16
Catholic San Francisco
August 25, 2006
TWENTY-FIRST SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME Joshua 24:1-4a, 15-17, 18b; Psalm 34:2-3, 16-17, 18-19, 20-21; Ephesians 5:2a, 25-32; John 6:60-69 A READING FROM THE BOOK OF JOSHUA (JOS 24:1-2A, 15-17, 18B) Joshua gathered together all the tribes of Israel at Shechem, summoning their elders, their leaders, their judges, and their officers. When they stood in ranks before God, Joshua addressed all the people: “If it does not please you to serve the Lord, decide today whom you will serve, the gods your fathers served beyond the River or the gods of the Amorites in whose country you are now dwelling. As for me and my household, we will serve the Lord.” But the people answered, “Far be it from us to forsake the Lord for the service of other gods. For it was the Lord, our God, who brought us and our fathers up out of the land of Egypt, out of a state of slavery. He performed those great miracles before our very eyes and protected us along our entire journey and among the peoples through whom we passed. Therefore we also will serve the Lord, for he is our God.” RESPONSORIAL PSALM (PS 34:2-3, 16-17, 18-19, 20-21) R. (9a) Taste and see the goodness of the Lord. I will bless the Lord at all times; his praise shall be ever in my mouth. Let my soul glory in the Lord; the lowly will hear me and be glad. R. Taste and see the goodness of the Lord. The Lord has eyes for the just, and ears for their cry. The Lord confronts the evildoers, to destroy remembrance of them from the earth. R. Taste and see the goodness of the Lord. When the just cry out, the Lord hears them, and from all their distress he rescues them. The Lord is close to the brokenhearted; and those who are crushed in spirit he saves. R. Taste and see the goodness of the Lord. Many are the troubles of the just one, but out of them all the Lord delivers him; he watches over all his bones; not one of them shall be broken. R. Taste and see the goodness of the Lord.
A READING FROM THE LETTER TO THE EPHESIANS (EPH 5:2A, 25-32) Brothers and sisters: Live in love, as Christ loved us. Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ loved the church and handed himself over for her to sanctify her, cleansing her by the bath of water with the word, that he might present to himself the church in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish. So also husbands should love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. For no one hates his own flesh but rather nourishes and cherishes it, even as Christ does the church, because we are members of his body. For this reason a man shall leave his father and his mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh. This is a great mystery, but I speak in reference to Christ and the church. A READING FROM THE HOLY GOSPEL ACCORDING TO JOHN (JN 6:60-69) Many of Jesus’ disciples who were listening said, “This saying is hard; who can accept it?” Since Jesus knew that his disciples were murmuring about this, he said to them, “Does this shock you? What if you were to see the Son of Man ascending to where he was before? It is the spirit that gives life, while the flesh is of no avail. The words I have spoken to you are Spirit and life. But there are some of you who do not believe.” Jesus knew from the beginning the ones who would not believe and the one who would betray him. And he said, “For this reason I have told you that no one can come to me unless it is granted him by my Father.” As a result of this, many of his disciples returned to their former way of life and no longer accompanied him. Jesus then said to the Twelve, “Do you also want to leave?” Simon Peter answered him, “Master, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life. We have come to believe and are convinced that you are the Holy One of God.”
Appearance on the Mountain in Galilee, tempera on wood, (1308-11) by Duccio di Buoninsegna, Museo dell’Opera del Duomo, Siena, Italy.
Scripture FATHER JOSEPH PELLEGRINO
Choosing the Lord Many of the people were leaving. This message of Jesus was just too much. “Unless you eat my flesh and drink my blood, you shall not have life within you.” Perhaps the disciples thought that Jesus didn’t recognize the popular reaction to his teaching. People were leaving. His mission to change the world would stall if it lost its grass root’s base. So the disciples came to Jesus and said, “This sort of talk is hard to endure. How can anyone take it seriously?” It was time for Jesus to tone things down. It was time for Jesus to become more politically correct and give the people what they wanted to hear. But Jesus was not interested in being political. He wasn’t about to take a poll on what the people wanted to believe. He was not about to eliminate the gift of the Eucharist because it would take a great deal of faith to accept this belief. He was not interested in compromising the truth. When the disciple reported the reaction to his teaching on the Bread of Life to him, his answer was, simply, “So, are you going to leave too?” Faith is not determined by a poll. Truth is not established by the number of people who believe one thing or another. The vast majority of the world believed in many gods two thousand years ago. Only the Jews believed in one God. They were outnumbered, but they were not wrong. At the time the vast majority of the world believed that morality was only necessary in the ways that actions affected the good of society. Only the Jews believed that morality was the way one responded to God’s love. This way of thinking still continues. Today the majority of people still follow humanitarian or society related reasons for governing their behavior, and only a minority of believers see their lifestyle as determined by serving God’s presence in others. But the minority is still correct. No poll can decided whether or not something is to be believed or not believed. No survey can decide whether a course of action is moral or immoral. Numbers do not matter. Truth matters. God matters. The Lord never, anywhere in the Bible, promised us that we would be on the majority side of every issue, or, for that matter, of any issue; but he did promise us this: that he would be with us always. “So,” Jesus responded to the Twelve, “Do you want to leave me too?” Then Peter made his greatest profession of faith: “Where else are we to go, Lord? You alone have the words of eternal life. We have come to believe and we are convinced that you are the Holy One of God.” Peter is recognizing and giving deference to Jesus’ origin. Jesus is the One who was turned to the Father for all time. He is the Eternal Word Made Flesh. He is the Source of Eternal Life. “Where else are we to go, Lord?” When people are serious about life, they realize that they must choose God or not choose God. There are no other options. “As for me and my household,” said Joshua, in our first reading, “we will serve the Lord.” I have read that Pope John Paul II was a wonderful counselor and a wonderful confessor. He developed these skills not just as Pope, but as a holy man throughout his life. The interesting thing is that when people told him about a situation of sin they had fallen into, or sought his advice on a moral matter his final answer was always the same: “You must choose.”
And so we must. And so we have. And so we do. We must choose. We have got to make a decision in our lives to stay with the Lord or to leave him. Yes, most of our parents decided for us as when they had us baptized when we were babies. They led us to the Church, and made sure we received the sacraments. Still, the decision to choose Christ became our own when we entered that stage of life, perhaps in high school, perhaps in college, perhaps at another time, when we were in control of our own decisions. Perhaps many of you drifted away from the Lord until you realized that you would have children dependent on you for their spiritual life. At that time you joined Joshua and said with your lives, “as for me and my family, we will serve the Lord.” Perhaps you were single in your early 20s and you came upon so many friends who were destroying themselves with drugs, or alcohol, or whatever, and you decided, “That is not for me. I don’t want a life where I am embarrassed by my actions.” And you made a conscious choice to be different, to choose the Lord. Whatever the motivation, these moments of actual Grace led us to make a decision to follow, to choose, to be disciples. We must choose, and so we have chosen. We picked a particular direction to our lives that focuses on the spiritual. We decided how we will live and that becomes our way, our style. When people ask us, why we don’t join in with everyone else and do this or that, our response is non judgmental but definitive. We simply say, “that is not our style.” We have chosen. We must choose, we have chosen, and we continually choose. Life is a process, a movement, a continual conversion. Another great Pope, Blessed John XXIII, formed as his motto, “Now I begin.” Every day we are confronted with the choice to follow the Lord or to go a different way. Every day we renew our determination to be his disciples. Every day we choose him. And what a choice this is! Our choice is a choice of life over death. Our choice is a choice of meaning over futility. Our choice is a choice of the divine over the mundane. St. Paul tells the Romans and us, “I urge you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God, your spiritual worship. Do not conform yourselves to this age but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and pleasing and perfect.” The choice of the Lord gives us the same gift that Peter and the disciples received. The choice of the Lord results in our sharing the Bread of Life, the Body and Blood of Christ. This is not just something we do every Sunday. The Eucharist is our participation in the death and resurrection of the Lord. Our choice of the Lord results in our sharing the Lord dying for each of us, rising from the dead for each of us and giving eternal life, eternal happiness and joy to each of us. He fills the empty hearts. He gives meaning to life. The One who is united to the Father offers this life to each of us. How can we go anywhere else? We are not Catholics by default of our family background. We are not Christian by default of our culture. We have been chosen by the Lord. And, we, in response to this choice, have chosen Him. “Lord, where else are we to go. You alone have the words of eternal life.”