Pascha V

The Fifth Sunday of Easter 2020 – Cycle A Acts 6:1-7; Psalm 33; 1 Peter 2:4-9; John 14:1-12

“What you are going to do, do quickly.” …and into the night Judas leaves the supper.  “I will be with you only a little while longer.”  Unexpectedly Jesus then announces his own leaving.

The atmosphere grows tense and confused.  There are concerns and questions.

Peter: “I will lay down my life for you.”   Thomas:  “We do not know where you are going; how can we know the way?” Phillip: “Show us the Father, and that will be enough for us.”

Everyone is grabbing for something to hold on to as we might be reminded of Betty Davis’ famous line in the movie, All About Eve, “Fasten your seat belts, it’s going to be a bumpy night.”

The world has stopped.  Enterprise, finance, politics, travel, entertainment, sport: all have stopped.  Public religious life has stopped.  It is like a great fast, a universal abstinence.  And people all over the world have been grabbing at anything to make life normal.

In the midst of legitimate concerns and confusion, it has been a bumpy month plus and Jesus speaks to us, “Do not let your hearts be troubled.”  Yet there is a question that precedes Jesus’ answer: What frees the human heart from being troubled? Society has always had a multitude of answers to soothe troubled hearts but they all eventually reveal themselves to be shallow.

Jesus has but one answer for a troubled heart: Believe in God, believe also in me.

In John’s Gospel to believe is not an inward assent to teachings and creeds but rather an outward commitment to a person, the person being Jesus.  Actively commit yourself to God, commit yourself also to me.  Enter into a relationship with us, is John’s understanding of belief.

The 16^th century reformer, Martin Luther understood this when he taught that God is who you hang your heart upon.

A wonderful image, is it not?

But what does it mean to hang your heart on God?

Though you and I were not called to monastic life, the lives of cloistered monks and nuns might offer us, who did not ask for this situation of involuntary isolation, this “bumpy night,” some serious insights about hanging our hearts on God.

The world has stopped and we have become impatient.  Why?  Mauro–Giuseppe Lepori, the Abbot General of the Cistercian Order suggests it is because we have lost the ability to stand still. We are always on the go, even when on vacation.  Busy-ness, constant activity, rushing is used as the sign of a successful person.  We’ve all had the conversation: “How are you?”  “I’m busy!”   Busy-ness is the character and the curse of Western, globalized culture.

In Psalm 46 God invites us to be still in order to recognize the divine presence within us.  “Be still and know that I am God.”  Gods asks us to be still.  God does not stop us like a police officer arresting a criminal on the run.  God does not impose stillness.  God desires a free, loving choice on our part.  Unlike what many Americans believe, freedom does not consist in constant unlimited choice.  Freedom is the grace to be able to choose that which restores our heart, even when everything is taken from us.  Freedom is hanging your heart on God.

Consider.  When was the last time you daydreamed?  …allowed yourself to get bored?  …wasted a lazy afternoon?  …reflected?  We need to pause and take a deep breath.

Is this time of pandemic and quarantine, marked by the loss of life and jobs, Cistercian monk, Michael Casagram, questions whether this is “a divinely disguised moment for human breakthrough.”   He reflects that one of the solutions our society peddles to soothe the troubled heart is the notion that power and wealth give meaning to existence.  We are what we have.  We are what and who we can control.  But like the disciples on that ill-fated night, we find ourselves not in control.  “Power and wealth,” Brother Michael warns us, “create an illusion of meaning and purpose while undermining our spiritual destiny”.  In reality they “close the door to grace”.  

I posit, this pandemic is a grace-filled moment in our lives if we are willing to recognize it as such.  When we are busy with our daily routines and tasks, much of which is good, it is easy to feel as if we are in control and that our lives have purpose and meaning.  But purpose and meaning for the Christian comes from our relationship with God.  Be still, day dream, reflect.  You’re worth is found in that you were created by a loving God.  Hang your heart on that God.

How can the Covid-19 pandemic not remind us of our mortality and that life is fragile?  “All life is lived in the shadow of death” Brother Quenon reminds us, “and we forget that”. We may not want to think of our mortality but the Church universal does.  Every day in the Liturgy of the Hours the Church sings at Morning Prayer [Lauds] that God will shine on those who sit in darkness and the shadow of death [Benedictus] while concluding each day of prayer [Compline] with the gentle request, Grant us a restful night and a peaceful death.  Christians are not afraid of their mortality; but the world is.   Thus the monk, Thomas Merton said that life in this world is designed to distract us from thinking about questions of ultimate importance such as our mortality.  Forced isolation “makes us face our own thoughts, deal with our own feelings.  We can run from these or we can learn from what they are telling us…” says Brother Michael Casagram.

Quarantine can lead us inward through the double doorway of solitude and silence.  An easy pathway so as to cultivate solitude and silence is a contemplative form of reading known as lectio divina, spiritual reading.  It is spending time meditatively reading a short passage from Scripture, a classic of Christian spirituality or a piece of fiction by Catholic authors such as Flannery O’Connor, Jon Hassler or Graham Greene.  It is through being present to our thoughts and feelings that we come to experience God’s loving presence in isolation.  Simply take time to read and reflect.  The hermit and nun, Sr. Wendy Beckett wrote, “If we do not read with intervals of silent reflection, we will understand only in part what we read.”

After spending weeks in quarantine with other people, even people you love, you may be finding yourself fraying a bit at the edges.  We may need to ask ourselves why we feel the way we do.  Might it be a reaction to our culture’s appetite for individualism?  Yet might this experience make us more aware of a sense of community, of our interdependence on each other? Thus Brother Michael says that to be humble is not to put one’s self down but rather to “make room for one another” person, to be attentive and make a space for listening.

Admittedly it is difficult to focus on the spiritual life in the midst of the anxiety so many people may feel at this time.  So, be attentive to the present moment, focus on what you can control, read, be open to being taught by your family members, and most importantly, “Actively commit yourself to God, commit yourself also to Jesus” and thus hang your heart on God.

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PLEASE NOTE: Homilies presented here are also being videotaped and put up on the Saint Mary, Oneonta website: http://www.SMCCOneonta.org.