Answer Me

Homily, Ordinary Time Sunday 27A

God wants to see us bear good fruit, not for any profit of His own. He is God. He needs nothing. In Himself, He possesses everything. God wants to see us bear good fruit, only for our own advantage. Because He loves us as His own dear children, He wants to see us grow to be strong and mature. To be able to love even as He loves, unconditionally and without limits. To be able to respond in kind to the love that He has shown for us. 

I’ve always been struck by how disproportionate our response to God tends to be. In my own life, being blessed by God with such great parents, such a great family, such great examples of virtue, with a great education and natural abilities, so many advantages that most other people in the world and throughout history were never given, and what sort of response have I been able to give God for His countless blessings to me? I’m still so attached to my own sins, to my own comfort, to my own laziness and pride. As a priest, I am called to do penance and make sacrifices on behalf of all God’s People, especially for those who come to me for the Sacrament of Confession, but I have hardly even begun to do penance for my own sins. 

The vineyard that bears sour grapes, the tenants that reject and kill the prophets, these are not just God’s People in the past. We are the ones, today, that “crucify the Son of God again, to [our] own harm, and hold Him up to contempt,” by our continued sin and rebellion against God, by our lack of response to God’s infinite love (Hebrews 6:6). 

At the noon Mass this past Friday, I shared what are known as the Reproaches of Good Friday, but quite a few people told me afterwards that they had never heard them before. The Reproaches are meant to be sung during the Adoration of the Cross on Good Friday. As I was growing up, I was familiar with them as part of a couple versions of the Stations of the Cross. They have always been a rich source of prayer and meditation in my own spiritual life, so we’ll end our reflections today with these Reproaches, but I’d encourage each one of us to spend some time in the days ahead thinking more specifically, what are the particular gifts and blessings that God has poured out upon my own life, and how is He calling me to respond?

My People, what have I done to you? 
Or in what have I offended you? Answer Me!
What more should I have done, and did not do?

I scourged Egypt for your sake with its firstborn sons,
and you scourged me and handed me over.

I led you out from Egypt as Pharoah lay sunk in the Red Sea,
and you handed me over to the chief priests.

I opened up the Red Sea before you,
and you opened my side with a lance.

I led you out in a pillar of cloud,
and you led me into Pilate’s palace.

I rained down manna upon you to sustain you in the desert,
and upon me you rained blows and lashes.

I gave you saving water from the rock to drink,
and for drink you gave me gall and vinegar.

I struck down for you the kings of the Canaanites,
and you struck my head with a reed.

I placed in your hand a royal scepter,
and you placed on my head a crown of thorns.

I exalted you with great power,
and you hung me on the scaffold of the Cross.

My People, what have I done to you?
Or in what have I offended you? Answer Me!

In this, and at every Mass, I give you everything. I give you My Body and Blood, My Soul and My Divinity. I give you My entire Self, holding nothing back. What more should I have done, and did not do?

My People, what have I done to you?
Or in what have I offended you? Answer Me!