I’ve got a secret to tell you, but you have to promise not to tell anyone else, in fact, especially don’t tell your pastor, because, well, he might not let me back….
Fr. Reutter/Fr. St. George, well, he is, ummm…, a sinner. He is not perfect. In fact, there are things that he struggles with. Now, be assured I am not breaking a seal of confession, as I am pretty sure he has never gone to confession to me, nor would I really want him to, unless it is an emergency. But how do I know that he is a sinner? Well, because the second secret is that I am a sinner, too. I have weaknesses, I have foibles, I make mistakes, I fall down. It isn’t the place to discuss them openly, but rest assured, I am very sure that I am not perfect. Ask my mother!
But I don’t say this as if it is a bad thing, in fact, it is a very good thing to have your priest, your pastor, be a sinner. It is something that I became conscious of very soon after I was ordained a priest. Even though I am still working out my own salvation as a Catholic Christian, salvation which involves me now serving Christ as a Priest, I must also help others in their path to salvation. It is the marvelous way that Christ set up His Church, that even though it is the Spirit who is in charge, He works through the instruments of very imperfect agents. So it is important to pray for your priests, as they in turn, pray for you.
I do not say this to beg for prayers, even though I am very much in need of them, I do this in recognition of our First Reading today, for this is exactly what the priests of the Old Covenant, at the time of the Captivity, failed to realize. They forgot that they were there as God’s instruments, to help lead the people towards salvation. Instead, as we hear in the Second Book of Chronicles, they ‘added infidelity to infidelity, practicing all the abominations of the nations and polluting the LORD’s temple, which he had consecrated in Jerusalem.’ The priests should have known better, but became comfortable in their position and in their status, in their place as leaders, and no longer call the people to conversion, no longer cared about the right sacrifice in the Temple, they no longer recognized their own need for salvation and that they were supposed to lead others to salvation.
Because of this, God destroyed the Temple and allowed them to be carted off into Exile. We hear echoes of the shame in the Psalm for today: “We hung our harps by the streams of Babylon and sat and wept, for Zion, God’s Holy City has been destroyed!”
But this fact that we priests are sinners and imperfect, in fact that we all are imperfect and sinners, is something which we strangely rejoice over! So many times throughout the Old Covenant, God tried to reach out and restore us to His friendship, restore us to a place of honor in Creation. But the more He called us to conversion, the more we turned our hearts against him. While Moses and Aaron were present, we did fairly well, but even then the Golden Calf was made. During the time of judges and prophets, the people of Israel were sometimes good, as long as a righteous leader was present. But soon, they would fall back into their old ways. The Kings were an unmitigated disaster!
But in the New Covenant, the Covenant founded in Christ, we no longer have to rely on the weaknesses and foibles of the priests, for we have a perfect priest whom we all worship: Jesus Christ! And what we see in this snippet of the passage of the conversation between Jesus and Nicodemus, is the whole key that will turn this whole thing we call the experiment of life around: John 3:16. There are many apparent answers to why Christ came to this Earth, but here we have a summary of his whole mission, a short summary which, I think, we should all memorize: “For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him might not perish, but might have eternal life.”
This is the key! Christ came not to be a good teacher, not even to embrace the poor, not to be a spiritual role model, he came to save us from our sins, so that we can dwell with him forever. If we are here to experience something other than salvation, if we are here looking for something other than that great gift of Salvation; we are here for the wrong reasons. Salvation is first and foremost what we are about. My salvation. My coming to know Christ so much, that I cannot wait to be with him not only in this life, but also in the next. This is what drives the Church’s mission to the poor, this is what drives her commitment to social justice, because it helps me to know that Christ died for my sins, in a way that is perfect and eternal, and unlimited. And I want others to know about it.
Hence, we rejoice that we are sinners, for when we forget that we are in need of salvation, we forget that we are in need of Christ. It starts with the Holy Father, it runs through every priest and bishop, and drives every Catholic and Christian in the world to be Christ’s agent of light out in the midst of the world.
As we reach this midpoint of the Lenten Season, let us rejoice that we have so great a redeemer who won for us Salvation. But let us also strive to always recognize our great need for redemption, for it is only in that recognition are our hearts truly opened to receive the powerful and great light of Christ, which will dispel the darkness of sin and radiate the bright joy of Everlasting Life.
The first reading that we have today is one of those almost garish readings from the Old Testament. To our modern ears, it is incredible that God would ask for a human sacrifice, that God would seemingly demand that Abraham, after a long journey of faith, would now have to kill the one gift that he has been waiting and waiting for: the gift of his son.
Plus, today the Church comes out so vociferously on the side of life, which this seems to be a senseless act. How is it that a Church that is so pro-life could hold up the example found in this Scripture passage?
Well, as we look at this passage, I think what has to be kept in mind is that this is a passage about Abraham, not Isaac, his story will be told later. In our typical modern mindset, it is easy to lose track of the scope and depth of the story of Abraham, how he became our Father in Faith, that this story jumps off the page at us. So, let us turn back and look at his example, so that we may learn from his faith.
In the early part of his life, even after he was given the great promise from God that ‘he would become the father of many nations,’ Abraham always traveled with a security blanket, so to speak. When he was called to leave his homeland, he took his nephew Lot with him. When he visited Egypt, he sold his wife out to the pharaoh, so that he would not become jealous of Abraham. He protects his son Ishmael (through the harlot Hagar) when his wife Sarah tries to send him away, because she knew that as long as Ishmael was with Abraham, Abraham would not fully trust.
All through this process, God is working on Abraham, trying to increase his faith, so that finally God is able to grant that deep desire of Abraham’s heart: once that heart is fully purified, God grants that Isaac may be born. The promise made many, many years ago is finally starting to be fulfilled. Abraham’s faith is now true, and centered on nothing else. What becomes remarkable at this stage is that he is no longer holding on to some type of security blanket, but is ready and willing to give back to God the great gift that God has given to him in his son. What a beautiful testimony!
But there is an even deeper level than this. Whenever we read the Old Testament as Catholics, we always read it through the lens of Christ, typology is inescapable.
Here, in the passage that was trimmed from the pericope that we have heard is how Isaac carried the wood of his own impending sacrifice up the hill to the place of Sacrifice. This immediately brings to mind Jesus carrying his cross up the Hill of Calvary. The Church Fathers richly developed this theme and expounded upon it in the years after Jesus life, death and resurrection.
But there is even something more that is here in this passage that has another impact for the Christian believer. Ancient Jews, even up to the very day of Christ were very aware of where Mt. Moriah was. They knew what happened on that mountain, for it was known in their day as Temple Mount. This is the last part of the Holy Land that was conquered by the people, this was the mountain that as David brought up the Ark of the Covenant, he danced before it naked in jubilation. Finally, this holy site from the deep recesses of the past was part of the patrimony of the Jews. It was on this mountain that Solomon built the first Temple, the Western Wall still stands today (of the later Temple.)
Jewish Christians at the time of Jesus and the Apostles would have been very aware of these connections, and it would have confirmed the truth of who and what Jesus truly was.
But there is even more! In the comparison between the Sacrifice of Isaac and the future Sacrifice of Christ, we see how the New Covenant completed and replaced the Old Covenant, for the New took it to a deeper degree.
The Sacrifice of Isaac is not only a foreshadow of Christ’s Sacrifice, but it is also a foreshadow of the Old Covenant Sacrifice, which was imperfect. Abraham wanted to give the greatest gift he had been given (Isaac) by God back to God, but was prevented by God’s own hand. Instead, Abraham offers a propitiatory sacrifice, a sacrifice of the ram caught in the thicket as a replacement for his very own son. In the Old Covenant begun under Aaron and Moses, the priest had to do the same thing. He had to first offer, on the Day of Atonement, a propitiatory sacrifice of a bull, in place of himself, because he could not offer himself.
In the New Covenant, the Sacrifice is no longer of one offering another, it is now Christ offering Himself. This makes all of the difference! By giving Himself, He is able to overcome the weaknesses of the Old Covenant and establish an unbreakable bond between the human race and God. All things become new in Christ! The limitations and weaknesses of the old are completed and renewed in Christ. This is what we are preparing to enter anew at Easter.
Therefore, as we continue our journey through Lent, what we see in the example of Abraham and of Christ is that it is not enough to offer God just the leftovers, what remains after we have taken care of ourselves. Rather, let us throw off the security blankets that we have accumulated around us and offer back to God the most precious gift that He has bestowed upon us: our very gift of self as an offering back to God, in the model and mode of Christ, that He may do as He wishes with our lives and build and establish His Kingdom through us.
Priest recruitment was a priority for you in Duluth, where the number of seminarians tripled on your watch. Will it be a priority here?
"I don't think the Archdiocese of Cincinnati is an exception. It's a very important concern for the church. There are many good programs in the archdiocese that relate to vocations (priest recruitment), but there are places we could have a little bit better approach."
Will you be actively involved in priest recruitment?
"I think it's very important for the archbishop to express an interest in the seminarians. The renewal I experienced from the seminarians in Duluth was nothing less than inspiring."
Why have some Catholics, especially young Catholics, drifted away from the church and from regularly attending Mass?
"What we are experiencing is in part due to the real confusion that followed the Second Vatican Council (a series of reforms in the 1960s). We didn't explain the changes that were taking place, so people became very confused. Because of that confusion, a lot of our Catholics, you might say, threw the baby out with the bath water."
What can you do to bring them back?
"You hear people say we have to establish a culture of vocations, and I agree with that ... The whole idea of God calling can't just be limited to the priesthood. Every single person has a vocation. Everyone has been called to a purpose. One of the most important questions we have to answer in our lives is, 'What has God called me to do?' Until you raise the question - Why did God create me? - there is no understanding and you're not going to pursue that purpose."
Mike Aquilina, patristic scholar in his own right (and author of a fantastic book i was recently given by a friend on ancient signs and symbols) interviews sociologist Rodney Stark on the rise of the Early Church from a sociological point of view. He makes some interesting claims, some of which follow. Read the entire interview here.
I sometimes get asked why I am fascinated with the Early Church. The simple answer is that I feel we are re-entering a period very similar to what happened then, with respect to Church-State relations. The more we know of how the Early Church dealt with the adversity faced, the better we can face the similar adversity.
You say that Christianity succeeded in part because of its high moral standards. Today, however, many churches are lowering the bar to make religion more popular. How would you analyze their efforts?
RS: They're death wishes. People value religion on the basis of cost, and they don't value the cheapest ones the most. Religions that ask nothing get nothing. You've got a choice: you can be a church or a country club. If you're going to be a church, you'd better offer religion on Sunday. If you're not, you'd better build a golf course, because you're not going to get away with being a country club with no golf course. That's what happened to the Episcopalians, Methodists, Congregationalists, Unitarians and, indeed, to some sectors of Catholicism.
Are Christians waking up to that?
RS: Most denominations are tightening up, and the reason is they're running out of members. The young clergy have religious motives that their elders didn't necessarily share. It was a much better job forty years ago. If you look at Catholic religious orders, you'll find that some are recovering and some new ones are growing. The only ones growing are those that have joint living arrangements instead of everybody living out on their own; that have organized worship; and that have some distinctive dress, so you can recognize them on the street as not just your average social worker or schoolteacher. That's a QED. If religion gets too cheap, nobody pays the price.
Here's an example: Do you really need to have hamburgers on Friday? Getting rid of meatless Fridays was a dreadful error the Church made. When I was a kid -- in a town that was 40 percent Catholic and 60 percent Protestant -- meatless Friday was an enormously important cultural marker. Every Friday reminded you who was like you and who wasn't like you -- and it did this in a way that wasn't harmful to either side.
Our high-school football games were always played on Friday nights. After the game, you took your girlfriend to the drive-in restaurant. And, around midnight, you could hear the Catholic kids count down to twelve and then shout, "Hamburger!" And everybody would laugh. It was a little social ritual that left Catholics with an enormous sense of solidarity. We thought hamburgers were the big denominational difference.
What do you make of the current pope?
RS: Here's someone who knows what it was like for the first Christians -- who knows what it is to fight for his Church's life. If an Italian bishop wants to know how many Catholics are in his diocese, he looks in the census books for the number of people who live nearby. A bishop in Communist Poland knew that the census and the number of Catholics were not the same number, and that it's important to get yourself some Catholics if you want to have a Church. Whether you agree with him or you don't, it's very clear this pope is a holy man, that he's on a mission.
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