The Church of Saint Matthew - Saint Paul’s West Side

08.29.2020 Homily

This passage of the gospel falls immediately after the passage that was part of the gospel of last week. Remember, last week Jesus comes into the region and He says, "What do people say that I am?" And then Peter confesses, "You are the Christ, the son of the living God." And then Jesus changes his name. He says, From now on you're Peter," and He gives to him the keys of the kingdom of heaven. And later that day or the next day, Jesus says, "Now what it means to be the Son of the living God is this. That I must go to Jerusalem. I must suffer. I must die. And I must be raised to life." All four of those pieces have the word must with it. That you cannot be the son of the living God without this happening.
Peter says, “Well it will never happen." The one who just almost hours before confessed, 'You are the son of the living God," now challenges Jesus. The Greeks have two ways of describing time. One word they use is kronos, like chronometer, and that's just ordinary time, regular time. It's like you would say, Oh, I had a wonderful time at the birthday party, or it's time to pay property taxes, or I really should see the doctor. It's been a long time since I've seen the doctor. That's the kind of time that is kronos, But then the Greeks have another word for time and that's kairos. And that means time that's transformational in life, time that makes the world stop and then move in a different direction. It is time that is suffused with the power of the spirit. The Transfiguration story in the gospel reflects that kind of time, that kairos time. And what happened to Peter, that also is kairos time, is transformational time. It's turning things upside down. He gets a new name and he gets a new mission. 
This time, this special time, this transformational time is really the time that makes the ultimate difference in life. When you're experiencing that kind of time, when that kind of transformational event occurs, you don't always understand it when it's happening. You know, Peter did not understand what he was saying. When he said "You are the Christ, the son of the living God," he didn't understand that until after the Resurrection and the Ascension of Jesus and the coming forth of the Holy Spirit. Then all of a sudden the light went on, and then all of a sudden he saw a life change.  There is a new heaven and a new earth. 
Well, my friends, I believe that COVID-19 is for us a transformational moment. I believe the time that we're experiencing is that kairos time. Transformational time always involves prophecy, and the work of the prophet is to point out the signs of the times. And the kairos time provides a unique opportunity, an invitation, a challenge. And the invitation is to live in a new future, not the future I dreamed about a year ago, but a new future. That there is something very new. People say to me, when are we going to get back to normal? And my answer is we'll never get back to normal. What we're experiencing is a profound change in life. We need a new vision of something more than just what was old and just clean it up. We need a vision of a new community. We need a vision of a new society.   And in the United States, we need a vision of a post-racial world. 
The old world is run off. It's run its course, it's going and gone. I just can't polish up things and straighten up things and say, okay now, now everything's going to go on like it was before, because it's not. What we do know is that at least at this point in this transformational moment, there are a number of realities that are held together. One of them is the experience that we are having with COVID-19, but linked to it very, very tightly is the experience that not only this country, but the world, has undertaken as a result of the events that were associated with George Floyd's death.
Peter ultimately realized what the Lord was saying and doing with him. But the way that you realize that transformational moment, the way that it makes sense for you, it's a hard thing to do. But it means going back and rediscovering your roots, rediscovering what are the ultimate facts of who you are, or the ultimate facts of what this society is, or the ultimate facts about what this community is. And then from that point to rebuild in a new spirit. 
The Germans have a word for it. Now this word is 26 letters long for Bergegenheistaufarbitung is what they call it. And it means the process by which we strive to learn from our histories, the process by which we strive to learn from our histories, the process by which we go back to our roots, a process by which we don't take anything for granted, the process by which we embrace the ultimate facts of our lives. That there is God, that human beings are made in the very image of God, that the love of God is inclusive and embrasive of all, that human beings are part of God's creation, and that there's a fundamental connection between the elements of the created universe, between me and the rest of the created universe. 
Those are some of the basic principles. There are others, but we go back and we grab onto those really tight. And then we say in light of that, how do we want to live it? How do we want to live it? And I would suggest we have to do the same thing with the society, the principles that undergird the society, the dignity of the human person, the value of the human person, the rights of the human person, the justice that is owed to the human person, the opportunity for a person to use their talent for their good and the good of their neighbor, all of those basic principles that we hold to. We need to grab on to those and then rebuild. 
Well, let's just say it's not easy to do. That's what Jesus was really saying to Peter. “Peter, you're thinking about this with human thoughts and you'll never get there that way. You've got to view this through the mind of God.” That's what's transformational. That is what is the new heaven and the new earth. 
And so I would suggest to you that ultimately the meaning of COVID-19 and the meaning of the death of George Floyd is found in the very presence of God.

08.29.2020 Gospel Matthew Chapter 16

The Lord be with you.  And with your spirit The gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ according to Matthew
Jesus began to show his disciples that He must go to Jerusalem, and there He must suffer at the hands of the scribes and the Pharisees and the chief priests. That He must be killed. And that on the third day, He must raise from the dead. Now when Peter heard this, he said to Jesus, "Lord, this will never happen to you." Jesus said to him, "Get behind me, Satan. You're thinking the thoughts of human beings, not the thought of God." And then He said to them, "Anyone who wants to be my disciple must take up his cross and follow after me. Whoever would keep his life will lose it. And whoever loses his life for my sake will have it. What do you gain by giving up everything just to inherit the goods of the earth. I assure you that those who accept my word shall live forever. "
The gospel of the Lord,

08.22.2020 Homily

What we're reading is really an instruction for any one of us who has responsibility over a community, or over the work of others. It's really an instruction about what it is to be in the Christian spirit, a leader.
He tells Peter, "You have the power to bind and to loose." The leader is expected to focus on what we call the common good. That what holds all of us together, what all of us share together, that that be promoted, that that be advanced. And yet each and every one of us and every person in the operation or the organization is different, and so perhaps the needs of that person are different. And so perhaps the responsibility of the leader is different for each one.
As I grew up as a child, it became clear to me and my siblings that we weren't all treated the same. And that was very difficult for children and adolescents to accept. There were some things I needed and the others didn't need. And there were things that they needed and I didn't need. And so we were treated in different ways, and well, we knew it wasn't fair. And so you know if you're 10 or 12 or 15 or 18 years old, you're so insistent that things be fair. And my father was a very wise man. He said, "You aren't all the same. And to the ability I have, I will give to each of you what you need.”
That's what binding and loosing is about. Whether you're a parent, whether you're a teacher in a classroom, whether you're the manager in a business, whether you're a civil leader, whether you're the governor of the state, your job is to commit to the common good. To hold that community together. To be an instrument of unity within the family, on the job site, in the classroom, in the state or the city, that those who are leaders are to promote the unity of the community.
And that's what Peter is called to do. He's called to make sure that the church lives in unity with each other, in peace with each other. And that's what binding and loosing is about. He needs to know what to say is essential that we all agree with. And he needs to know what is non-essential and we have great freedom in that regard.
And that's different. And that's sometimes very hard to figure out--what is essential and what is not essential. That's hard to figure out in a classroom. It's hard to figure out in a business. It's hard to figure out for the mayor of a city or the governor of a state. It's hard to figure out what is essential for the good of a community. And that's what we must mandate and make sure happens. And everything else, everything else that is not essential, there's got to be freedom for that. Because people are different. 
Now, when people are frightened, they want to make everything the same. That I don't like what's going on, and so I'm going to legislate that we all walk lock-step this way. And that's not leadership. That may be dictatorship, but it's not leadership. The leadership would be to hold first the common good of the community and to advance that, recognizing that some things must be held and lots of it must be given to freedom. But in everything there must be charity. And in everything, the love of one's neighbor must govern it all.
So, as we pray today, we pray for the church. That the leadership of the church may know well what Jesus is calling us to. In 2005, shortly before Joseph Ratzinger became Pope, when he was still Cardinal Ratzinger, he preached on this topic in St. Peter's Basilica and he talked about the binding and the loosing of leadership. And he said, "You know, some communities do this very well and other communities don't." He said, "For instance, us, Roman Catholics, we know how to bind, we've learned how to bind, we're experts on binding. We have no idea how to loose. We have no idea how to grant freedom. We have no idea how to respect the liberty.” 
“Then you sit on the other side, you've got the Episcopalians. And they know how to loose, they know how to open up everything, they know how to provide no guidelines. So they are good at loosing, but they don't know how to bind." And he said, "The secret is to bind and to loose, and to do that focusing on the good, the good of a community." 
So that's what we pray for, pray for that in ourselves, and we pray for that in the church this evening,
 

08.22.2020 Gospel Saint Matthew Chapter 16

The Lord be with you.  And with your spirit The gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ according to Matthew
Jesus and His disciples came into the region of Cesarea Philippi. Jesus turned to them and He said, "What do people say about me? Who do they say that I am?" They said, "Some say you are John the Baptist come back from the dead. Others say, you're Elijah, or Jeremiah, or one of the prophets."
Jesus said, "But you, who do you say that I am?" Peter, spoke up and said, "You are Christ, the son of the living God." Jesus said, "Blessed are you Simon, son of John. Flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my Father in heaven. And so I say to you, you are Peter, and upon this rock, I will build My church and the gates of hell will never prevail against it. And I will give to you the keys of the kingdom of heaven. So whatever you bind on earth, shall be bound in heaven. And whatever you loose on earth, shall be loosed in heaven."
The gospel of the Lord
 

08.15.2020 Homily

The gospel story today is about boundaries and about crossing boundaries. It's about life is not just either/or, life is really both/and. Matthew has a very difficult time in the community that he writes for. His community is located in places we know now as Syria, and the majority of the people in the community were Jews who were converted to Christianity. But a growing minority that was moving into that community were Gentiles who became Christian. And there was a tension between those of Jewish background and those of Gentile, and they found it very difficult to get together.
And so what Matthew tried to do in writing this gospel is, he tried to show to the Jews that Jesus does not reject the faith of Israel. He does not reject the law. He fulfills the law. He brings it to its conclusion. He rounds out what the law truly means. And so they should not be afraid of holding their faith in Jesus. And then he says to the Gentiles: Jesus has a mission out to you. He said to his disciples, "Go to all the world. Tell them everything I have told you. Baptize them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit.” For Jesus this is an inclusive act by which all of creation is drawn together.
Matthew tried to walk that line between those two either/or positions. There is a point in Matthew's gospel, which is a little bit autobiographical. He says, "A true scribe who has been trained in the household of God is like a farmer who knows how to bring what is good, what is new, and what is old out of his storeroom.”
Well, you and I are living in a time when there are lots of boundaries, and there is a lot of binary thinking. Either this is right, or this is right, and there is no middle ground. I mean, we do that with immigration. Either we keep everybody out or we open the doors and let everybody in. And the real question is where do we find the answer to immigration that respects both those who seek entrance and those who are citizens? How do we do that? That's not easy, but it's certainly not going to the extreme. 
Or we have tension between the disproportion of wealth between the rich and the poor. And some would say that we should revert to a system where everyone receives, and no one has too much and no one has too little. And there's another extreme that says: listen, I worked hard for this. This is my money. I don't see any reason why I ought to be giving that to someone else.
Well, the problem of the disparity of income is a problem that needs to be solved, but it's not solved by either/or. It's solved by both/and. A border needs to be walked over. A boundary needs to be walked over. 
Jesus walked over that border. At that boundary, He came into the story, being a pious Jew. He has said, "I have no business with these people. I was sent only to the children of the house of Israel." And then the woman comes and she pleads with Him. She gets down on her knees and she makes an act of faith. And what does she do? She changes Jesus. He changes His heart. He looks upon her lovingly and He says, "Woman, you have great faith. Let it be done as you wish." Jesus crossed that boundary. 
He does that in so many ways in the gospel, He is found with people who are on the fringe, or who are on the outside. He eats with them. He gathers them around Himself. He makes friends with them. And He runs into trouble because He's not observing the cultural differences that are really written right deep into the heart of the Jew. Either you’re an Israelite and a follower of God, or you're not. Either you share the love of God or you're outside. You know, we used to say that same thing. We said, you know, it's only Catholics who can go to heaven.
Well, Jesus tells us that we need to put aside the binary thinking. And if we're going to embrace the gospel, we must have arms wide open and be inclusive. The great racial turmoil that we face in our country, a lot of that is on one side or the other, and there are extremes. And yet it's absolutely necessary that we as a people, independent of race, and independent of culture, and independent of national origin, that we as a people come to see ourselves as one. 
Just as Matthew prayed that the Jewish converts and the Gentile converts would be able to come and see themselves as one.

08.15.2020 Gospel Matthew Chapter 15

The Lord be with you.  And with your spirit The gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ according to Matthew
Jesus withdrew into the region of Tyre and Sidon and a Canaanite woman came up to Him and said, "Lord have pity on me. My daughter is tormented by a demon." Jesus ignored her and He walked on the way. His disciples said to Him, "Get rid of her, tell her to go. She bothers us." Jesus said, "I have only come to call the children of the house of Israel." 
Then the woman came up and she went down on her knees and she said, "Please, have pity on me." Jesus said to her, "It's not right to take food away from children and then give it to the dogs." The woman said, "Even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from the master's table." Jesus said, "Woman, you have great faith. May it be done just as you wish." And from that moment on her daughter was cured.
The gospel of the Lord.

08.08.2020 Homily

The story is told about a young boy who was being prepared to be a sailor. He was taken aboard the ship and the older sailors taught him all the skills that he needed, all the activity that he had to undertake if he was to be a good sailor. And one of the things he had to learn was to how to climb the mast of the ship up to the crow's nest on top.
And so one day he was doing that and everything was fine until he got about halfway up and he stopped, and he looked down and he saw how far down it was. And he saw the boat shifting a bit from side to side and he began to feel dizzy.
He began to lose his grip. And a seasoned sailor from below yelled, "Lad, look up, look up lad!" He raised his eyes and he looked up, and he was able to make it to the top of the mast.
I think that's not unlike story that we're told about Peter in today's gospel reading. Peter faced an insurmountable challenge. This wind and the sea was really too much. The Lord was present and Peter asked for him; he wanted Jesus to call him so that he would know that it truly is the Lord. And he was doing just fine, he was walking on the water until he took his eyes off Jesus, until he looked at the waves, until he focused on the wind. And he was sucked into that devastating circumstance. And there was only blackness there, there was no light and he began to sink.
You and I, we face many challenges that seem far beyond our ability. As a world, we're present within a pandemic now that that no one really knows about, no one really can tell us what's going to happen. We have to live through it. We have to go day by day.
That's the storm. That's the wind and the waves for us. And Jesus says, "Look at me. Keep your eyes on me. Place your trust in me. Do not lose faith. Do not be afraid.”
And that's what we're invited to do. We're invited to keep our eyes on Him and know that I don't have the answers and you don't have the answers, but we do know that if we keep our eyes on Him, there will be a way. And we know that if we allow ourselves to be sucked up in all that death-giving negativity that can surround us, then we lose, and there's nothing.
So we pray today that we might simply learn again to keep our eyes on Jesus.

08.08.2020 Gospel Matthew Chapter 14

The gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ according to Matthew
After Jesus had fed the people, He made the disciples get in the boat and precede Him to the other side. Jesus stayed there to dismiss the people, and after He had dismissed them, He went up to the mountain by Himself to pray. Later that day He was alone on the mountain, but the ship was far from shore and was being tossed about in the waves for the wind was against it. Early in the morning, Jesus came to them walking on the water. And when they saw Him, they were frightened and they cried out, "This is a ghost." And Jesus said, "Be calm. It is I. Do not be afraid."
Now when Peter heard this, he said to Jesus, "Lord if it is truly you, command me that I come to you on the water." And Jesus said to him, "Come." And Peter got out of the boat and began to walk on the water with his eyes firmly fixed on Jesus. And then he realized how powerful the wind was, and he began to sink. He cried out, "Lord, save me." Jesus reached out and took hold of him. He said, "Oh, you of little faith. Why did you doubt?" When they got into the boat, the wind calmed down and they all paid Him homage. And they said, "Truly you are the son of God."
The gospel of the Lord

08.01.2020 Homily

I really want to talk to the first communion people tonight, and you adults can also listen in. Yes, you'll probably learn something. When you were preparing for First Communion, you were told the story of what Jesus did the night before he died. Oh, He gathered his disciples together at a supper. We call it the last supper, and he took bread and he broke the bread and he gave it to them and he said, "Take this, eat this, this is my body." And then he said, "Whenever you do this, do this in memory of me."
He asked his disciples to do what he had just done, again and again and again. Because in receiving that bread, the body of the Lord, they draw close to him. They enter into a deep, deep connection with him. That he's really there, and you can talk to him. And he wants to be with you, and it's the great gift of the Eucharist. Now that's one time that Jesus did something with bread. The only other time Jesus does something with bread in the gospel, is in today's gospel. Where 5,000 people are there, and they're hungry. And Jesus said to his disciples, "Well you go find food and feed them. Make it your responsibility to feed them."
And they said, "We don't have enough. There isn't enough food. We can't feed all these people. All we've got is five loaves and two fish." And Jesus says, "Bring them to me. Put them in my hands and there will be enough." What Jesus is asked us to do is to never, ever say, there isn't enough. There isn't enough food. There isn't enough clean water. There isn't enough fresh air. There isn't enough opportunity. Never say there isn't enough, because just like the five loaves and the two fish, they are enough if you and I are willing to share them. And that's what Jesus did. He blessed them, and he broke them, and he gave it to his disciples. And he said, "Now you give it to the people." And they did, and there was enough. In fact, there was more than enough. They collected things at the end, the leftovers, and there were 12 big baskets that were filled. Well, the sacrament of the Eucharist, Holy Communion, has got two parts.
The first part is what we're doing inside church this evening. We come to pray. You remember what Jesus did, and to receive Jesus in the gift of the Eucharist, in the gift of Communion. That's the first part of the Eucharist. But the Eucharist isn't over at that point. The rest of the Eucharist takes place when you leave the church. The rest of the Eucharist takes place when we're willing to share with each other, and we're willing to accept the fact that there is enough. There is enough as long as I am not greedy, is I'm not selfish. There is enough for everyone. And if we place that into the hands of the Lord, and if we're willing to stand back from selfishness and greed, there will be enough. Now those are the two parts about receiving communion. The part in which Jesus comes to each of us individually, and the part by which we go out and we share with others what God has given.
 

08.01.2020 Gospel Matthew Chapter 14

The gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ according to Matthew.
When Jesus heard that John the Baptist had been killed, he left the place he was and you went to a deserted place by crossing the water. When people heard what he had done, they followed after him on foot. And when he disembarked from the boat he saw this large crowd of people, and he had compassion on them. And he spent the rest of the day hearing those who were ill. His disciples came to him and said, "We are in a deserted place and the day is almost over. Send these people to the villages and to the towns to buy food for themselves."
Jesus said to them, "There is no reason to send them to buy food. You feed them." And they said, "We don't have enough. All we have is five loaves of bread and two fish." Jesus said, "Bring them to me." So when they brought them the loaves and the fish, Jesus asked the people to sit down on the grass. Then he took the loaves of bread and the fish, and he raised his eyes to heaven. He prayed the blessing. He broke them and he gave them to the disciples who in turn, gave them to all the people. And everyone ate and all were satisfied. And lest anything be lost, they gathered up the fragments. And the fragments filled 12 baskets. Now there were more than 5,000 people who ate that day. 
The gospel of the Lord.