Homily

We are reminded today in Luke's Gospel that not everyone loved Jesus when He was preaching, teaching, and healing in the land of Israel 2000 years ago. As we heard today, after he cures a woman from her illness of 18 years, she gives glory to God, but the head of the local synagogue complains and criticizes her for breaking the Sabbath. What I find so very interesting here is that he criticizes the woman, not Jesus Who cured her. She did not even ask to be healed, but she is blamed for getting well. The synagogue man makes his statement to her and to the crowd of people, but not directly to the One Who healed her. Why not go after Jesus?

And why is the synagogue chief not happy about this healing? Why isn't he also giving glory to God for having been able to witness this great miracle? There is something wrong about him, something flawed, some great weakness or sin that causes him to lash out at Jesus, and yet he doesn't directly speak to Jesus. He makes a general angry statement to the crowd. Most of the time Jesus' enemies do speak directly to Him, but there are a number of places where they criticize Him, but not directly, and not to His face.

And it made me think that there is a similar pattern that goes on in our society today among people and interests in the media, and in the entertainment and the academic worlds. Most of the time you will not hear any real criticism directed to Jesus Himself, but only to those who believe in Him and follow His teachings. Very few people, and I mean very few people who are hostile to or critical of Christians, will blame Jesus for their complaints. They will not engage Jesus directly; they are only interested in going after His disciples.

It makes me think about the beginnings of the Church in the Roman Empire. There were people in power and authority, leaders in society and academics, who embraced the Gospel of Christ. But so many of those in positions of influence or authority just could not see giving up the old established order in which they held power in exchange for a new order where they would have to acknowledge that all power comes from the hand of God, and all peoples are subject to His loving authority. Most of the people who embraced the Gospel were the poor, the powerless, the slaves, the ordinary people of the Roman world. And they did not say, "Oh, I believe in the teachings of the Church and that's why I became a Christian." No! They came to believe in Jesus Christ and His Good News and that's why they became Christians. And because they were Christians, they embraced the teachings and moral values of the Church, because they saw the Church as the Body of Christ. It was not some institution of powerful Vatican officials who decide what people should believe, as you can fairly often falsely read in newspaper accounts of Church teachings. No. They were a part, each one, a member of the one Body of Christ. Notice what St. Paul says today to the Ephesians: ". . . you are now no longer strangers and foreigners, but you are citizens with the saints and members of God's household; you are built upon the foundations of the apostles and prophets with Christ Jesus Himself as the Chief Cornerstone. In Him the whole structure is closely fitted together . . . "

I think a lot of what we see today in our society is the desire of a number of people to go back to the type of pre-Christian pagan society that existed when the Church was born: all religions are basically the same, and the traditional gods may hold a certain place of honor in the affairs of state, but no real power to influence that state. Moral values are based on traditional values but those can change with the times as long as those in power don't feel threatened by it. The state has the power to legislate morality and enforce it without your consent, or regard to your beliefs. Those who gain power politically or financially will have great lives, and obviously how much power you have determines how much your life is worth, or not worth, and may determine when and how you live or die.

Although I don't think many who have the public spotlight today have an intentional desire to return to the paganism of the Roman Empire, they are, in fact, trying to lead us there. They cannot do so by attacking Jesus directly, (1) because it is pretty hard to do that without looking foolish and hateful, and (2) because it would truly anger most of the people. You don't attack Jesus. You attack His followers, His Church, those who believe in Him. You are not against Christians, you are just against Christians who believe this thing, or that thing. You're not against Christians, except for the ones who foolishly and ignorantly hold on to the same beliefs, teachings, and morality as Jesus' followers did 2,000 years ago.

You don't have to attack Jesus. You just need to put His followers in their place. Here's how you do it. "You have one day a week in which to follow your God. Be religious on that day — unless you have shopping, or a game to play, or a race to be run, or you need to wash the car. But do not defile the weekdays with your faith. (or Saturday, either.)"

Yes, there's a lot of scorn and ridicule and disrespect in the society for our faith and there are a lot of people who tell us that we're only allowed to talk in the public square if we leave our religion at home, because they have decided the public square is only fit for atheists and pagans and for those who are willing to talk and act like atheists and pagans.

But how can we leave the Gospel at home? How can be separate ourselves from Christ in order to try and gain some peoples' respect? How can we hide the Gospel of Jesus from the eyes of the world and yet tell people it is important to us? How can we ever act as though there is only one day of the week on which we can be healed in Christ, and look for a better deal on the other six days.

The other day someone on TV who was doing a documentary on America attended a voodoo ceremony in Louisiana and, off camera, on the commentary he said, "Please understand, I could no more believe in the power of voodoo than I could believe in the power of the Virgin Mary." Instantly my blood started to boil. I believe he was honest, and I also believe he feels at least a little bit superior to people like us, making a comparison between voodoo and Christianity as if they're simply different expressions of the same kind of foolishness.

But I realize my anger does very little good unless I can convert it into a better effort to carry Christ in my heart and Him to the world by my words and actions and my prayers that people like the guy on TV would come to know Christ, even through the power of the prayers of the Mother of God. And may we all put our lives, seven days a week, into the hands of our Lord, so we can carry Him out to everyone we meet.