Easter, 2021
My Dear Parishioners,
I glimpsed resurrection recently. It happened as I followed the Pope’s pilgrimage to Iraq. It happened as Francis stood in the midst of a dwindling and frightened Christian community, threatened with extinction due to violence; a martyred Church that was enlivened by his presence and message. A community of believers that goes back to the 1st century and mentioned in the Acts of the Apostles.
I glimpsed resurrection as the Pope limped down a narrow alleyway in Najah to meet 90-year-old Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, Iraq’s most prominent Shia religious authority. When entering the house, Sistani stood, to the surprise of everyone, breaking with tradition: a revered man of peace recognizing in the other a kindred spirit as both clasped hands in greeting. I found myself quite moved by it all; this pontiff and bridge-builder mirroring for all to see the “God of surprises”. In that humble abode located on a narrow alleyway, two men of peace came alive in a place that has known so much violence and death.
Since his election in Rome, Pope Francis has been intent on reaching out to the Muslim world that has been unjustly vilified and stereotyped. It’s what we, the morally blind, do when faced with another who’s seen as different. Difference often threatens us; viewed as an ominous threat to our understanding and way of life.
As Francis limped his way down that narrow passage in Najah, I recalled how Jesus urged his followers to “enter by the narrow way”. The way that leads to life. Way that opens us to the mystery and life of God housed in the other. How few choose to walk this path today. Indeed!
So, this meeting of two revered spiritual leaders was, to my way of seeing, so much more. It was an encounter: a glimpse of resurrection and what is to be. What is, for those willing to see.
During this historic pilgrimage to a beleaguered region of the world, Francis emphasized how “Violence in the name of religion, was a form of blasphemy.”
Recently, we’ve again witnessed sporadic violence in this wealthiest of nations; where the façade cracked and we glimpsed the malaise underneath. All is not well: the senseless loss of ordinary folks going about their daily lives. To me, such violence is blasphemous in that it’s an attack on the inherent dignity of the human person; where death is chosen over life.
All of us are created in God’s Image. There is much more to each of us than meets the eye: a permanent, essential characteristic. There is something inside us that cannot die. In God’s eyes we are worthy without question. Thomas Merton writes: “Our job is to love others without stopping to inquire whether or not they are worthy.” To quote the Holy Father, “Who am I to judge?” Indeed.
“Violence in the name of religion”: jihads, crusades and inquisitions come to mind. Yet, the violence in the name of religion I want to highlight happened most recently. It happened when the Church’s Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF) in Rome took a stand on same-sex couples today saying, “God does not and cannot bless sin.” To me, such language is not God’s doing. So, the Church needs to stop putting such words into God’s mouth for God’s sake! Such language does violence to the dignity of the human person. It’s abortive, discriminatory, unjust. Such language does not ring true when placed next to the person of Christ. The revealed Face of God. Jesus was quite at home with sinners and broke bread with them breaking, as he did, with the religious caste system of his time. A deadening system that judged who was worthy, and who was not. Did not Jesus warn the religious authority of his day saying, “Tax collectors and prostitutes are entering the kingdom of heaven before you”?
Seamlessly, Jesus focused on the inherent dignity of the other. As followers of the Risen One, “Our job is to love others without stopping to inquire whether or not they are worthy”. To do so would be blasphemous. It wreaks havoc and does violence.
Without exception, all of us are daughters and sons of God. All of us are sinners, both blest and broken and not unlike the Eucharist; saved by a Love that cannot die. Jesus reveals how God’s ways are mysterious. As I’ve said before, we have a God who colors beyond the lines. Who are we to limit God that, in the Beginning, found what had been created to be “very good”? Each one of us is blest from the beginning. Blessing that must not be withheld, if desired. To do so would be tantamount to playing God, and blasphemous. The words, “God does not and cannot bless sin”, addressed to same-sex couples is like that stone rolled in front of the entrance to Jesus’ tomb: an impediment and obstacle to hope. The CDF’s thoughtless and blind-guided words left me beleaguered. However, I’m reminded of other words by the Catholic writer, Flannery O’Conner, and penned to a correspondent: “It seems to be a fact that you have to suffer as much from the church as for it” (“The Habit of Being”, p.90; italics mine).
Recently, more than 230 professors of Catholic Theology expressed their dissent in these words: “We believe that the life and love of same sex couples are not worth less before God than the life and love of any other couple.” In other words, God does not play favorites, nor take sides; “seamless in His Godhead”.
We are meant to be, just by the fact we exist. All of us called to love as best we can and within the givens of one’s life. The way God meant us to be, fashioned as we are in His Image. We are given the freedom to love in ways that enliven us. To prohibit it by requiring Catholics with a gay orientation to live celibately as to be worthy of the Eucharist does violence. How could that ever be God’s will, or part of His mysterious design who is “closer to us than we are to ourselves”?
Jesus rose from death “before dawn and while it was still dark.” We continue to stand in a lingering darkness, I’m afraid. Not without hope, however. As we stand in the promise of this Easter Day, may the risen and luminous Christ shine through the darkness of all sin to aid us in seeing as God sees: seamlessly and with great mercy. All of us a work of God meant to be here, and worthy of love.
A Blessed Easter to all of you!
Father Tim Clark, Pastor
