OCTOBER 22, 2017
7:30 AM, 9:00 AM ORDINARY FORM (ENGLISH) MASSES
In the 1977 movie titled “Oh God,” John Denver portrays store manager Jerry Landers who is granted an audience with God … Who reveals Himself first as a voice on an intercom, and then as a voice on the radio. Eventually, when God does appear in person, He is portrayed by George Burns – an American comedian, actor, singer, and writer; who died 21 years ago at the age of 100.
Jerry is tasked with getting the word out that “God lives! …God is here and He’s giving you a guarantee … [He] set all this up for you and made it so it can work.”
And despite the simplicity of the message, Jerry can’t seem to get it out. He’s met with skepticism on one hand, and overwhelmed by religious fervor on the other.
His own struggle to come to grips with being chosen by God and trying to understand the message he is tasked with getting out makes him a sort of a-religious everyman struggling to embrace as a reasonable possibility that God could indeed exist.
In a final courtroom scene, God’s closing argument is:
“I know how hard it is in these time to have faith. But maybe if you could have the faith to start with, maybe the times would change. You could change it. Think about it. Try. … If you find it hard to believe in me, maybe it would help if you knew that I believe in you.”Today is the 29th Sunday in Ordinary Time.
In the first reading from Isaiah, God speaks through the prophet and explains that He will end the Babylonian captivity of Israel through a future king of Persia – even going so far as giving a name, which when played out hundreds of years later.
Scholars are torn between believing that was truly a prediction or an insertion by a later commentator. Nonetheless, the point is the same: God not only exists, but directs the flow of history, and He has a plan.
St. Paul, in the first few lines from his First Letter to the Thessalonians, reminds them – and us as well – that we are chosen by God to live out and proclaim the Gospel in word and power through the graces given to us by God: namely, Faith, Hope, and Love.
And finally, in the Gospel, both the Pharisees and the Herodians put Jesus on trial. They think they’ve got Him in a bind – a “lose-lose” situation, if you will. If Jesus opposes the Roman tax, they can have the civil authorities arrest Him as a rebel; but if He supports it, He will lose the support of the people.
Jesus takes a third way. In identifying the coin as “what belongs to Caesar” He tells them to give it back to it’s owner. But then admonishes them to repay “to God what belongs to God.”
For ourselves, we have been chosen by God – from before we were born – and more importantly – through the waters of Holy Baptism, which have bestowed on us the supernatural graces of Faith, Hope, and Love. With this solid, spiritual foundation, God indeed has “set all this up for [us] and made it so it can work.” God has already given us “the faith to start with,” so we can utilize His power to change things – to change the world – starting right now with ourselves.
No matter how strong or how weak our Faith may be, God indeed believes in us, and is taking a chance on us. So, maybe it’s time we step out in Faith and take a chance on God.
As we approach this altar to receive the Sacred Body and Blood, Soul and Divinity of Jesus Christ, let us ask for a deeper outpouring of those Baptismal graces so that we might be strengthened in Faith, Hope, and Love … and fueled with the power of His grace, let us go forth from this place as messengers of the Gospel – chosen by God, redeemed in Christ, and filled with the Holy Spirit
