SECOND SUNDAY of Ordinary Time Cycle A Jan 15, 2022

 SECOND SUNDAY of Ordinary Time  Cycle A        Jan 15, 2022

I would like for you to picture Jesus in your mind.  Maybe some picture you have seen.  We’ve all seen picture of Jesus. 

Some time ago, that paradigm of Biblical and theological scholarship,  the magazine, Popular Mechanics, tried, as best they could, to have forensic artists reconstruct what Jesus would have looked like.   They wanted an accurate picture of Jesus as possible.   //

Now perhaps you have a picture of Jesus in your head.  Maybe it is based on pictures you have seen of Jesus dressed in beautiful robes of sumptuous blue and red cloth, immaculately coifed with long flowing golden hair, beard and mustache, and radiant white skin.  

Well, that is NOT what the forensic artists came up with.  First of all, in Palestine women wore long hair but men wore their hair short.  St Paul, in 1 Cor. 11:14 says that long hair on a man is a disgrace.  So, Jesus did not have long hair.  Sorry.   {That’s why I keep my hair short.}

Secondly, Jesus did not dress in luxurious clothing.  He wore what the common people wore, a simple tunic, similar to an alb, the white robe that a priest or deacon or our servers wear.  Since Jesus did not have an extensive wardrobe, and did not use deodorant, and He lived in a hot, sweaty climate, Jesus probably smelled like everyone else around Him.  If he came in and sat down in church today, you would move to the other end of the pew. 

And most assuredly Jesus was not white.  He was like everyone else in Palestine in those days, brown or olive colored. 

When the forensic artists finished their probable portrait of Jesus, the caption in the Popular Mechanics magazine was “you wouldn’t want to sit next to him on an airplane.”   He looked kind of shady or scary by today’s standards.

I mention all this because getting Jesus right is difficult.  It was even difficult for John the Baptist as we hear in today’s Gospel.  Twice in our short passage John exclaims, “I did not know him.”  

Now if John the Baptist, who was sent specifically to prepare the way for Jesus, had a hard time recognizing and knowing Jesus, perhaps we might have some difficulty too. 

We might know a lot ABOUT Jesus.  That knowledge is fairly simple to acquire.  There are plenty of books and bible study resources to tell you ABOUT Jesus.  But that is not the same as knowing Jesus.  We don’t want information primarily.  What we want is a relationship with Jesus, knowing Him in Himself.

You come to know Jesus pretty much the same way you come to know anyone else:  you spend time together.  You talk with each other.  You laugh and cry together.  You do things together.  You share life together.       //

Jesus is with us now.  Jesus is with us in our gathering together as His Body.  Jesus is with us in His Word in the Scriptures, especially in the Gospel.  Jesus is with us in the Sacrament of His Body and Blood in the Eucharist.  Jesus is with us through the gift of the Holy Spirit. 

John the Baptist gives us some help in today’s Gospel.  Twice John exclaims: “I did not know Him.”   I think it is important to recognize that we DON’T know Jesus in order to start clearing away the accumulated clutter of what our culture and society have told us about Jesus.  We need to let Jesus be Himself and not impose pre-conceived notions on Him.  We need to open ourselves to let Jesus lead us in revealing Himself to us:      through prayer, through the Scriptures, through worship, through interactions with other people, especially other believers. 

Just as a relationship with a long-time friend, or a beloved spouse, matures and develops over time, so the relationship of each one of us with Jesus should develop, grow, deepen, mature over time.   Jesus doesn’t change very much, but we do, as we enter deeper and deeper into relationship with Him. 

We continue to grow, just as John the Baptist did in our Gospel today.  And hopefully, with the grace of the Holy Spirit, we will come to proclaim along with John the Baptist, “Now I have seen and testified that he is the Son of God.”

God bless! 

Homily for the EPIPHANY

 

HOMILY                                                                         EPIPHANY   January 8,  2023

 "We three kings of Orient are .. NOT Kings!"  In fact the whole "king" thing is all PR. These guys are passing themselves off as kings in the song, but in reality, the Gospel tells us they were MAGI.  Magi are not kings.  Magi studied the occult and magic.  We get our word "magicians" from Magi.  They really were magicians.  These guys pulled rabbits out of the hat, did card tricks, sawed ladies in half and that stuff.

These guys are rather shadowy figures.  They have several aliases:  Other translations (old NAB) call them Astrologers: you know, psychics, horoscopes, auras, crystals, New Age weird stuff.   After all, they are wandering around the country-side trying to follow a star!  

We know almost nothing about them - we don’t know their names, nor their country, (only that they come from "the East", I mean, it could be New Jersey!) nor what happened to them - not even sure there were 3 of them.  The idea of THREE Kings is based on the number of gifts. 

They were dreamers: they change their itinerary and route and go back another way on the basis of a dream!  They were not practical, sober, industrious types like us.  I mean who gives myrrh as a birthday present?  How weird is that? 

In any case they were NOT Kings - not responsible pragmatists, administrators, realists.  They didn’t know anything about budgets and personnel policies.  They were also terribly niave.  They come to King Herod announcing, “Where is the newborn King of the Jews?”   Now Herod was the King.  And Herod was well known for killing anyone that got in his way, especially other family members who might pose a threat to his Kingship.  To come asking Herod about a newborn King was just begging for trouble.

The Magi were, well, oblivious!

IN CONTRAST to these magi, take Herod – Now There was a KING!  He was a RULER!  In fact, he is known to history as Herod the GREAT. 

Unlike those shadowy, mysterious, flaky Magi/astrologers -HEROD made his mark on history.

King Herod the GREAT ruled for 34 years.  He was a wily, unscrupulous schemer and clever politician.  He ruthlessly and cold-bloodily eliminated anyone who stood in his way, or might possibly stand in his way. 

Including most of his own family. 

King Herod went through ten wives.  He built theaters, roads, temples, amphitheaters, monuments, gardens, palaces and fortresses all over the place, and taxed the people severely to pay for his projects.   He even ordered the killing of many prominent people on the event of his own death so that people would not rejoice when he died.  Of course, once he was dead no one paid attention to his commands.

If you go to Palestine today you can still see the ruins of his works.   Herod knew about POWER.  He was a ruthless, cruel, no-nonsense, realistic pragmatist.  

Notice in the Gospel how Herod interrogated the magi to find out from them the exact time of the star's appearance.  This man doesn't deal in dreams and visions and “feelings” - he wants the facts.  He wants what's real.  Because he was a doer.  He made things happen.  He was a POWER.  He was HEROD THE GREAT!

Still, .....   we don't sing any songs about Herod at Christmas time - or any other time of the year.

We don't put plastic statues of him under the tree in the Manger scene.      And Herod, for all his power and hard-bitten realism, never did find the Christ child.

SO WHAT ABOUT US?

This Gospel story instructs us to look beyond the facts, to see beneath the surface, to open ourselves to a deeper dimension of reality, in order to really see.  To dream that nations can resolve conflicts without war:   That in spite of scandals of sexual abuse by clergy, and then cover-ups by bishops, the Spirit is at work in the Catholic Christian community.   To see that the way to the fullness of life is not the result of trying to get all you can, but comes from fidelity, selflessness, and care of others.  That what we see is only the surface, and reality is much, much deeper.

 Specifically, we are called to look beyond the surface reality of a new-born baby, to see the Glory of God's LOVE shining resplendent in the Christ Child.

Our friends the magi have yet another title, one that fits them better, the WISE MEN.  Because for all their mystic flakiness - they were wise enough to look beyond the mere facts - to peer into what was really happening - to follow their faith and hope - and so they came to the Christ Child.

King Herod, for all his accomplishments - was not great.  He was a FOOL, because he missed the whole purpose and meaning of life.

We are now called to be wise - to follow the Star of Faith - to bring along the gift of ourselves - to seek, to find, and to adore, The radiant splendor of the Father's Glory,  The Word made Flesh, Jesus the Christ!