit, but it's never too late to take advantage of what God offers us to achieve this goal.

The bible doesn't tell us what happened to this fig tree. Despite the efforts of the gardener, did it still bear no fruit when the owner came back the next year? Was it still just taking up space and exhausting the ground? Or did it finally bear figs, did it finally achieve the purpose for which the vineyard owner had intended when he planted it? We can only hope. For the fig tree – and us.

Second Sunday of Lent, cycle C

Luke 9:28 - 36

I'm convinced that there are different kinds of minds. I have friends who can get lost in music; I appreciate music, but can take it or leave it. Same with art; some people can't live without it. And I guess I envy the passion in these people. But the ones I envy the most are the mystics. I've known a few in my life, people who seem to have an intimate connection with something beyond ordinary experience. I knew a woman when I lived in Buffalo – the wife of a physician, mother of eight, an ardent Catholic, and very very smart. She confided in us that after one of her children was born, she nearly died, and had one of those near death experiences. It was more real to her than her ordinary life, and she found that she could get glimpses of that world beyond when she was in prayer or meditating. She, by the way, had absolutely no fear of death, but contrary to what you might have thought, she enjoyed every minute of life. I envy mystics; they've seen something I never have.

I don't know if Peter, James and John were mystics – probably not. It's hard to be a mystic when you fish for a living. On the other hand, maybe out there on the water far from shore, far from noise, they may have felt something of the divine. I know that there are moments like that in my life, although never as intense as the experiences of real mystics.

Some of you may have read the book “Proof of heaven: a neurosurgeon's journey into the afterlife.” by Eben Alexander. He suffered an infection of the spinal cord and the surface of his brain that rendered him comatose – by EEG, all brain activity was gone, and he was being kept alive by machinery and his family was told that there was no hope and probably it would be best to turn off the machinery. Gradually, however, he recovered, and remembered the experience when there was, as he put it, no filter between himself and reality. He said that normally our brains filter out most of our experience. And previously a skeptic, he is now convinced that we live on after our bodies die.

I believe that the transfiguration was something like that. The apostles didn't see Jesus transfigured into some sort of god-like being, they saw Jesus unfiltered through their ordinary minds their ordinary experiences. And that was so shocking to them that even Peter was momentarily at a loss for words until he proposed building tents – but Luke tells us he did not know what he was saying. The moment was quickly over, but I suspect that the memory of this carried Peter through the rest of his life and even through his martyrdom. Did he long to once again see Jesus unfiltered?

I don't know if I'll ever have a profound mystical experience. Maybe God gives them to some people and not to others. But I would like to experience reality unfiltered. And I think if someone wants to develop a skill, you have to practice. If I wanted to learn a language, I'd need to memorize vocabulary, practice speaking with others – it would take effort. And perhaps seeing the world unfiltered, experiencing the presence of God in a more powerful way, takes practice as well. That's one of the things we are supposed to do during Lent by the way – become more aware of how God permeates everything. How our experiences are somehow knitted up into God's continued creation of the universe. And Jesus, John tells us, is the word, the Logos, the blueprint of what God has planned for the universe. And the apostle Paul tells us something similar: “... there is one God, the Father, from whom are all things and for whom we exist, and one Lord Jesus Christ, through whom are all things and through whom we exist.”

So what should we do, as Catholic Christians? How should we practice knowing Jesus? How should we open ourselves up so that we see reality unfiltered – or at least less filtered than when we start out? It does take work – on our part and on God's. But God always stands ready in the person of the Holy Spirit to point us in the right direction, to help us develop a supernatural sense.

First, we need to go where we know Jesus is. The Blessed Sacrament is where Jesus is most truly present in our world. If I want to really know someone, I don't hit the internet or start a long-distance correspondence. I try to be in the presence of the other and that's possible for you and I. Second, our Church teaches us that Jesus is present in scripture. Catholics as a rule aren't very literate in scripture. Over the course of three years if you listen to the readings on Sunday, you will hear about seventy percent of the bible. But unless you spend some time thinking about what you've read and relating it to your own life, it isn't much use. And sometimes you can find out interesting things by reading more than the passage you hear in church. Today's gospel is a case in point. While the three apostles are up on the mountain hearing the Father acknowledge his Son, the other nine are down in the valley trying to deal with another son – a boy who is the only son of his father, the father who is begging the apostles to drive out a demon, and they can't do it. Did Luke put these stories together to make a point? I don't know, but I'm going to think about it.

The third place to find Jesus is in each other. Jesus said, “Where two or three are gathered together, there I am.” And “Whatever you do for the least of my brothers that you do for me.” Every Catholic should be in seeking Jesus among others – whether it is being involved in Food for the Soul, Faith formation, the Knights of Columbus, the St. Joseph's society, the St. Mary's Guild, a bible study group, cursillo – you name it, there's something for everyone, and if you can't find it, start your own. Jesus made a promise, hold him to it.

The Transfiguration reminds us that there is a greater reality out there, and we don't appreciate it because of our filters. Jesus is that reality. This Lent resolve to go where we know He is and practice knowing Jesus.

First Sunday of Lent, cycle C

Luke 4:1-13

As some of you know, if you've been listening to my sermons over the last 22 years, I used to be a cancer doctor. Patients with cancer sometimes show amazing heroism; others get pretty depressed. And one of the things I heard patients say many times was “Why me?” Sometimes they or their loved ones would elaborate on this. “He's always been such a good person1” ; “She's been such a wonderful wife and mother; she doesn't deserve this!”; :He's way too young; he has a whole life ahead of him!”“Why do bad things happen to good people?” Cancer is one thing, but sometimes little things trigger the same response, even among holy people: Saint Theresa of Avila, who reformed the Carmelite Order together with Saint John of the Cross, was crossing a river on her horse one day as she was on her way to visit one of the Carmelite monasteries. She fell off the horse into the river and as she dragged herself to shore, she looked up to heaven and said, “If this is how you treat your friends, no wonder you have so few of them!”

The Gospels of Matthew, Mark and Luke tell almost the same story: Luke and Matthew are gentle; they say that Jesus was led by the Spirit into the desert. Mark uses a different term; he says “the Spirit drove him into the desert” a somewhat different picture indeed. But all three agree, Jesus didn't go into the desert because he wanted to, just as he didn't go to the cross because he wanted to be tortured and killed – he went because he knew that was what the Father wanted. And I think most of us have found ourselves in deserts we did not want to be in. Like my cancer patients, we look for answers, we ask “Why me?” Like Saint Theresa, we say, “But God, I'm your friend!”

When we read the story about the temptations of Jesus, it's good to remember that just before Jesus goes into the desert, he comes out of the baptismal water and hears a voice from heaven, “This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased!” And I think that event makes the temptations more understandable.

After forty days of fasting, Jesus must have been at a very low point. And it's at those points that it's hard to resist temptation. The first temptation is to turn stones into bread. But the real temptation is, “If I am God's beloved, why is he allowing me to be hungry?” Jesus is tempted to perform a miracle for a perfectly good reason but he does not, because to do so would deny the fact that He is human. And that's our cry as well; because we are God's beloved, why are we deprived? Why can't I have what I want, why should I or one of those I love be in need of anything?

I imagine that Jesus may have felt very unimportant out there in the desert. Mark tells us that he was with the wild animals. I wonder if Jesus was thinking about his future ministry – or did that come later? In any event, the second temptation, to power and glory, is really “If I am God's beloved, why are things so hard? Why doesn't he give me a short-cut; if he gave me power and glory, I could bring about the kingdom of heaven without breaking into a sweat.” And you and I are God's beloved, and sometimes we wonder why things are so difficult, why our hard work is not recognized, why our efforts to do good are sometimes met with so much resistance.

The desert is a terrifying place, especially at night when you are alone. Native Americans knew this and a rite of passage to adulthood was to go out and be alone in the desert or the forest until you had experienced a change in the way you looked at life; you would recognize it when it happened. But you had to go through that helplessness. The third temptation is for Jesus to throw himself off the temple tower, because, as Satan tells him, “the angels will bear you up”. Again, the real temptation is “If I am God's beloved, why am I vulnerable? Why will I die someday, possibly in pain; why am I growing old and losing my strength and my memory, why do I wake up with pains in my back; why do I have to take all these pills? Why is my immortal soul in so fragile a body?” And you and I are God's beloved, and ask the same question.

Jesus is driven into the desert; he had no choice. But he chooses to remain in the desert, where he has to confront what every human being must confront. Why don't I have everything I need and want? Why is it so hard, doing my work, nurturing my relationships, raising my children – and worst of all, no one truly appreciates what I have to do. And why are my days and years trickling away; why am I getting weaker rather than stronger?

And we see what Jesus does. He chooses to be hungry rather than to be satisfied; he chooses being misunderstood and doing everything the hard way (like us) rather than taking a short cut; and he chooses vulnerability over taking on superpowers. He chooses humanity.

And he does this consciously, deliberately, because of all human beings who have ever lived on earth, he does not have to; he is divine; as we will see as we read through the gospels, he exercises his divinity for others throughout his entire ministry. But there in the desert he learned what we also must learn; Man does not live by bread alone, but by God's words; You shall worship God alone; and you shall not tempt the Lord. Jesus learned that the goal of our human struggle is to embrace our humanity not because it is fragile and limited, and yes, painful at times; but because it is given to us by our Father, and we are God's beloved, and if we don't see it now, we will someday see that the Father has always acted toward you and I as he did towards Jesus; he brings us through the desert of our lives to Resurrection. Lent is the desert; fast and pray and help each other; empty yourselves out so that God can fill you up with himself.