Sunday, December 13, 2020

Third Sunday of Advent St. Austin Church December 13, 2020

 Third Sunday of Advent      St. Austin Church         December 13, 2020

 

          “Brothers and sisters:  Rejoice always.  Pray without ceasing.  In all circumstances give thanks, for this is the will of God for you in Christ Jesus.”   So begins our second reading today from the first Letter of Saint Paul to the Thessalonians.  Very nice.  Very positive.  Uplifting.  It would make a great Christmas or Get-Well card: “Rejoice always.  Pray without ceasing.  In all circumstances give thanks, for this is the will of God for you in Christ Jesus.”

          Then St. Paul says something interesting: “Do not quench the Spirit.”    The NRSV, the NAB and the Greek Bible all translate this statement exactly the same.  The Jerusalem Bible gives “never try to suppress the Spirit..”  

          What does St. Paul mean?  “Do not quench the Spirit.”   

Do you quench the Spirit?  Do you suppress the Spirit?  How do we do that?  In what ways to we stifle, smother, extinguish the Spirit? 

          Well, the Holy Spirit can be a consolation and a great source of peace,   But at other times the Holy Spirit is a bother, an unwanted interruption, a pain.  The Spirit invites and nudges us to things we don’t want to be bothered with, don’t want to have to face, don’t want to do.  

          Sometimes the Holy Spirit prompts us to be more generous when we want to be stingy and selfish.  Or prompts us to reach out in forgiveness to someone who hurt us.  Maybe the Holy Spirit urges us to take action, to reach out to a lonely person, or the Holy Spirit pushes us to refrain from a caustic remark, or passing on gossip, or visiting that porn site.  Maybe the Holy Spirit is urging us to take a risk at a new job, of joining a ministry at church, at investigating a vocation to priesthood or religious life, or examine our hidden racial and other prejudices. 

 Maybe the Holy Spirit is urging us to look at areas in our life that are painful or embarrassing, urging us to growth and change.   Do not quench the Spirit.   It is so easy to distract ourselves and not pay attention to the promptings of our heart.  Do not quench the Spirit!

          One of the ways I think the Holy Spirit helps us to grow is by doubt.  People come to me in confession and confess doubts about Church teachings, or their understanding of Church teaching. 

          There is a way in which persuing and fostering doubts about our faith can be destructive to our spiritual life, but many times I think doubts are an invitation from the Holy Spirit to deepen our faith life, to come to a more mature faith that is solidly our own and not borrowed from parents or teachers or priests. 

          The teachings of the Church document, Humanae Vitae, on birth control and the regulation of birth, have caused many people to think more deeply and pray more fervently over this issue, to investigate and learn natural family planning, and come to a more firm personal faith stance on these issues, sometimes in keeping with church teaching and sometimes not. But now, their own faith.

          The terrible and horrible mis-management of the on-going clergy sexual abuse, with yet again more horrible revelations about former Cardinal Terrance McCarrick and politics in the Church, and clerical blindness, have shown many of us that we cannot just pass off to the bishops and priests responsibility for our faith, but must do the hard work to make it our own, not dependent on any church official.

          The deepening understanding of homosexuality, with an increase in knowledge over the last fifty years that is far greater than what we had learned in the previous 500 years, and our personal experiences of

same sex couples, can cause us to question and then interiorize church teaching on love and sexuality, making it more authentically our belief, and not just something we wear because we are Catholic. 

          In these and other ways the Holy Spirit leads us to a deeper appreciation of, and adherence to, Church teaching and the Gospel. 

          “Do not quench the Spirit” St Paul instructs us.   It is so much easier, and more comfortable, to quench the Spirit, to just accept what we are told, and wear our belief as something on the outside of us, not penetrating deeply into our hearts. 

          Making faith our own, deep in our hearts and spirits, is hard work.  St. Paul is telling us it is worth the effort, worth the work, the confusion, the doubt, the groping, the search to truly follow the lead of the Holy Spirit and make faith authentically our own.

          Do not quench the Spirit!  

Stay thirsty, my friend!   AMEN