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10 Jan 2010 - Preaching the News for Sunday

"With you I am well pleased," the voice from heaven in this Sunday's gospel says of Jesus, who "went about doing good," as the Book of Acts reading option tells us. One way to beat the post-holiday blues and dreary headlines is to offer a helping hand to those in real need. An advice column called "My Goodness" offers a roundup of "smart and easy ways" to get 2010 off to a generous start. The columnists suggested that those interested in helping consider organizations that boost the local economy. The Chicago Community Trust, for example, puts out a monthly report on the impact of the economic crisis locally and funnels donations to local organizations providing food, shelter, and heating to those in need. The Trust is also currently matching every $1 donated to the Unity Challenge (which is focused on supporting local service agencies) with $2 from the Trust. Other community foundations have similar programs to help the most vulnerable, such as the Neighbors in Need Fund in Washington, D.C. and the Building Resilience Fund in Seattle. If you are fortunate enough to have some money to spare, said the columnists, give to the organizations you want to thrive but also to your local safety-net providers that provide food, water, electricity, and other basics. Source: An article by Patty and Sandy Stonesfir for Slate.com's December 30, 2009 "My Goodness" column

needy donation building resilience fund neighbors in need fund unity challenge chicago community trust my goodness

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Exploring the word

10 Jul 2016 - Fifteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time, Cycle C

A stranger at a gathering asks: "Who are you?" So you introduce yourself. Easy thing to do, right? "Hello, my name is . . . " But is that really who you are? Human identity is complicated. The answers to most simple questions are complicated. My personal favorite is the breezy standard: "How are you?" No one really cares how you are, so don't bother going into it. The correct answer is: "Fine," or even "Great! Couldn't be better!" The real answer to that simple inquiry, if given in full, might take days to explore. Because we appreciate this about the game of questions and answers, we know the scholar in today's gospel bit off more than he could chew when he decided to bring his questions to Jesus. We can hear him clearing his self-important throat as he begins, "Teacher, about eternal life: what must I do to acquire it?" I'm reminded of countless dinner parties after which I, a catechist of the church, am routinely led to the door and asked a simple parting question: "By the way, I've always wanted to know: what about the anti-Christ?" I want to reply, "Do you have a minute? Do you have a guest room?" So too this scholar blusters his way into the presence of Jesus to have a public tête-à-tête on eschatology. He presumes this will be a mere crossing of intellectual swords. Both he and Jesus will retire to their respective corners looking good. Jesus might well have been tempted to say, "Ah yes, how to get eternal life? Here's the shopping list of requirements, and pick up some amazing grace while you're at it." Because Jesus is a better person than I am, he graciously invites the scholar to take the first stab at responding. Which he does, delivering a deft reply about loving God and neighbor, based on two key items among the 613 Deuteronomic laws. Obviously the scholar didn't need the answer. He already had his. Jesus agrees that it's a good one—adding that doing these things, not just talking about them, is how you get eternal life. You can almost pity the guy. He should have walked away right then. Instead, he pushes the matter just a bit more: "And just who is my neighbor?" Now he's done for. Soon he'll find himself like Wile E. Coyote, suddenly in mid-air with nowhere to go but down. Because Jesus is going to give him the real answer, not just the quick phony one exchanged as an intellectual pleasantry. Your neighbor's not the lady next door. Your neighbor's not the family that lives in your complex. Your neighbor's not a fellow citizen, a member of your clan, your race, your kind. Your neighbor is the world. So have a nice day! Related scripture links Merciful as God is merciful: Luke 6:36; see also Matt. 5:48 The Sabbath is for us: Matt. 12:7-8; Mark 2:27-28; John 5:16-17 The wages of sin: Rom.6:23 Shema Yisrael: Deut. 6:4-5 Urim and Thummim: Exod. 28:30; Lev. 8:8; Num. 27:21; Deut. 33:8; 1 Sam. 28:6; Ezra 2:63

Authors Alice Camille

neighbors

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Homily stories

10 Jul 2016 - Fifteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time, Cycle C

Living in an increasingly violent city like Chicago—or anywhere in this dangerous world—can harden a person. When you encounter trouble, or even sense it, you have to look out for yourself and get out of the way. But that’s how evil grows, when everyone turns a blind eye and simply lets it happen. On Feb. 7, 2016, 32-year-old Marques Gaines, a popular hotel cocktail server, was punched and knocked unconscious into a crosswalk outside a convenience store in Chicago. Footage from surveillance video showed that a group of people immediately gathered around Gaines and two men went through his pockets. Others actually walked right past Gaines without trying to pull him out of the street or block traffic. More than a dozen bystanders failed to help him in the nearly two minutes before a cab accidentally drove over him. Gaines died shortly after. This true story is eerily similar to the allegory of the Good Samaritan—only minus a Good Samaritan. It’s easy to think you might have been the one to step forward and do the right thing in this situation. But . . . how many times have I heard a commotion, put my head down, and kept walking—fast? No one is suggesting being reckless about personal safety, but we also could do much, much more to look out for our neighbors, too.

Authors Jennifer Tomshack

Good Samaritan neighbors

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Exploring the word

14 Jul 2019 - Fifteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time, Cycle C

A lot about religion gets relegated to the overcrowded room of “mystery”: unknowable, unprovable, intangible, invisible. In theological terms, mystery is that which cannot be fathomed by human reason alone, or which depends upon the gift of divine revelation to be grasped. We can get sloppy about the appeal to mystery, however, and start to use it as a catchall for painful intersections where our teaching and our experience are at variance, or simply to silence questions that challenge our authority. Not everything about God is a total mystery, obviously. If the Bible is to be taken seriously, God has spent human history in the task of self-revelation and a relentless bid for intimate relationship with us. God’s self-communication has made the divine will seem not very mysterious at all, truth be told. In story, in law, in oracles, and in supernatural acts, God has been surprisingly transparent about what the divine intentions for our happiness are. So if any mystery is left in what God wants of us, it is that we are still so vague about the plan. Listen to the rants of televangelists and milkcrate preachers in the park, and be amazed at all the ways God’s words are manipulated to make an idiosyncratic point. Ask three people of the same religious persuasion to explain a particular doctrine, and stand aghast at how we routinely domesticate teachings to support a predetermined worldview. As is often noted, after God created human beings in the divine image, we returned the favor by creating an image of God that mirrored us to a T. So long as this mirror-image God we worship affirms the way we choose to live, the whole system of religion hums right along quite nicely. Not exactly rocket science Moses was the first to suggest that we can’t plead ignorance when it comes to knowing the divine will. He insists that we all know darn well what God wants from us. God’s will is not up in the sky or across the sea, some exotic formula lost in translation and perceived through a cosmic mist. It is near to us, speaking in the yearning of our hearts, warning us in the mutterings of conscience, obvious through the long, sad lessons of history. If we do not hear the voice of the Lord proclaimed in story and symbol, word and sacrament, personal history and communal experience, it is not because God has fallen silent or is being deliberately mysterious. Refreshingly, God’s law is written in stone and hasn’t changed much since then. If anything, it has become even more sharply outlined over time, written on hearts of flesh as the prophets foretold, so that we have become the aleph and bet of God’s purposes. As Saint Paul reminded the community at Corinth, those who follow Jesus become letters written in the Spirit, known and read by all. Moses’ declaration concerning the evident nature of God’s truth matches our experience pretty accurately. Most of us have had the experience of being asked for advice from a friend in trouble. Inevitably, the friend knows what must be done to avert disaster and is fairly clear on the outcome of each road that might be taken. The problem is never what to do, but finding the resolve to do the right thing. Rarely do we wander blindly into the path of adversity. Some instinct for right and wrong warns us well in advance that the decision we just made is not wise, honest, or good. If we pursue it to the end, we will wind up more or less where “it was written” that we would. Or if we get off scot-free this time, it is only a prelude to getting caught further down the line, where the stakes are higher and the voice of conscience has become muted from disuse. Knowing what to do and doing it are not the same thing. When ethical dilemmas do confound us, it is usually not the terms of the choice that are unclear, but simply that we are standing in our own way and blocking the light available to us. Jesus and the scholar A scripture scholar came to Jesus with a question basic to the religious enterprise: “What must I do to inherit eternal life?” From the first, we sense his insincerity. If he is a scholar, he comes to this question with a host of presuppositions about the answer. This is not the earnest question of a truth seeker, then, but a test of Jesus’ own credentials. This prompts Jesus to direct the question back to the scholar, who replies from within the safety of the “Moses zone” with a chestnut from the Law: Love the Lord completely and your neighbor as yourself. Jesus tells him bluntly, then, to do it. Ah, but that is the delicate heart of the matter, isn’t it? But the scholar can’t leave well enough alone and does what scholars do best, splitting fine hairs further by asking for clarification on the definition of “neighbor.” I asked my 10-year-old niece what a neighbor is, and she had no problem defining the term. The scholar’s second question underscores his game playing, and so Jesus decides to tell him a little story that sounds the truth loud and clear. At the end, even the cagey scholar has to admit that he knows which character in the story acted like a neighbor. Applying the word Do mercy likewise The story of the Good Samaritan is the fundamental building block of Sunday school morality. Luke’s Jesus has posited compassion as the essential response of God to a world of misery and sin. If we face a fork in the road, our direction is simple: choose mercy. If we don’t know how to behave, be compassionate. When confronted with obstacles and enemies, there is only one route through, and that is to forgive. We feel a mortal tug toward self-righteousness, judgmentalism, prejudice, and pride, but none of those paths are available to us if we are using the Christian road map. The answer to life’s dilemmas is generally a simple one. It is the application that so far confounds us. Related scripture links Written on hearts of flesh: Jer. 31:33; Ezek. 11:19-2, 36:26-27 We are God’s letter: 2 Cor. 3:2-3 The word dwells in us: Phil. 3:16 You shall love the Lord and your neighbor: Lev. 19:18; Deut. 6:5, 10:12

Authors Alice Camille

mystery divine intentions divine will conscience neighbors Good Samaritan Compassion Forgiveness

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Homily stories

14 Jul 2019 - Fifteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time, Cycle C

“We had no time to grab anything. The water was rising and the current was already in the park. There were even some who had to leave without their pets. It was grab yourself and get.” That’s what Patti said in a video report after flooding devastated the rural area where she lived in a small trailer park off an interstate highway. “Emotionally, the people here lost hope—for a minute,” she said. But then the volunteers showed up—more than 600 of them from the small towns all around. “They literally wrapped their arms around us. Volunteers were lined up everywhere. Cars parked along the highway. I didn’t know we could hold this many people in here. They helped us clean up and start over. They brought in truckloads—truckloads—of stuff.” Patti was surprised to discover that she had all these neighbors, and maybe the neighbors didn’t realize it either—until the tragedy become an opportunity to come together and do a better job of being a community. Local groups formed a long-term recovery group and created a disaster relief fund. “If there’s a need, they’re reaching out,” Patti said. “It’s still been going on since the flood. Everybody is family now. The love that’s come out of this is amazing. God bless every single one of them. It will never be forgotten.”

Authors Jennifer Tomshack

neighbors disaster relief Good Samaritan

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26 Jun 2022 - Thirteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time, Cycle C

Living in a city with a lot of violent crime, like Chicago—or anywhere in this dangerous world—can harden a person. When you encounter trouble, or even sense it, you have to look out for yourself and get out of the way. But that’s how evil grows, when everyone turns a blind eye and simply lets it happen. A few years ago, a young man was punched and knocked unconscious into a crosswalk outside a convenience store in Chicago. Footage from surveillance video showed that a group of people immediately gathered around him and two men went through his pockets. Others walked right past him without trying to pull him out of the street or stop traffic. More than a dozen bystanders failed to help him in the nearly two minutes before a cab accidentally drove over him. The young man died shortly after. This true story is eerily similar to the allegory of the Good Samaritan—only minus a Good Samaritan. It’s easy to think you might have been the one to step forward and do the right thing in this situation. But how many times have I heard a commotion, put my head down, and kept walking—fast? No one is suggesting being reckless about personal safety, but we also could do a lot more to look out for our neighbors, too.

Authors Jennifer Tomshack

Good Samaritan good neighbors

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