HOMILY WEEK 13 01 – Year II
Gratefully Going the Right Way –
Optional Memorial of St. Cyril of Alexandria
(Amos 2:6-16; Ps 50; Mt 8:18-22)
********************************************
At a first glance, the readings for today’s liturgy seemed to be a difficult read, with a focus on lots of injustice and sin in the first, and Jesus putting off people in the gospel.
However, the last stanza of Psalm 50 provides a powerful message: “Those who bring thanksgiving as their sacrifice honour me; to those who go the right way I will show the salvation of God.” In other words, we are to be grateful and do God’s will.
Gratitude is a basic Christian virtue. A monk on a television show one day made a statement that stayed with me ever since: “A grateful person is a happy person.” It is almost impossible to be unhappy when we are grateful. I believe it was Karl Rahner who said if at the end of our lives all we could pray is three words – “Thank you, thank you, thank you,” that would be enough. Jesuit Father Matthew Linn during his retreats encourages participants to end their day with a litany of blessings of that day.
I remember during a silent directed retreat one year, finding myself thanking God for everything that did not work out in my life. A bit surprised at this, I checked with my spiritual director, who told me it seemed my healing had come full circle. That ties in with the second half of life teaching about being more flexible, mellow, open, and able to see and think in a both/and, win/win manner.
An exercise we could do might be to do a litany of the blessings that have come our way in life, and to thank God for each one. That would be a wonderful way to live out this first reading.
The second part of that message from the psalm is to “Go the right way” and we will be given the salvation of God. To “go the right way” surely means to do that will of God. It is safe to say that will of God includes especially living the Beatitudes and keeping the commandments Jesus gave us.
The Beatitudes are really the Magna Carta of Jesus’ teachings – a summation of how we are to live within the Kingdom of God. They are Kingdom attitudes or ways of being in this world. To be poor in spirit, gentle, compassionate, single-minded, just, peaceful, forgiving those who hurt us – is to be Christ-like and doing his will.
The Returning to Spirit program speaks of our “Way of Being.” That is our habitual way of thinking, feeling and acting in this world – how we operate and carry ourselves day by day. That can be positive or negative. I was in that formation, and was struggling to find my way of being, until a liturgy where a brother Oblate introduced me with these words, “We Oblates call him Mr. Fix-it.” I was shocked, but quickly became grateful, because he had just identified my “way of being” for me! It wasn’t a positive one, but it was true – that was how I was carrying out my ministry, and it wasn’t working. What I appreciated was being aware of it now, and the opportunity to deal with it, heal it, let it go and grow into a more accepting way of being that would be more along the line of the Beatitudes.
Turning to “going the right way,” the commandments Jesus gave us certainly reflect his will: to love God with our whole being through prayer and worship; to love and care for all others in our lives; to accept ourselves as we are, to love one another the way Jesus loved us, and finally, to love those who hurt us by forgiving them from the heart – is certainly to do the will of God.
Perhaps one exercise we can do to practice loving ourselves is writing out all the things we like about ourselves, believing what we wrote, and thanking God for all those qualities given to us by God.
One parish secretary shared with me how her former pastor always took her for granted and rarely if ever, thanked her for her work. Her new pastor was just the opposite, often commenting on her work and thanking her for all she was doing. That made such a difference in her life – just to be thanked and appreciated for who she was and her work gave her new energy and love for her work.
Today, we are given the option of honoring St. Cyril of Alexandria, who spent his life doing God’s will. Cyril was a patriarch of the Eastern Church and a Greek theologian. In 412, he succeeded his uncle as archbishop of Alexandria and used his power and wealth to champion his cause – the defence of the doctrines of the Church. At the Council of Ephesus in 431 in great Christological controversy against Nestorius, Cyril held that the relationship between the divine and human in Christ was so closely united that the Virgin was actually Theotokos (Mother of God). This controversy engaged Cyril until his death in 444. In 1882, he was declared a doctor of the Church.
The word “Eucharist” is a transliteration of the Greek word eucharistia, which is itself a translation of the Hebrew word berekah. All three words have the meaning of thanksgiving, or praise for the wonderful works of God. So, as we celebrate, we are giving thanks to God. To do so is certainly God’s will. Ron Roheiser OMI points out the Eucharist is our “one great act of fidelity” because apart from all the mistakes of the Church over the ages, we have been faithfully celebrating the Eucharist ever since Jesus told us to “do this in memory of me.”
So, may our celebration empower us to strive to be grateful persons and do God’s will, and in that way honour God and experience God’s salvation.
