November 2003

Homily for the First Sunday of Advent - C November 30, 2003

Did you read the Journal this week?
(“Concord,” that is - not “Wall Street”!)
The Journal was filled with pictures and announcements
of the annual holiday “Stroll”
and holiday lights, and a holiday tree lighting ceremony,
and holiday concerts, and a holiday trolley,
and holiday refreshments,
and even a holiday train for children to ride on Beharrell Street.
But the Journal never mentions, not even once,
just what holiday it is that we might be celebrating!
We can speak about the “holiday” - but we can’t name it.

Who draws the line here? And why?

As you may know,
the church is making some changes in the liturgy.
Some parishes are instituting those changes this weekend.
Our parish will take a slower approach,
taking a broader, deeper look, over the next five months,
at how we pray together.
Some of these proposed changes want to return to the clergy
liturgical duties that have been performed by lay people
for about the last 30 years.

Who draws the line here? And why?
We live in a culture of divorce.
In addition to the staggering divorce statistics,
the Catholic church, in the United States,
annuls about 60,000 marriages - every year.
I read last week that:
“Marriage is in crisis because marriage,
which relies on a culture of fidelity,
is now asked to survive in a culture of contingency.”
(The Power of Marriage by David Brooks, NY Times, 11/22/03)
How might we better encourage people
to move from relationships of contingency
to relationships of pledged fidelity?
Divorce, annulments, contingency, fidelity...

Who draws the line here? And why?

The press is quick to report every word the Pope writes or speaks - on matters sexual.
But how many of us know from the media:
the Holy Father’s views on consumerism;
or his thoughts on the plight of migrant workers and refugees;
or his deep and grave misgivings about the war in Iraq?

Some papal statements are widely reported, others are not...

Who draws the line here? And why?

The season of Advent is about much more than
advent wreaths and candles and purple bows and vestments.

This season of Advent is meant to help us prepare
to celebrate Christmas on December 25th,
and it is also meant to keep us mindful
that Christ will come again.
The gospel today paints an Advent picture
of the heavens being shaken by the coming of Christ.

Jesus came, and will come again,
both to draw lines, and to erase lines.

He came 2,000 years ago to draw a line:
between all that is true and all that is false;
between all that gives life and all that deals death;
between all that builds up and all that tears down.

And he came to erase lines, too.
He came to erase the line
between God and humankind,
between heaven and earth,
perfectly blending in himself the human and divine
- and inviting us to be like him.

What lines need to be drawn in our culture?
in our church?
in our hearts?
in our daily lives?
And what lines need to be erased in those same places
- if we hope to meet Jesus when he comes again at the end of time?

In the eucharist,
all lines are erased when we sinners are invited to “take a seat”
at the table of the prince of peace, the One who is to come again,
the Lamb of God who takes away sins of the world;
who erases the lines our sins draw
between us and our neighbor
and between us and our Maker.

May no boundary line keep us from the Lord’s table,
or from the love of God,
or from the life we share here.

We need not wait for Christmas or the end of the world
to meet Christ coming again among us:
he comes this morning to this very table
in the bread and cup of the eucharist,
as real as his body and blood made present for us.

At this table,
on Christmas day,
at the end of our lives and at the end of time:
in every instance,
let us be prepared to meet him
and let no line be drawn to keep us from him.

Rev. Austin Fleming

Homily for Dedication of the Lateran Basilica November 9, 2003

Ezekiel 47:1-2, 8-9, 12 1 Corinthians 3;9-11, 16-17 John 2:13-22

In the early days of the life of the Christian community, the building in which Christians met for prayer was called, in Latin, the domus ecclesiae which means, “the house of the church.”

The subtlety here is important and we need to study it. Neither the Latin word for church, “ecclesia” nor the Greek word for church, “ekklesia” refer to a building. Both words mean a gathering of people, a people called together. In our case, a people called together by God.

So, at least in the beginning, the word church referred to a community, not a building. But the house of worship became so identified with the people that the house began to take on the name of those who gathered there for prayer.

Today, we readily refer to a structure like the one we’re in as “the church.” And very often we refer to the Vatican and its teaching authority as “the church.”

But I think we’re less inclined to think of and name ourselves “the church.”

In some Protestant communities, it’s not unusual for the pastor to get the congregation to rise by saying, “Let the church stand!” Such a pastor and congregation clearly understand the primary meaning of the word church: the gathering of God’s people.

So, here we are today: the church, the people of God, gathered in the church building of Our Lady Parish, come together to worship according to the prayer of the Roman Catholic Church.

Our parish is 96 years old. God has been gathering, calling together the Catholic people of West Concord, fashioning us as “church” for 96 years.

For 96 years this parish of Our Lady has gathered in this place to pray.

This past week our parish celebrated the funeral of Frank Viscariello. Frank was born in Concord 85 years ago and our parish baptismal register records his baptism in this church. Frank’s Christian life began the first time his parents brought him to church - for baptism. And this past week we brought him to church for the last time, for his funeral mass. Most of us don’t spend our lives in one parish. Most of us move around from parish to parish as our life’s circumstances draw us. But whatever parish we live and pray in, that parish, and its church building, become a home for us: a home for our faith; a home for our most important celebrations (birth, Sunday worship, forgiveness, marriage and death) a home for our hearts when they are filled with fear and anxiety, or overflowing with joy and peace; and a home for the intimacy of our relationship with God.

When we gather for prayer, as we are gathered now, each of us has the opportunity to enter into intimacy with God, in the quiet sanctuaries of our hearts, and yet still be in this very public place. How much we should reverence what might be the prayer of the person sitting next to us, behind us, or in front of us.

Who knows what joys or sorrows they may be laying at the foot of the cross of Jesus, and on the altar of his presence in the eucharist.

I did a little investigating in the parish record books this week. In the 96 year history of our parish, how many weddings do you suppose have been celebrated here? Well, some 1,574 couples have walked down this aisle and out the front door as husband and wife.

And in those 96 years, how many baptisms do you suppose have been celebrated here? That number is 3,829!

(And since we celebrate so many baptisms at Mass now, you may feel that by now, you must have been at least 2,000 of them!)

Those are impressive numbers: nearly 1,600 marriages and over 3,800 baptisms. But let me share with you a less impressive number.

In my letter in last week’s bulletin I asked for volunteers to offer rides to and from “church” to elderly folks who live at Concord Park - right down there in West Concord Center.

Number of people calling to volunteer for this effort? One...

When the big moments in our lives come along, we come flocking back to “church” to celebrate them. But very often, when it comes to living as the “church” day to day, we act as if the church is primarily a building, and easily forget that the church is us.

The folks at Concord Park aren’t going to be able to get to “church” unless the people who come here under their own steam reach out as if they understood themselves to be the church.

There are more wonderful things about the community of Our Lady Help of Christians Parish than I can tell. But as wonderful as our faith community is, there is always room for us to be, more and more, the church: to live out, day to day, what we pray and do when we gather in the building we call the church, too.

The heart of our church building is the altar where we offer, week after week, that sacrifice of thanksgiving the Lord gave us on the night before he died.

May the food we receive at the Lord’s table strengthen us to be more and more the church, the people God has made and called us to be.

Rev. Austin Fleming