Wisdom 18:6-9
Psalm 33:1-22
Hebrews 11:1-19
Luke 12:32-48
Where is your heart? Where has it wandered? In its purest youth, it longed only for God and for God's things. Do you remember the wonder with which you beheld an early Saturday morning in Spring? The edge of each new leaf so sharp, the freshly unfurled greens so bright, with high flown clouds over a blue, blue sky? Do you recall whole days spent roaming that other world, the mysterious woods, with its streams fragrant with clean, clear water and peopled with bright green leopard frogs, shimmering sun fish, and painted turtles and red-eared sliders basking on rocks. Nearby orange and black box turtles make their way stealthfully through the forest's floor, then at dusk the miracle of luminous, dancing fireflies. Settling down into a sleep out under the stars, the air is alive with calling owls and peepers and the invisible stirrings of foraging mammals. All these things held our rapt attention, for this was our earliest holy communion when the pure and innocent would "feed on Him in their hearts with thanksgiving," being fed by God, that is, through His prismatic Creation.
As St. Augustine wrote, "You have made us for Yourself, O God, and our hearts are restless until they rest in You." The young boy begins to fill his bedroom with various rocks, for he is fascinated by their colors and textures seeing the starting point of jewels. And the young girl presses flowers within the pages of books. For the spirit of wonder prods us on to share the beauty we have seen, and a society of friendship with God begins.
At this early stage of discipleship, the Cross seems out of place. To see the Hands, which created all, pierced with nails and dripping with blood seems somehow wrong in this pristine setting. Yet, no boy or girl who ever lived will fail to need this Cross and this bloody Man before all is done. For each will betray Him, themselves, and each other, and all will abandon the purity and goodness He has made both around them and within them. This notion is horrible for us to contemplate. Over and over again, in every succeeding generation, we want to believe that it need not happen, that it won't happen. But, sadly, it does happen. And we will need this Savior, Who mysteriously has taken all of our sins upon His sacred Head.
What happens to us? St. Augustine famously wrote that something is basically wrong, wrong with us and wrong with the world. For both ourselves and the world point unerringly toward perfection yet tragically fall short of it. Think of the Seven Deadly Sins. They have come down to us through many centuries for a reason, for each depicts that fatal excess, that "something that is wrong."
To savor food and drink, the fruits of the field and orchard, is to commune with God. For He fashioned every texture and taste. Yet, when we become too fastened upon it, we transform into grotesques of what a human ought to look like. Have you ever seen grossly obese men or women?
To become justly indignant is the stuff that courage is made of and an unavoidable outcome of integrity, but when we cannot get the bitter root out of our mouths, fueling our anger with its potent juices, we become a grostesque of rage. Have you ever seen a disfigured angry man or woman in a full-blown rage?
To admire a comely woman or man is to appreciate the lineaments of God's Creation, for what is more stunning than His own image, beautifully and graciously brought together in a living, human being? This graceful creature might be anyone -- a teacher, a mother, a husband, a wife, a father, a grandmother. Yet, when we begin to long for or covet that man or woman, dissecting them into erotic parts, we begin to defile ourselves and the object of our admiration and lapse into a grotesque. Have you ever seen a leering man, or, perhaps, a woman scanning the horizon for a hookup? Then you have seen proportion and beauty quickly lapse into bestial desire.
Frugality is a godly virtue. To husband one's resources is the very stuff of apostolic life. What Franciscan sister does not wash and rewash her ziplock baggies and reuse brown paper shopping bags until they are threadbare? But when we make a cult of pinching every penny to the point of losing all proportion, we become a grotesque. Have you ever experienced the cold and unfeeling eye of the miser? Have you ever had financial dealings with an avaricious man? It is not a wholesome experience.
To take one's rest and to sleep in God's peace is one of the deepest pleasures of life. We awaken refreshed and find ourselves, once again, to be alive to the world's many blessings. Truly, it is a resurrection-in-small. But to lie about on a couch, making a god of the television before which we worship day and night is to lapse into a grotesque that sinks far below what God made us to be .... and ironically far short of the heroes we watch on the radiating screen before us!
To appreciate the good fortune of a friend, or to toast him or her on the occasion of an award or a promotion is a true office of love, and joy is multiplied. But when we dwell upon good fortune wishing it to be our own and resenting the one who has received it, we become a grotesque, falling rapidly away from the love to which God has called us. And our eyes turn green drinking from its own special cocktail of rage and unwholesome desire.
Finally, God made us to become ever more and more like Him. The blueprint was set the moment He created us in His image. As we advance toward this unfurling wholeness and goodly image, we do right to take satisfaction in all that He has given us to have and to be. But when we become absorbed in our own glorious image, when we fawn over our own appearance, when we find that the whole world undervalues us, we lapse into that most dangerous grotesque of all, pridefulness. Have you ever seen the woman who is a diva, or the narcissistic man? Such a one as this is apt to carry within the heart all of the other grotesques we have reflected on this morning. Ultimately, this is Satan's sin and leads us into the Evil One's ancient feud with God. Nothing is good enough for us.
St. Augustine, sometimes called the Father of Psychology, wrote that what we ponder from moment by moment is what we become over time. That is, our daydreams and fantasies eventually become our private reality, from which, in time, we cannot escape. Ask anyone who has descended into pornography. The whole world becomes sexualized, and they have utterly lost the capacity, it seems forever, to enter innocent and pure relationship and love. Ask an alcoholic what his world looks like? It is skein of taverns and inns and barrooms. He looks forward to that first drink each day, and he cannot stop until he is unconscious.
Truly, whatever we have decided to value, to devote ourselves to, even to make our god, this will become our heart's desire and the reason why we live. And then we shall arrive to that inevitable place where we unveil our hidden idol to the world: ourselves, and the world sees us plainly -- the obese woman, the man of rage, the leering woman, the close-fisted miser, the couch potato, the jealous man, the towering pridefulness of the disordered soul. A horror to behold! Is this really us?! How did we get here?! And, more important, how do we get out?! For so, so many people, the answer is, that they cannot get out. For grotesques are many years in the making, and transformation is simply not possible in a nonce.
When Dr. Faustus reaches the end of his life, realizing that he has given away everything including his soul receiving nothing in return, he demands of Mephistopheles one last thing: "Then, tell me at least this: Where is Hell?" And his demon companion replies, "Why, this is Hell, nor are we out of it." Milton puts it this way, "The mind is its own place, and in it self, can make a Heaven of Hell, or Hell of Heaven."
Once we have entered earthly Hell, which will lead irreversibly to eternal Hell if all be left to its own immovable weight and intertia, escape is impossible, .... at least, we cannot do it alone. And it is then that we discover God's most beautiful gift, which is forgiveness. We learn that no matter how far we wander, however shameful or dark or distant from those we love, He is there waiting -- waiting to behold our tears, to hear our stories, to embrace our despair, and, finally, to receive our sorrow and heartfelt regret for having injured ourselves and Him.
Becoming secure in our friendship with Him and living the life that He has given us to live, we begin to witness a marvelous transformation. The poisons of unwholesome desire and wrong choice begin to leach out of us; the disfigurement of our soul and holy image begins to heal; and the a light returns to our visage where only recently a dull, grayness was apparent. And we gain confidence that all is not lost, .... in fact, that everything might be regained.
Of course, we should remember that St. Augustine's dictum operates in both directions. If we should love kindness, we become a kind person. If we should love charity, we become a charitable person. If we should love generosity, we become a generous person. If we should love patience, we become a patient person. And if we should love God, the Holy One, we become sanctified .... and all by the grace of God. It takes a very long time to make a saint, and it cannot be undone easily. For a saint is not made to decay, losing all vestiges of original innocence and purity, nor even to be buried in some cases, for some do not decompose. A saint is formed for unending life, to be Heavenly, and when a saint leaves this world, his or her entry into Heaven is seamless, graceful, and natural, for nothing very much will have changed. St. Catherine of Siena wrote that, "It is nothing but Heaven all the way to Heaven." That is, Heaven is not so much a place where we go as it is something we become. And that becoming began a long time ago, on a fresh, green Saturday morning in Spring.
We know the truth of the alternative and the reality of a destination where there is no hope. So let us be saints. Let our hearts behold Him moment by moment, day by day, and then forever. Let us rejoice in His handiwork all about us and His unfailing Love that surrounds us. For Heaven is in your heart .... calling your heart to become Heaven. It is easier than you think and as simple as a child's wonder. Amen.