Humility to Listen to God

This is a computer-generated transcription that has been included to make the homily searchable.  It has not been verified by the author.

“They widen their phylacteries and lengthen their tassels.” I always feel self-conscious when I read this gospel. I don’t wear phylacteries, but this this chasable. I use this stole, this is the stole, it used to have tassels. And they cut off the tassels because I didn’t want to be wearing that. The Church asked religious to wear a distinctive garment. And when I, 40 years ago, over 40 years ago, when I joined the Brothers of St. John in France looking for a monastic life, in which I would be hidden, in a, hidden in a monastery, and one of the first things at our entry, we received the habit, the full habit. And the thing I didn’t realize was, I didn’t think about it was, as soon as you put on that habit, when ever you go out in public, you really stand out. You know, I was looking for a nice, quiet hidden life. And suddenly you’re kind of the center of attention, where if when you’re walking through an airport or whatever. So when the time came for us to start this new community, the Mission of Divine Mercy. So there was Father Moses, who wasn’t that Father yet, and we were trying to decide what our habit should be, because we had to take the new habit. And we didn’t want the full habit. We’re starting this new little community in a place where nobody knows us. Nobody knows about monastic life or anything. So we were looking for a habit which would be more normal, maybe some sort of a top, and then we’re just wearing pants. And because it’s, it’s like in France, it’s where I was, at one point or in Mexico, it’s easier, because it’s the more of a Catholic sense, at least in France as the Catholic tradition, whereas in the United States, we don’t really have much of that. And so we didn’t want to take a full habit, because we both experienced it, and we knew how hard it was going to be. But we felt the Lord clearly saying to us that that’s what he wanted. And you know, I’ve gotten different reactions. I remember, at first we were wearing a long, when we first came, we had a long tan habit, tan, beige habit. I remember walking through Landa Park one day by myself and hearing someone say, Obi Wan Kenobi. When we’re when we’re traveling, a lot of times people ask us if we’re going to a Renaissance Festival. There’s, I think, the Society of creative anachronism. And no, that’s not what we’re doing. I remember one time getting gas and going into the little store there. And the young cashier looked up and said, Cool Knights Templar. There are different reactions and some are better reactions, I remember knocking at somebody’s door, and a little boy answers and he then he runs back, I can hear him telling his mom, Mom, it’s Jesus. That’s better. The sisters, the sisters experience is a little bit different. Because people even though we don’t see many nuns in habits these days in these areas, but still people have more of a sense of what it is. But remember that the sisters, Mother Magdalene, Sister Amapola, at an archdiocesan gathering of religious, religious sisters, and almost not very few of them were in, in religious habit, and most of them are just dressed in lay clothes. And the topic they were discussing was, how can we become more visible? And they were, they were trying to come up with ideas. One of the ideas was maybe we could wear sashes, or maybe we could have parades through neighborhoods and where carry banners and maybe have posters or speak at Mass or so forth. But of course, there’s another way to do it. And the sisters have often shared also because it is a little bit different. I think it’s more known that a lot of graces, that they’ve experienced when people see their habit. But my point is that this distinctive religious guard that we’re wearing, we’re doing it because we believe, not because it’s an easy thing to do but because we’ve sensed the Lord is asking us to do it. And the tunic which represent for us Jesus, as St. Paul says, to put on Jesus. And the scapular which represent our Blessed Mother’s presence and then the emblem, the emblem, and again, all our habit, our community wants to be a community which listens to the Lord. And we feel the Lord can guide us sometimes in very specific ways. And we feel that He gave us very specific instructions. The emblem was not something that, the emblem that we wear on our scapular was not something that we dreamed up, it was something we felt very clearly, you can believe it or not, but we felt the Lord is saying that there’s a cross of light, you wanted a cross of light, like a glorious cross, and the Sacred Heart, with the thorns, with blood that it’s flowing for us, and the fire of the Holy Spirit. And so that’s the key point that I want to focus on today, is listening to God, listening to what God wants. Because we see in the readings today, that the first reading we have is from the prophet Malikai. And so there’s a couple of verses, which a couple of verses, which can be for the verses we have today, first of all, he says, “For the lips of a priest,” God says through the prophet, “for the lips of a priest, should guard knowledge, and men should seek instruction from his mouth, for he is the messenger of the LORD of hosts.” So the priest is to be the messenger and of the Lord of hosts. But it says, “But you have turned aside from the way, you have caused many to stumble by your instruction, you have corrupted the covenant of Levi says the Lord of hosts.” So he’s speaking to the priests who are not fulfilling their role. And so I was saying that the need to listen and listen with humility to the Lord. And that’s precisely what he’s saying that they’re not listening. He goes on to say, “in now oh, Priest, this commandment is for you. If you do not listen,” if you do not listen, that’s what he’s telling them that they have to do, to listen, “if you do not listen, if you do not lay it to heart, to give glory to my name,” so not to give glory to oneself, “to give glory to my name, says the Lord of hosts, I will send a curse upon you, and of your blessing, I will make a curse.” So that’s how important it is to for His priests to be listening to Him and seeking His glory, listening to God’s word. And that’s always the challenge and it’s a challenge in our Church today. You know that there’s this big Synod that which was going on in Rome and which will be continued next year. And Synods, can be very important, to St. Charles Borromeo that we just celebrated yesterday, one of the things he did was he had a number of Synods in his diocese, and I’ve been to several Synods in other diocese to participate in them. And they can, there can be very good things in them. But there’s also a danger. The danger is, are we listening to man’s word? Or to God’s word? Are we following human opinions and human pressures? Because there’s often groups which have their own agenda. Or are we listening to God. And so the danger of pride is always present. And its present in all the members of the Church, we all struggle with that. And so we can be led by, our pride can lead us to follow our human understanding, rather than faith in God. And one of the things that gets involved in that and gets involved in the Church is ambition, ecclesial ambition, and that’s a big danger. And it’s a big danger for the pastors of the Church. Because the desire to be, you know, to be better known to be stand out to be prominent, to rise in a hierarchy. And so to do that, you have to please men. That’s the way you rise. And so that’s very dangerous. And Jesus Himself in the Gospel today says, “Whoever exalts himself,” and that’s what that’s what ambition leads us to want to do, right, to exalt ourselves and Jesus, “whoever exalts himself will be humbled,” and will be humbled, if it doesn’t change will be humbled forever. “But whoever humbles himself will be exalted” So this is important for pastors for priests, you know, I was I was a priest for a number of years in Mexico, and in Mexico, and that was back in the 90s. And that there was a lot of respect for priests. In the United States today, it’s not very prestigious to be a priest, and an even less so with all the terrible abuses that have come out. So that’s sad in a lot of ways. But there’s also something good about that. Because there’s always a danger that a person wants to become a priest, because of a position of status. And in the situations where the priest has a high status, that’s a bigger danger. It’s not such a big danger in the United States now, rather, it takes a lot of humility. And so that’s the key to receiving God’s word, is this grace, this virtue of humility. And so we have this beautiful Psalm today. And I’ll read it, “oh, Lord, my heart is not proud. Nor are my eyes haughty. I busy not myself with great things, nor with things to sublime for me. They rather I have stilled in quiet in my soul, like a weaned child, like a weaned child on its mother’s lap, so is my soul within me.”  And we have a good example of the contrary of, of this bad shepherds, we have example of a good shepherd in reading from St. Paul. And what we see in St. Paul is the effort not to transmit his own opinions, but to transmit the Word of God. And he says, “Brothers and sisters,” so he’s giving the example of a good shepherd, “We were gentle among you, as a nursing mother, cares for her children. With such affection for you, we were determined to share with you, not only the gospel of God,” notice it says the gospel of God, not of man, not of Paul, but of God. “Not only the gospel of God, but our very selves as well. So Dearly beloved, had you become to us, you recall, brothers and sisters, our toil and drudgery, working day and night, in order not to be a burden to any of you, we proclaim to you the gospel of God.”  So it’s emphasizing it’s the gospel of God, not man’s gospel, in fact, to the Galatians, St. Paul insist on this, he says, “Brethren, I would have you know, that the gospel, which was preached by me, is not man’s gospel. It’s not from man, for I did not receive it from men. Nor was I taught it.” You know, most of us did receive the gospel from man, you know, from men from our parents, and from humans, but also with the help of the Holy Spirit, but transmitted through humans. But that wasn’t the case for St. Paul. It says, “I did not receive it for man, nor was I taught it, but it came through a revelation of Jesus Christ.” His gospel came directly by a revelation of Jesus Christ. And Scripture tells us about that. So his situation is different from the 12 apostles, the 12 apostles heard from Jesus and Jesus human ministry. But same, and then there were the companions. A lot of people heard about Jesus and the apostles taught a lot of other people. But St. Paul’s situation was different. And that sense, it was more like a prophet, because he received it directly as a revelation. And so we see these two different ways of receiving the Word of God, either the ordinary way in the Church, in which the ministers and the catechist and family transmit the Word of God to the newer generations. But sometimes God also act in an extraordinary way with revelations. And we have the great example, the prophets. And so how did the people respond to St. Paul, that he’s speaking here, I think, to the Thessalonians. And so say, there was, say what St. Paul says, is pretty surprising that the response, he says, “We think we also thank God constantly for this, that when you received the word of God, which you heard from us, you accepted it not as the word of men, but as it really is, the word of God, which is that work in you.” Now, we’re used to hearing that so we don’t realize how shocking that is. But when you know, this, Thessalonica was a city, which there was all sorts of different ideas, all sorts of different religions. And so here’s this one guy shows up that they don’t know. And He’s even been, he’s even been rejected by his own community, his Jewish community. And so he begins giving this outlandish teaching. And what proof does he have to back him up? He doesn’t have a long religious tradition. He is just saying he has experienced this because that’s what he said St. Paul said by revelation, this came from a revelation. And yet what’s striking is that he says that the Thessalonians received his word. And remember St. Paul was not reading from scripture when he’s doing this because there was no Scripture. Yeah, this was before scripture. In fact, this letter to the Thessalonians is one of the first parts of the New Testament that we have. But of course, when they heard St. Paul, there was even a letter to the Thessalonians didn’t exist yet. So all they have is his, his, his preaching. And yet they received his preaching, based on the revelation that he had received, they received it as the word of God and not the word of man. Most people would have said, all that, just this some crazy straw guy. But these people had a grace to receive the Word of St. Paul, as the word of God. Even though Paul of Tarsus, was the one transmitting it, and yet they believed it was God himself who was speaking. And again, think of that, he’s not basing himself on Scripture. They had to believe that this man that they’re hearing is truly speaking the Word of God. And that’s the case of prophecy. That’s why this is such revelatory, because we’re here at the Mission of Divine Mercy, for those who are new, prophecy is something that the Lord has called us to be very attentive to, is realizing prophecy is still going on. And this is a good example. And the people didn’t say, oh, that’s crazy. Because what authority do you have? They sensed it, it was God, they had a grace to sense it was God himself, who was speaking to, listen again, to what St. Paul says, “We thank God constantly that when you receive the Word of God, which you heard from us,” you heard from us, you didn’t read it, because it wasn’t in Scripture, and no one else was saying it, we were the first ones to say it, and “that you still believe that it was God speaking, you accepted it not as the word of men, not as my word. But as it really is the word of God, which is that work in you.” So St. Paul’s saying, the word he’s giving is the word of God. The word this, which he received by revelation, as Jesus told His apostles, he who hears you, here’s me, he who hears hears you because when the apostles began preaching to them wasn’t any that none of that the gospel was written yet. And yet, when they began preaching, Jesus says, You’re hearing, you’re hearing me that people are hearing me through you. And so again, that clarifies the role of prophets. And so I think this is important, in these times of confusion, of great confusion that we’re living. And a lot of that confusion comes from pride. And so our great model is our Blessed Mother. And those of you who come often to the mission, know we often come back this very simple, this very simple call, to humbly listen to the Word of God, Mary is the great example of humbly listening to God, who continues to speak. And in these critical, dramatic, difficult times that we’re living, God is continuing to speak to His Church. And sometimes when the normal channels are not working, He uses extraordinary channels. That’s the role of prophets. And so it’s important for the Church to humbly listen to God. And so I gave you one example, you know, one practical example for us of why we chose a habit which was difficult for us to wear. I’d say one more thing about that, when we’re, when you’re a very small community, it’s even more difficult. Like sometimes I see someone wearing the habit of the Mission of Divine Mercy far away, and I can’t see who it is. But since there’s only two people in the whole world who wear it, and I’m one of them, that kind of narrows it down. We’re a very small community. And so it’s more challenging to do that. But the key is to listen, to humbly listen to God. And so, as I read again, that there’s words of Saint Paul, “we thank God constantly for this, that when you receive the Word of God, which you heard from us, you accepted it not as the word of men, but what it really is the word of God, which is at work in you, the believers.” And I’ll just end with reading again, the beautiful song, we have a humility, as an invitation for all of us to ask for this grace of humility. So if you want you can close your eyes. “Oh Lord, my heart is not proud. Nor are my eyes hottie. I busy not myself with great things, nor with things to sublime for me. Thou rather I have stilled in quieted my soul, like a weaned child like a weaned child on its mother’s lap. So is my soul within me. “Amen.

KEYWORDS / PHRASES:
Matthew 23:1-12
Malachi 1:14-2:2, 8-10
Psalm 131:1,2,3,
1 Thessalonians 2:7-9, 13