Homily

Pope Francis published his first encyclical last Friday entitled, "The Life of Faith." Actually most of this encyclical was written by Benedict when he was pope, and Francis made some additions to it to complete it. I started reading it yesterday and I wanted to share one small part of it with you today.

It is clear that the sections I read were written by Benedict so I'll use his name here. He writes about God's revelation of Himself to Abraham, and Abraham's response in faith. Then he moves on to Exodus and Moses leading the people of Israel out of Egypt into the desert. When Moses goes up onto the mountain to speak with God, the people down on the desert floor begin to feel bored and abandoned, so they build a golden calf and begin to worship it. Here is what Benedict writes:

"Idols exist, we begin to see, as a pretext for setting ourselves at the center of reality and worshipping the work of our own hands. Once man has lost the fundamental orientation which unifies his existence, he breaks down in to the multiplicity of his desires. . ."

So instead of God being at the center of our lives, instead of faith being the guide for our thoughts and actions, we turn away to focus on our own works, our own ideas, our own glory. And when we do that, when we step out of the guidance of living in faith, we lose or give up the real goal of human life and we fill that empty spot with trying to satisfy our many desires. That is true for individuals, and that is true for a culture as well, just as we see the Israelites choosing their own style of God in the Sinai desert, and fashioning it with their own hands.

Benedict continues: ". . . in refusing to await the time of promise, (man's) life story disintegrates into a myriad of unconnected instants." So faith is the guide for our life not only in focusing us on our relationship to our God, but also it keeps us steady and connected in time. We don't jump from one action to another, one purpose to another, never knowing where we might be going next, never caring about where we might have been. Faith keeps us steady so we move from day to day and year to year. It keeps us focused and directed.

"Idolatry then, is always polytheism, an aimless passing from one lord to another." I love how Benedict here does not say that the opposite of faith is atheism. He says the opposite of faith is idolatry. It is the worship of man, the things man creates, the many gods he can put before himself as objects for his devotion, the idols he seeks after which never bring peace or lasting satisfaction and which can be changed out for new idols at any given moment, because they are man made. We need not be tied to the past, and we shouldn't worry that we might have to find new and better idols for tomorrow. We have no goal but what we want now. We have no lord except the lord we want now.

"Idolatry does not offer a journey but rather a plethora, (a multitude) of paths heading nowhere and forming a vast labyrinth (a maze). Those who choose not to put their trust in God must hear the din of countless idols crying out: 'Put your trust in me!'" Today, if you say to many people that while you respect the rights of others to believe and worship as they choose, you yourself hold that there is only one true faith that is found in the Church established by Jesus Christ, you will be called a heretic, a blasphemer, a bigot, a hater and un-American. We are constantly being lectured in public on the importance of honoring diversity. We are often told that there are many paths that all lead to the same place. But, my friends, all we need to do is open up any map to see that this is not true. If I want to go to New York, I-5, Rt. 38 and Hwy 99 will not get me there. They will take me somewhere, but not where I really want to go. This idea that is accepted unthinkingly by so many Americans cannot be true: all religions or religious beliefs cannot be equally true. All opposing moral values cannot be equally true. That can only happen if you believe that faith is basically unimportant in human life, and it's simply a matter of personal tastes or cultural attachments, not an encounter with the living God.

So I love what he writes here about the noisy world we live in, where the noisiest of noises is that of many idols calling out, "Put your faith in me!" I'm sure you can name for yourself and recognize many of those idols. Think of government, social issues, technology, entertainment and sports, institutions, universities and schools—the many ways and the many places where idols call out to us. And then very personally there may be idols in our own lives that also call out, "Pick me, not Him! Serve me, not Him!"

"Faith, tied as it is to conversion, is the opposite of idolatry: it breaks with idols to turn to the living God in a personal encounter. Believing means entrusting oneself to a merciful love which always accepts and pardons, which sustains and directs our lives, and which shows its power by its ability to make straight the crooked lives of history. Faith consists in the willingness to let ourselves be constantly transformed and renewed by God's call Herein lies the paradox: by constantly turning towards the Lord, we discover a sure path which frees us from the dissolution (the corrupting breakdown) that is imposed on us by idols."

So, are there any idols out there that are attracting us, tempting us, calling out and gaining our attention? Are there any idols much closer and more personal that hold us back from living more faithfully in the presence of God? Can we identify them? And will we turn away from them, even again and again if we need to, so that instead we may serve not a dead-ended idol, but the living God Whose face we see in the face of Christ? The golden calf of the Israelites may seem foolish, yet, truly, no more foolish than any other idol that may attract our attention.

One Lord, one faith, one path, one love, one fulfillment with our Creator, and here and now we worship God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, and may it be so ever more completely until our last breath, so that we might get back home because we have found and followed our true way.