Oct. 26, 2008: 30th Sunday Ordinary Time (A)

Have you ever looked at the bottom of one of your electronics gadgets lately? There is a label that tells you where it was made. Many of them are made in Mexico. Few years ago, I got to see where in Mexico the factories which made these goods were located.
 
Juarez, Mexico is a border city located directly across from El Paso, Texas separated only by Rio Grande river and miles of fences. I was there in winter of 2001 for three days with the Columban Fathers—a missionary order— trying to see what it was like being a missionary priest. Many poor have traveled from the interior of Mexico to this border town hoping that they could make better a living. In most cases, they did not. The minimum wage in this town was $3.40 a day (not per hour). I went to the local grocery looking to buy few things, and I was surprised to find a gallon of milk was still $3. I wondered to myself, how could an average person, let alone a family survive. With the passage of NAFTA, the border between U.S. and Mexico became a commercial zone with low tariff and low wages. American companies rushed to build factories in this no-man’s land where Mexican workers did not have protection of either the U.S. or Mexican labor laws. The workers got paid higher than minimum wage in these American factories. They received $9 dollars a day, instead of $3.40 a day. 

One evening, I was taken to a high hill that overlooked the shantytown and the border to El Paso. Looking down at the other side of the border, a U.S. Border Patrol cop flashed his high-beam from his car. It was a warning to us standing on the Mexican side that we should not attempt to cross the border. How surreal it was. Here was a Korean standing inside Mexican border, warned not to cross the U.S. border. What separated me from men, women, and children living in the shantytown, with whom previous night I worshipped and adored Jesus, was a piece of paper—U.S. passport declaring that I was a U.S. citizen. Here we were identically baptized and confirmed by Jesus, and yet we were opposite in the kind of privileges we could enjoy in life. I’m sure most folks on the El Paso side heard about the living conditions on the other side, but really did not experience the kind of life that people on the other side of border lived. 

This brings to our Gospel today. A Pharisee asked, “Teacher, which commandment in the law is the greatest?” Jesus said, “You shall love God with all your heart and soul, and love your neighbor as yourself.” We’ve heard these words over and over, and it doesn’t sink in as powerfully as when we heard it the first time. But let me put it this way. Six years ago, the extent of my life revolved around cubicles in a chemical plant in front of Excel spreadsheets, rarely getting any glimpse of the personal lives of others. After ordination to priesthood five months ago, I was given privilege to travel across the borders of hearts of people, young and old, married and single, healthy and sick. 

This white collar I’m wearing was my passport to be allowed into people’s well guarded borders of their hearts. Now after traveling five months through the hearts of countless number of people, I have learned one thing. No matter how close two persons are, no matter how many years they lived as siblings or as husband and wife, one cannot understand fully the living condition of the other, just as people of El Paso had only heard about what’s going on the other side of the border. How can we understand the loneliness of the elderly, the widows, and the divorced? How can we know what struggles our teenage sons and daughters are going through? How can we understand the anxiety and fear of those who are stricken with cancer, those who are grappling with decision to enter a nursing home? 

What’s our passport to be allowed into the hearts of others? This white collar of mine represents someone whom one can trust, one who is willing to listen, one who is willing to take time and patience to understand the other. Then, one does not need to be a priest. The one who crosses the borders of hearts are those who are willing to be patient and compassionate like Our Lord. That is the meaning of, “Love your neighbor as yourself.”  

Oct. 19, 2008: 29th Sunday Ordinary Time (A)

The new arrival of a first child is one of the most life-changing experiences for the mom and dad. Their car will now be occupied by an infant car seat, stuffed animals, diaper bag, and Barney CDs. They will begin to wonder about the future. Do we need a bigger house? Do we need to move closer to a good school? Is the neighborhood safe? Should we begin college savings account? Will our child have a job?  

What motivates these parents to ponder about these future questions? The love for the child. Without love, all the sleepless nights wrestling with a fussy infant or sacrificing a third of your income on education do not make sense. Our concern for the child begin in the small confines of our home in the crib, but soon it expands into our neighborhood and our community. We join local PTA, become den mother of Cub Scout, and get involved with youth ministry at our church. Soon as the child matures into a young adult, parents worry about what’s being shown on TV, what they are browsing on the Internet, and what’s being discussed with their friends. In other words, the love for our child propels us to think about the values in which our children are raised in. It’s because we know how important values are that we try to set good example. And we want our children to be raised, especially in Christian values—values that Jesus taught.

I remember when I was in the middle school in Dallas, Texas, I was reminded of the Christian values even when playing football. On the football field, minutes before the game began, our team knelt on one knee and prayed. We didn’t pray that God would give us special grace to pounce on the other team 57-0. We prayed, instead, that when we play the game, we would play fairly, at our best, and we prayed that no one in either team will be injured. Wouldn’t it be nice to have such values and attitude in everything we do? Wouldn’t it be nice, for example, before the bells on the New York Stock Exchange rung to start the morning, every broker and floor traders would pray the following prayer: “Heavenly Father you have entrusted to us hard earned money of the citizens of our nation. Let us not be tempted into vice of selfish greed for a quick gain. Rather, let us be tempered with virtues of prudence and charity to be servants of our nation’s citizens.” Would we have such turmoil in our retirement accounts if our financial workers had such Christian attitude?    

When we look around, we see gradually our Christian values being forcibly removed or forgotten. There is a religion out there called secularism which believes that there is no God and that other belief system should be rejected or ignored. Secularists support the following: 

• The complete separation of church and state.
  
• The banning prayers, cross, crucifixes, monuments of Ten Commandments in schools and public buildings.
  
• Removal of religion and signs of religion from schools
  

We may not have problem with these subtle changes occurring around us. We may even agree with some of the demands of secularists. But let me go back to the image of the love of the parents for the child. It is love that propelled the parents to care about what values the child was raised in. There are two fundamental values we as Christian parents want our child to be raised in: love for God and love for neighbor. When either is removed, there is bound to be vacuum in virtues. When care for God and our neighbor is removed, selfishness sets in and then vice moves in—pride, anger, lust, gluttony, envy, sloth, and greed. Have we seen this in our financial world?

In our gospel, Jesus replies to the Pharisees who attempt to trap him with the question, ‘Tell us, is it lawful to pay the census tax to Caesar or not?’ And Jesus replies, “Render unto Caesar the things which are Caesar's; and unto God the things that are God's.” What is Jesus saying here? Is he saying keep our faith private from our public squares? Rather he’s saying be faithful to your civic duties. And at the same time, do not hide your faith; proclaim it. He says to us, be the salt of the earth (Matt 5:13-15); what good is the salt if it loses its taste? He says to us, be the light of the world; who puts a lit lamp under a basket? He says, “I have come to set the earth on fire, and how I wish it were already blazing!” (Luke 12:49)

Recently Archbishop Charles Chaput of Denver Colorado has published a book called, "Render Unto Caesar: Serving the Nation by Living Our Catholic Beliefs in Political Life." In the book, Archbishop Chaput encourages Catholics to participate in public life, where faith and politics intersect. Archbishop says, “People who take God seriously will not remain silent about their faith. They’ll act on what they believe, sometimes at the cost of their reputations and careers…for Catholics, the common good can never mean muting themselves in public debate on foundational issues of human dignity. Christian faith is always personal but never private. That is why any notion of tolerance that tries to reduce faith to private idiosyncrasy, or a set of opinions that we can indulge at home but need to be quiet about in public, will always fail.”

Our love for our children and our love for Our Lord Jesus will not allow us to let values of our community, state, and country degenerate into selfish vices. That is why we are not to be silent about our love, our passion, and our values. 

Oct 12,2008: 28th Sunday Ordinary (A)

Gratitude is thankfulness for favors or gifts received. We experience gratitude when (1) we receive something that we wanted or needed, (2) we realize how much it cost the person to give us the gift, (3) we know that person had our best interest in mind when giving the gift, and (4) the gift was given freely without strings attached. It's very refreshing to see someone grateful. It's perhaps because we experience more ingratitude than gratitude. Parents of little children drill them to say 'thank you,' whenever someone gives their child a candy. 'What do you say Johnny?' When there is a long silence from Johnny, parents say, 'I'm sorry, Johnny is shy.'

This past weekend, I spent some time with high school seniors at a retreat. At one point of the evening after a presentation about relationships, the seniors were given some silent time. The room was darkened, and candles were lit. The seniors were given time to think about the various relationships in their own life. They were given chance to think about persons they wronged so to ask for forgiveness, to think about change in the direction of their own life, to pray for someone who needed God's help. It was in these moments that they were given letters from their parents. Once they had chance to read the letters, all of the seniors were in tears. I saw a faculty member going around the building handing out Kleenex. When the seniors read how their parents were proud of their accomplishments, they experienced gratitude. They were grateful to their parents for making sacrifices freely with their best interest in mind. Many parents here probably wished that their kids go to this retreat every month so that their kids can show some appreciation more often. It's a mystery how quickly we take for granted all the sacrifices and gifts that others make for us. 

The question of whether we are grateful for what we have received is put to us today in our Gospel. And it centers squarely on mass. Are we grateful for mass? Are there reasons to appreciate what's being done at mass? Our Gospel shows mass as a wedding banquet that a father throws for his son. It's a rich feast, and invitations are sent but many reject it and some who come are poorly prepared. Sometimes our attitude can be like the following: "I used to go to Mass regularly, but I did not get anything out of it, so I finally gave up. I think I live a good life: I pray when I like it, but if I go to a beautiful lake, meadow or forest or even if I look at the sky, I feel closer to God than being at mass. The ritual is always the same and I have to endure a mediocre or bad sermon. Why should I waste my time with all this? I can read the Bible at home and get more out of it than listening to the parish priest."

This is what I call the shopper's attitude. When we go shopping, we want the best buy for the money. As shoppers, we are in control in picking what we like and dislike. What would happen if our children had this attitude at home? I don't like what you're putting on the dinner table. I don't like the school you're putting me through. I don't appreciate all your nagging about how I should be dressed, how long I stay on computer, and whom I befriend. Soon you would have a very upset parent over very ungrateful child. I've done my share of church shopping. When I was still in my Protestant-days in college, I went to a Pentecostal church for their cool music, evangelical church for exciting young-adult ministry, and another church for dynamic preaching. But once you begin to shop, it never ends. There is always a church that outdoes the other in some novelty. 

At the heart of the mass, taking away the music, the artwork, and this building, is a loving God the Father who willingly lets his Son offer himself as a sacrifice for us. Jesus does this freely with our best interest in mind. As we eat his body and drink his blood, we experience healing, comfort, freedom, and courage to face another week of challenges. We heard this many times. But why did our seniors at the high school retreat all of sudden realize how much their parents sacrificed for them when they received their letters? Mass is like that letter, opened and read week after week, to remind us to be grateful for what God has done.

Are there things that you would like for St. Aloysius to improve upon? This is where Our Lord calls you to be his fellow co-workers in the vineyard. Our Lord said, "The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few." There are laborers around us whom God is calling. They just need to be asked. If there are persons you know whose gifts will be invaluable to St. Aloysius, I encourage you to fill out the yellow 'Look Around You' card and drop it in the collection basket. I also encourage all of you to take home and read the Catholic Update on "Lay Ministry" available at all the entrance doors. 

Oct. 10, 2008: 27th Sunday Ordinary (A). Respect Life Weekend

It's not easy being a sign of contradiction in this world. And that's who we are as Catholics, a sign of contradiction, contradicting the ways of the world. Many times we can blend in with the rest of the world, but some times we stick out like a sore thumb. And our presence can make others uneasy.

One Friday weekend evening when I was still a seminarian, a few seminarians and a priest got together to have dinner. On the way back, we stopped at a Shell station. As one seminarian was putting gas in the car, the priest (who was in his clerical) went inside to buy a gum. The line was long, and a couple of persons ahead of him were two high school or college aged young ladies. They were dressed up for going out Friday night; and when I mean dressed up, they had strapless shirts and way short skirts. And then they noticed the presence of the priest behind the line. And boy their conscience must have been pricked because they were trying to lower their skirts realizing that what they were wearing were immodest.

Sometimes when we speak our Catholic convictions in public, we can be accused of creating division. The world does not like to hear what Our Lord has to say through the Catholic Church. In 1994 Mother Teresa was invited to address the National Prayer Breakfast held in Washington DC. About 3,000 were present; most of these were Who's Who of politics in DC. The President, the First Lady, and the Vice President were sitting next to the podium from which she spoke. People were letting their plates full of scrambled eggs, sausage, and bacon go cold because they were so captivated by Mother Teresa. At the beginning there were lots of applauses. She spoke of God, of love, and of families, and she mesmerized everyone present. Then she dropped this following line: "I feel that the greatest destroyer of peace today is abortion, because Jesus said, 'If you receive a little child, you receive me.' So every abortion is the denial of receiving Jesus, the neglect of receiving Jesus." There was no applause, only several seconds of cool, deafening silence. Then began few applauses in several tables. No one at the head table was applauding. With few more lines of speech, Mother Teresa dropped an even bigger bomb. She said, "I know that couples have to plan their family, and for that there is natural planning. The way to plan the family is natural family planning, not contraception. In destroying the power of giving life or loving through contraception, a husband or wife is doing something to self. This turns the attention to self, and so it destroys the gift of love in him and her...Once that loving is destroyed by contraception, abortion follows very easily. That's why I never give a child to a family that has used contraception, because if the mother has destroyed the power of loving, how will she love my child?" Then began a real long silence. One senator turned to his wife and asked her if his jaw was still up. Didn't Mother Teresa know that we don't talk about abortion and birth control in public speeches in America? What she said divided not only the protestants from Catholics but Catholics from Catholics.

Some would ask Mother Teresa, 'Mother, what you are teaching is out of touch with reality.' How would she have answered that question? She would have said that Jesus himself asked her to teach that message. Some of us find this part of message of Jesus difficult. As many of his disciples said in John Chapter Six, "This saying is hard; who can accept it?" Many years ago in my beginning college days, when I did not have faith or knew Jesus, my belief about abortion and contraception were opposite that of Jesus' teaching. Once I got to know Jesus few years later, I had to tell Jesus, 'Lord, I do not understand what you are teaching. But I do trust you that Your ways are above my ways. Your thoughts are above my thoughts. Help me understand." 

Lord, I do believe and trust in you. Help my unbelief.